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[roisin]

Eoin Colfer: The Legend of Captain Crow's Teeth

It's not as good as Spud Murphy, but comes close, and certainly grips the reader and keeps their attention.

It is focused around ghosts and spooky happenings, so probably not suitable bedtime reading for sensitive little flowers.

But it's well-written, short (90 pp), plenty of b/w illustrations, but feels like a real book. Similar difficulty level to Spud Murphy. Ds2 (6) loved it. Ds1 hasn't read it yet, but I think he will enjoy it too.

I think it would be particularly good for 6-8 yr old boys, who are just starting to read 'real books' as opposed to reading scheme books, (especially ones with older brothers).

Thanks! Your recommendations are always good. DS2 is enjoying "Flat Stanley" right now, but he's not ready to read it independently.

DS1 is loving the Roddy Doyle Giggler books at the moment.

Since I've relaxed about 7 yr old DS1's reading, he's started reading much more on the sly. We are reading "A series of unfortunate events" to each other at night, but he doesn't want to read on.

After giving him carte blance to read Beanos etc he has finally moved on to reading the other library books I've casually left on his bedside table...

Oh thanks Singersgirl, that's a nice thing to say.

I casually leave books out for ds1 as well. It often works better than a direct recommendation.

Other things that I do to encourage my boys to read:

They watch Blue Peter and Newsround to see authors, and reviews of books. (Anthony Horowitz was very impressive today.)

I've checked out the publication dates for the next 6 months of books by their favourite authors, and in their favourite series. This is printed out and stuck on the wall, and they enjoy anticipating the arrival of new books.

Writing to authors, though we haven't done this for a long while.

DS2 is a still a bit hit and miss with his motivation to read. He enjoys reading nf books, but doesn't often really engage with stories. But tonight he read to me a couple of chapters of a new book, and then chose to read right to the end by himself, so I'm very pleased.

Thanks for the other ideas. Will have to try some of them. DS1 would enjoy writing to authors.

DS1 had letters from all the authors he wrote to. Dick King-Smith, Michael Morpurgo, and Caroline Lawrence come to mind, but there may be others!