Challenging Children's Books for Advanced Readers

The Dead I Know

Scot Gardner (author)

Allen & Unwin, Australia: May 2011; 208pp

ISBN: 9781742373843 

Genres: crime, drama, realistic fiction

Issues: crime, death, identity, mental health

Aaron Rowe walks in his sleep, sometimes as far as 5km. He is beset by the same nightmare, over and over again. He lives in a caravan park with Mam Rowe and he's just begun his training as a funeral director. Aaron is not your average school leaver.

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Laughter for Beginners

Colin Thompson (author)

Sceptre, Hodder Headline, Australia: 2002; 298pp

ISBN: 0733614388

Genres: autobiography, realistic fiction

Issues: depression, identity, mental health

'This is sanity gone mad. We are applying to join a lunatic asylum. A girl two seats down is weeping but we all pretend she isn't. That's what you do. In an office by the entrance two people are having a normal conversation. I assume it's normal – family problems, shopping, dinner and unpaid bills. I've never had a conversation like that but I know a lot of people who have.' (p4)

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Now We Are Sixty

Christopher Matthew (author)

David Eccles (illustrator)

John Murray, UK: 1999; 111pp

ISBN: 0719559790

Genres: humour, poetry

Issues: aging

'When I was One/ The War had begun,/ When I was Ten/ It was wartime again./ When I was Twenty/ I thought I knew plenty./ When I was Thirty/ I liked to be flirty./ When I was Forty/ I got rather sporty./ When I was Fifty/ I turned very thrifty./ But now that I'm Sixty, I've got to confess/ That more often than not, I couldn't care less.'

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Empyrion

Stephen Lawhead (author)

Lion, UK: 1990; 899pp

ISBN: 0745918727

Genres: adventure, fantasy, science fiction

Issues: cultural differences, war

Orion Treet has been offered an immense fortune to visit and write a report on the new colony of Empyrion, ten light-years from Earth. Given little time to think, although curious as to why the powerful Cynetics Chairman Neviss has gone to such trouble to track him down, Treet becomes space-bound with an odd assortment of companions. On his arrival he finds that the colony appears to be located on a beautiful Terra-type world – but there are certain anomalies relating to its age, level of development and the complicated society that has developed.

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The Sparrow

Mary Doria Russell (author)

Black Swan Books, UK: 1997; 504pp

ISBN: 0552997773

Genres: science fiction

Issues: abuse, communication, cultural differences, friendship, grief/loss, identity, religion

advanced concepts

Winner of the 1998 Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction.

Humankind discovers they are not alone in the galaxy when some astonishing music is intercepted by a radio telescope. While the UN debates about who to send as envoy, the Society of Jesus has already pulled together a group to send on a mission from God – to learn about this new species and understand their relationship with the world around them, their beliefs about their existence. Thus a handful of disparate and highly complex individuals are thrown into a completely alien society.

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The Surgeon of Crowthorne

Simon Winchester (author)

Penguin Books, UK: 1998; 207pp

ISBN: 0140271287

Genres: autobiography, English, History, realistic fiction

Issues: communication,friendship, giftedness

advanced vocabulary

Have you ever thought about how that dictionary – the one that sits on your desk and that you take so much for granted – how that exceptionally useful volume came into being? Have you ever considered where the boundaries of the English language lie? For those who have brought their minds to bear on these chicken and egg type questions and to encourage those who haven't, Simon Winchester has brought to life the men who
spent lifetimes gathering, collating and organising the vast compendium that has become the definitive reference for all users of English: The Complete Oxford English Dictionary.

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The Many-Coloured Land

Julian May (author)

Pan Books, UK: 1982; 411pp

ISBN: 033026656X

Genres: science fiction

Issues: cultural differences, sexuality

advanced concepts

The first in the Saga of the Exiles series, The Many-Coloured Land is the beginning of a narrative that bridges two periods in time and two very different cultures. What had been an archeological curiosity during a scientist's lifetime – a machine that brought to the 22nd century lifeforms of the Pliocene Epoch – becomes, after his death, an escape for every kind of misfit.

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Xenocide

Orson Scott Card (author)

Legend Press, UK: 1991; 463pp

ISBN: 0712647740

Genres: science fiction

Issues: cultural differences, family, friendship, power, war

advanced concepts

Valentine has arrived on Lusitania to find that not only does the planet face the oncoming Congressional fleet with its destructive capacity, but there is a significant likelihood that the descolada virus will be taken off-planet to devestate other worlds inhabited by humans. In order to save all three species – the humans, the pequinnos and the buggers, Ender and Novinha's family must find a way to disable the virus.

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Speaker for the Dead

Orson Scott Card (author)

Legend Books, UK: 1992; 415pp

ISBN: 0099503204

Genres: science fiction

Issues: cultural differences, family, friendship, racism

advanced concepts

Three thousand years have passed since the young boy, Ender, managed to kill off an entire race of sentient beings by playing a computer game. His constant travels between the stars have kept him young while the worlds and societies around him age and change. In those millenia his name has become synonymous with destruction and he conceals himself behind a new role, that of Speaker for the Dead, humanist priest who reveals the truth, however unpalatable, to those who seek it.

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Cold Comfort Farm

Stella Gibbons (author)

Penguin Books, UK: 1994; 233pp

ISBN: 014018869X

Genres: classic, humour, realistic fiction

Issues: family, identity, relationships

advanced concepts

Flora Poste has just been orphaned by the parents she hardly knew. Expensively, athletically and lengthily educated, Flora finds herself with blessed with the sum of one hundred pounds a year and no property.Knowing very well that this is not nearly enough to allow her to live in London, she appeals to various eccentric relatives and eventually moves to Cold Comfort Farm.

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