Last Friday, GeekDad published 67 Books Every Geek Should Read to Their Kids Before Age 10. Consider it the geek section of your own virtual library. The idea was to let GeekDad writers suggest their favorite books to read to their children, and create a list of staff picks for you to use when looking for something to read together.
For me, the comment stream became the most enjoyable part of the whole post. It was like a trip down memory lane! Great suggestion after great suggestion. Frankly, it was too juicy of a peach not to highlight somehow. So here without further ado are your additions to the Books Every Geek Should Read to Their Kids Before Age 10. (The books are grouped in a few pages, categorized by the readers who recommended them.)
Anne commented, “Only two multicultural books on this entire list, one of which ( Rikki Tikki Tembo) is horribly stereotypical of Chinese people. Come on, surely you can do better than this.” Frankly, I agreed. In our defense, I will say we had no intention of creating a comprehensive list of books, just like a staff picks wall at a library is not a comprehensive look at any genre of literature. I asked Anne what books she would include to improve the diversity of our list. The text below the gallery are Anne’s own words from our first post.
Anne also suggested that readers look for books written by Pam Munoz Ryan, Rita Williams-Garcia, Cynthia Leitich Smith (the children’s books), and Yoshiko Uchida. For kids over the age of 10 she suggested authors: Sherman Alexie, Walter Dean Myers, Sandra Cisneros (especially The House on Mango Street), and Laurie M. Carlson.
Gumnos, Sean Kelly, Betsy Nolan and David Gleason-Rohrer each gave us nice meaty reviews…
and Ken Leonard and his wife gave us a whole page by themselves.
Both Peter Simpson and Kathryninla recommended Swallows and Amazons, among others.
Readers questioned the absence of four prominent series. We responded to some of them. You can find our answers in the original thread.
QuinnTheEskimo took me back to my childhood with his suggestions of two books by Virginia Lee Burton. Csanad Novak did the same with his recommendation of Saint-Exupery’s classic, and Frank Light reminded me that I had missed my all time favorite book about rabbits.
Many others added their great suggestions as well.
So there you have it. Between the two lists, you have enough geeky material to last you from ages 0 to 10 (and beyond). Happy reading!
