Suggestions for books to read aloud to ds, 14 and dd,9

[lainiekazan]

I have got out of the habit of this due to dog bursting onto the scene, but would like to start again in the summer hold.

Last year the dcs enjoyed Animal Farm, My Family and other Animals, and The Swiss Family Robinson among others.

now my mind's gone blank. Any ideas for books which work for both age groups? No rude bits (ds undergoing agonies of teenage embarrassment at the moment) but nothing else off-limits!

Treasure Island?

I still read to 11 y/o dd (and DH) sometimes. I would think all the things we've read over the last year or so would be fine for both a 9 y/o and a 14 y/o,

• Three Men in a Boat and then the sequel Three Men on the Bummel

- As the Falcon Her Bells (autobiography of a falconer, lots about the birds then some amusing bits about his life, though not as funny as My Family & Other Animals)

• The Gerald Durrell where he goes off as a teenager to work in a zoo, sorry can't recall the name of it
• The Shining Levels (chap goes and lives in a hut in the lake district, amongst other things he adopts an orphaned fawn)
• A London Child of the 1870s by Molly Hughes (really good read, her family sounds lovely! We also then read A London Girl of the 1880s but beware of A London Home of the 1890s because her baby dies and it is heartwrendingly sad :( )

Fly by Night by Frances Hardinge and its sequel Twilight Robbery by Frances Hardinge - different in that they are fiction, but they are fabulous to read aloud because of the writing.

I've got lined up to read next Letters from Skokholm which are all about the author's life on the island in the 1920s & the wildlife.

I had thought of hunting down The Swiss Family Robinson, does it still read well? Can only think of the 70s TV programme!

Beasts in My Belfry is the Gerald Durrell one where he works in Whipsnade. Or what about one of the Corfu sequels e.g. Garden of the Gods?

Or, in a different vein, Lord of the Flies?

Thanks. Read Three Men in a Boat. I was chortling away but ds was completely po faced and said the bloke's anecdotes were getting on his nerves

The Gerald Durrell one in Whipsnade I might try.

The Hobbit
Jane Eyre
Sherlock Holmes
Children of the New Forest
The Little White Horse

What about Brendon Chase by "B.B"?