Our boy went through a year of not reading much when he was 8. He’d become bored of the junior non-fiction on offer, and despite his teachers trying to encourage him to try fiction, it just wasn’t his thing at the time. The last post I did was 2 years ago.
This past year everything’s changed again, and it’s back to nightly reading in bed – and we’ve again found ourselves telling him multiple times to put the book down and go to sleep. And… I’m pleased to report this year he’s finally found a taste for fiction!
1. Goldfish Boy by Lisa Thompson
“This is fiction, but it’s like non-fiction. Because it could be a true story”. This was his summary of Goldfish Boy, which was the first non-fiction novel he finished cover-to-cover. He was so absorbed, he finished it in just a couple of nights.
It’s about a boy who lives his entire life inside, and from the clues he observes by looking through the window, he goes on the journey to solve a neighbourhood crime. The 9 year old was gasping, sighing and cheering out loud as he turned the pages and tried to solve the mystery himself.
2. Double Helix Magazine by CSIRO Australia
A Christmas present from my mum, this magazine subscription has been perfect for our fact-loving boy. Every 6 weeks an issue arrives and he rips open the plastic and heads straight for the puzzles and jokes section. Then over a couple of nights he reads through every article, calling out random facts to anyone who listens – ‘Mummy! Daddy! Did you know that octopuses have three hearts and blue blood and their arms have brains?!’
3. Diary of a Wimpy Kid – The Meltdown (Book 13) by Jeff Kinney
The boy went through a month there were all he read was Diary of a Wimpy Kid books. He borrowed all books from the series from his school library and the local library, and read on average a book a night (luckily he’s not cursed with being a slow reader like I am).
The Wimpy Kid books are about Greg and his challenges at school and at home, with comical drawings and easy-to-follow stories. Our 9 year old spread out the books over his bedroom floor so he could see them all, then he’d randomly pick one each night. Once he’d read each about 5 times over, he was finally satisfied and moved onto something new.
4. The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World – Eleventh Edition
Maps, maps, maps. Our boy loves his maps. He currently has two world maps stuck to his bedroom walls, he goes nowhere in the car without a street directory on his lap, Google Maps is his favourite thing on the internet, and he’s studied every page of The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World.
When Wordle’s geographical cousin Worldle came out, the 9 year old played it every morning. And he was incredibly good at it – not only guessing the most obscure countries, but picking their capital, flag, currency and population to the nearest 10,000 at the same time. His little head is filled with so much knowledge about the world it blows me away.
5. Sarah’s Nest by Harry Gilbert (1985)
This book was such an important part of my childhood and I must have read it 50 times. On a rainy night, Sarah falls into a canal and goes into a coma, but when she awakes she is no longer human, she’s an ant. She learns the way of the nest, and of course, learns about herself in the process.
Ants were always a big part of my upbringing – my dad had a special interest and I’d often help him dig up nests in search of the queen and to understand how they lived. Just like Sarah’s, my parents were also going through a divorce. A book about turning into an ant felt strangely comforting at the time, as if it was written just for me.
When I found this book and gave it to our son, I knew he’d love it. And he did.
6. Sydney and Blue Mountains Street Directory by UBD Gregory’s
Back when he was 6, we bought our son a Newcastle Street Directory to use in the car while we were driving around town. But whenever we went to Sydney the ‘limit of maps’ disappointed him greatly, so this book was an easy match for him.
Driving to Sydney brings so much excitement to our boy. There’s something about the big buildings, complicated road networks, trains, buses and trams that he just loves (all the exact things that make me dislike Sydney!) and for a wanna-be civil engineer there are multitudes of sights to amaze him as he stares out the window – or down at the street directory on his lap.
7. New Scientist Magazine
New Scientist magazine is my own magazine subscription, but I find I’m constantly sharing things with the boy that I know will interest him. Sometimes we do the crossword together, and we went through a phase where each weekend we’d do the brain teaser quiz together and eagerly await the next week’s issue to see if we got it right.
A few times when he’s been staggering around saying he’s bored and got nothing to read, I’d throw him one of the magazines. Then I wouldn’t hear a peep for at least an hour.
8. Runt by Craig Silvey
A recommendation from a mum at the boy’s school, Runt is certainly not a book I would have picked off the shelf based on its cover. Even after I’d ordered it at the library and brought it home, it took the boy a good three weeks of coaxing before he even considered it. But as soon as he read that first page he was hooked.
I think it’s about a girl and her dog, but I couldn’t tell you much more than that. Except that when the boy finished it after just three nights, he put the book down and sighed, ‘I think that was the best book I’ve ever read.’
9. Origami Animals by Hinkler
So not technically a book, but absolutely something that kept him entertained night after night for a while there. His brain is wired for turning visual instructions into 3D models – lego, Meccano, puzzles… and origami. Paper folding relaxes him too, especially if he’s feeling a bit worked up, and I often look into his room to see him sitting on the floor in ‘the zone’ amongst a sea of colourful paper shapes.
10. A Different Sort of Normal by Abigail Balfe
This book jumped out at me at the library, so I threw it in the bag with the others and didn’t think much more of it. It’s a book about a girl’s journey of discovering she has autism. It’s her personal story, but is also filled with facts and examples of experiences that many autistic people may have. Best of all – as the cover indicates – it both normalises autism, and celebrates it.
We had never used the word ‘autism’ around our boy, and we haven’t had a reason to date to seek a formal diagnosis. But we’ve had our suspicions. I was delighted when our son read this one cover to cover, then walked in to my room and said, ‘Mummy, that was a really good book. And I think I might have autism.’
The kid makes me so proud every single day, and I’m looking forward to seeing what amazing impact he has on this world.
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Jessie Ansons 