Books to read to a very bright 11 year old

[Kuriusoranj]

My oldest child is a super bright just-turning 11 year old, reading age of 15 and a great vocabulary. She reads All. The. Time. We are holding on to our tradition of reading to/with her - it's just such a lovely thing to share at the end of each day, for as long as she still enjoys it. However, we're struggling for some new material, so I'd love some suggestions.

Things she has read alone:

• Rick Riordan in all forms, she loves the bones of him
• The Martian - loved it
• Incorrigible Children series
• Artemis Fowl - didn't like it
• Agatha Christie - she loves them
• The Maze Runner series

Things we have read with her recently:

• HP, just finished book 7
• Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
• The Golden Compass
• Before that, we did a bunch of classics - Alice in Wonderland, The Secret Garden and so on

We've been trying The Hunger Games but she's struggling to get engaged and wants to read it herself instead. We're all wondering if it's because it's written in the 1st person, but that's only a theory.

We have a general low-censorship policy. The books she's choosing for herself tend to be YA ghost stories/junior horror and so on - she's developing quite a taste for the creepy! By her age I was deep into James Herbert and Stephen King, but she's not there yet. On the other hand, that's not the sort of thing that we want to read to her - she finds it easier to manage her reactions if she reads stuff herself.

Googling brings up lots of suggestions for 11 year olds to read, but not so many for books to read to them. I'm thinking maybe Lord of the Flies next. I'm particularly interested in any suggestions for classics that might be entertaining to read aloud - maybe Jane Eyre? Pride and Prejudice?

Any suggestions. literary mumsnetters? Anyone else faced the same situation?

place marking

Some Daphne du Maurier - Rebecca or My Cousin Rachel.

Great stories with the creepy element you say she likes. I first read Rebecca when I was about 10 or 11 and absolutely loved it.

Also, I Capture the Castle or some Nancy Mitford (The Pursuit of Love).
Just right for that pre-teen stage, and all still some of my favourite books now.

I wanted to say thank you again to everyone who made suggestions. I've assembled a huge list and we will work through the ones we both fancy, at least until she decides she's too cool to be in the same room as me anymore :).

If anyone is curious, we are currently reading Robert Graves' I, Claudius, of all things. She's a big Roman/Greek history buff and she's loving it. It took me a couple of chapters to get into the rhythm - I loved reading both books myself, but I'm not convinced they were written to be read aloud! He's the king of multi-clause, complex sentences and it's been 30 years since I studied Latin. We're both enjoying the story though.

I'm going to try some these with my DS who's just turned 12 all he wants to read are GCSE physics books because he loves physics, books on elements from the periodic table, Pokemon books, retro comics he chooses every week from a comic book shop and whatever he is given to read from school.
He really loved reading Wonder a couple of years ago so I recommend that.

Seconding Susan Cooper, Diana Wynne Jones, Lucy M Boston, Michelle Magorian, Madeleine L'Engle. What about Judy Blume (not Forever but some of her other age-appropriate ones?) Yes too to Anne of Green Gables & the Emily series; Louisa Alcott if she hasn't already read Little Women; the Little House on the Prairie series (these go all the way up to Laura's adulthood but are still age-appropriate for 11). And of course CS Lewis. What about Tamora Pierce's Alanna series (though there's a bit of mild love and sex in those, not explicit though)? Alan Garner? Though there are some works by these authors that might scare even a bright 11-year old - The Owl Service for example - and might be better off for 13 or so upwards.

Do you know, I probably would leave the GCSE classics and the Hunger Games and so on for a couple of years. There are such wonderful books for bright kids aged around 11-ish - all of the above authors I mention are amazing - and your DD could spend a couple of years or so exhausting them before being ready to tackle Jane Eyre etc. I read a lot of classics very young (Dickens, Bronte, Austen etc.) and there were lots of things I didn't quite get about it all. Didn't harm me in the end (I have three degrees in comparative literature ), but I just wouldn't be so quick to leave some of the amazing works that are explicitly written for bright, imaginative children of just your DD's age. There is a really rich vein of classic British literature from the 70s-90s for kids of 11-13 (Susan Cooper and Diana Wynne Jones being some of the best), as well as a lot of new talent writing for that age group at the moment. Will, the main character in the Dark is Rising books by Susan Cooper, is 11 when the series starts, just for that reason - it's a special kind of age on the borderline between child and teenage/adult interests, and rather than pushing your DD towards adult classics or recent teen/YA lit, I'd find better, more imaginative books for her age group first. Good luck!

Oh and if she likes Graves, try Wodehouse? I remember enjoying the Jeeves books around that age, precisely because they are not too "adult" but they're still funny and clever. Yes too to Conan Doyle because the date and the format means the Holmes stories are good for pre-teens.

Terry Pratchett I mostly enjoyed a bit later, say around 14-15, once I had read enough other stuff to appreciate all the references and what he's parodying. I read Douglas Adams about 10-ish and found it hilarious, but I think Pratchett's humour is somehow a bit more complex and less clearly anarchic and fantastical.

I loved the James Herriott books at that age, and Catherine Cookson.

I started readimg Pratchettbat around 12 1/2 and fell in love with the world. I agree with P.G Wodehouse and the idea of reading plays aloud. I ised to love it when we did this in school with Shakespeare...it brought the plays alive in a way that just reading them myself never has.

What about Geral Durrell, particularly the ones about his childhood in Corfu. Loved them at that age, and was also very keen on Dick Francis probably due to DF's books being closer than the library though some of those had slightly gruesome bits. Also enjoyed LIllian Beckwith - life in the Hebrides or similar.

Hi,
(by the way i am not a mum, i am just bored)
I just read your post and I am 11 years old myself and i love to read, I have read books like, harry Potter series , the hunger games trilogy, the divergent Trilogy, the hobbit, I am Malala, Noughts and crosses an i am in the middle of read he lord of the rings. I would say your daughters reading habits are normal as in my class the kids have read these books, the ones that you have said and many more. I am reading at the same level as them, maybe slower by a bit. I think it is just that now school really pressure their students to read alot. in magority of my lesson we have to read at the begining, in english even taking up to half an hour. So i think she is just working at an quicker speed then most kids but there are still many like her.

DD1 (nearly 12 ) sounds very similar and I still read to her, we both enjoy it so why stop? (I bet she won't admit to it to her friends though).

Recently she has enjoyed ..
The Book Thief (Marcus Zuzak) - be warned I could barely read at the end we were both blubbing so much
The Curious Incident of the Dog in The Night Time
The Hunger Games
Books by Ross Welford (e.g. what not to do if you turn invisible)
A Hat Full of Sky - Terry Pratchett
Holes (can't remember the author sorry)
To Be A Cat - Matt Haig

Also the HP play / film scripts for The Cursed Child and Fantastic Beasts

Personally I am keeping DD away from Jayne Eyre for now but only because I only recently read it myself and I thought it was amazing but I think I got more out of it by being older. Obviously if she wanted to read it I wouldn't stop her but I am not suggesting it.

James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small books.
Secret Diary of Adrian Mole books.
Wonder by RJ Palaccio
The Goldfish Boy by Lisa Thompson
Journey To Jo'Burg by Beverley Naidoo
Chrestomanci Chronicles by Diana Wynne Jones (I think there are seven of them altogether)
Journey To The River Sea by Eva Ibbotson

Princess Porcelaina!

Another vote for Oscar Wilde, and the Hans Christian Anderson fairy tales are beautiful to read aloud ... little match girl, the unabridged little mermaid, and so on.
And mythology- Greek, Norse, etc and tales of saints and legends

perhaps try some autobiographies or biographies. I got very into them at 12+. loads of really quite inspirational ones out there. if she likes scientists pick some female ones or something. there are a few I have seen recently about ladies who were at Bletchley Park in the war, Anne Frank's diary as already suggested. Books that WILL prompt a discussion if she likes that side of it. Or if she starts to say she would rather read on her own why don't you agree to read the same book one after the other and then discuss it, like your own book club? Personally I always hated Jane Eyre and Pride and Predjudice etc but that could have been because I read them first in English and we had to pull them apart which meant I really missed the actual story bit of them if that makes sense (had a very high reading and comprehension age but no interest in reading adult books)

I used to do some classics and some more modern,

Black beauty
Jane Eyre
Rebecca
Peter Pan
The cherub series
Secret garden
Little women
Diary of Anne Frank
Born free

Joan Aiken

I also read to my 11 year old. At the moment we are reading Ask Me No Questions by Ann Schlee.