Picture books for older boys?

[BoogleMcGroogle]

With a few exceptions ( The Faraway Tree, The Twits), my 7 years old is still struggling to enjoy chapter books, even when read to him ( he enjoys audio books in the car, so knows all the David Williams, Ronald Dahl books etc). He's a a super little reader, and will devour The Beano, but won't read a longer book for pleasure. Any ideas for more sophisticated ( funny, scary, thoughtful, anything really) picture books we can share together at bedtime?

How to train your dragon (and sequels).

Tin Tin or other comic type books

The Church Mice books are absolutely fabulous, pitched at 7 yrs plus in terms of humour (and funny for adults too), but definitely picture books.

The other obvious one is Asterix - again if he likes the Beano I would have thought the level would be good.

A bit longer, but still lots of pictures, and perfect humour for a 7 y/o is Captain Underpants.

I would recommend these comic strip books:
Captain underpants
Star Wars clone war comic books
Diary of a wimpy kid

The Tom Gates books are also good. Lots and lots of little pictures everywhere.

That said, if he’ll devour the beano, that’s great. You could branch out to other comics. I always recommend The Phoenix. It has single strips and also longer serialised ones so he can follow a story in chapters. You can buy volumes of some of the comics within it. DS2 adores Bunny v Monkey. Really adores it.

He might also enjoy some of the manga for younger kids (like the Pokémon manga, or the legend of Zelda manga), which has chapters. But just be careful to check suitability - lots of the series that are easily available are intended for teenagers and often feature things you might not be entirely happy about. There’s a lovely one called Yotsuba&.

Thanks so much for the suggestions, I'll definitely look those up and order a few at the library/Amazon. DD is a great reader of Manga for slightly older children, so hopefully the comic book ideas would be a nice first step for her brother too. We've just started Humphrey the Hamster this evening and he didn't seem too 'meh' about it, so I'm feeling hopeful!

We started listening to The Ice Monster in the car today which he's enjoying :)

Geronimo Stilton

I picked up a lovely hard cover version of Wind in the Willows which is full of wonderful pictures.

‘The 13 story tree house‘ series would be perfect for your DS. And I second ‘Diary of a wimpy kid’ and also the ‘Stick dog’ series.

My 7 yr old loves the Dog Man books, which are comics from the same writer as Captain Underpants.

He also has several very picture-heavy books that bridge the gap between picture books and chapter books, mostly comedies. 'Pugs of the Frozen North' is one that springs to mind - and 'My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish'.

I think there is a name for that genre of image-heavy comedic books for kids around 7/8 but I am not sure what it is!

Arthur and the Golden Rope (Brownstone's Mythical Collection)
& the one that comes after

Comic books - Amulet, Dragons Beware, 5 worlds, Zita spacegirl

I’m guessing the title is just poorly worded but obviously boys enjoy the same books as girls! I only mention it because I think sometimes people can be blinkered to all the options out there for reading because they’re thinking of boys’ books and girls’ books and inadvertently miss out on half the options. Do you get the chance to go to the library? I always found that helped with my two because they loved the feeling of choosing any books they wanted, and sometimes came back with things I would never have picked myself!