Who the heck doesn’t love reading? Though I can take quite a few names of the people I know who don’t, I think most of the craze of booklovers surpasses the sourness of all the rest.
And here’s what the crazy thing is—I like children’s books more than I like YA. Like, no comparison. I think the books for tweens and older kids are just overall more amazing, and soothing, and wholesome than the cringey, soapy YA books I’ve read. (Not condemning YA authors, but children’s books writers rule the space, if you ask me!)
These are the book reviews of the 15 noteworthy, excellent books for tweens and older kids.
15 Amazing, Noteworthy Books for Tweens That I Read in My Teens
Do you ever have those moments when you’re just tired of all those adult problems and worries and you just want to be a kid again and not think about anything for some time?
I bet we all just wish to be kiddos again, not for our whole life, but temporarily, say, for a day or for an hour. We just want to feel young and childish. And what better way there is to feel like a child than to read children’s books?
These are the book reviews of the fifteen top-notch middle grade and children’s books that I’ve ever read, and now I’m going to share them with you so you can take a part in the happiness they spread too.
#1 The 1000-Year-Old Boy, by Ross Welford
When I read it, I fell in love with Ross Welford’s writing and the way he told stories.
In fact, I loved it so much that I got three other books I knew that had been written by him.
Alve Einarsson is immortal. He’s just eleven, and it seems like he won’t grow up to see his teenage years. He’s just stuck. This might be pretty depressing for anyone, but the good news is that Alve (a.k.a Alfie Monk) isn’t alone.
First he had his mum, then he had Aidan and Roxy, two kids of the neighborhood, who—though after some complications and confusions—do at last believe him when he says that he is immortal and a thousand-years-old already.
Told from the alternative point-of-views of Alfie and Aidan, the book follows them on their mission to find friendship, love and, of course a way for Alfie to stop the spell of immortality put on him, and start living his life like ordinary people do.
I found this book magical. It was truly stunning because of the beautiful and painful portrayal of the fierce agony of a child who’s immortal and who’s lost everything and everyone he’s ever loved. Living forever won’t help him with that.
He has to grow up and die like everyone around him does. Will he be able to find the answer?
#2 What Not to Do if You Turn Invisible, by Ross Welford
Just before she fell asleep, she could see herself. She was visible and she knew who she was.
Let’s face it, I’ve always been a fan of realistic novels, the ones that portray rich human relationships and diverse situations and conflicts. The concept of the main character turning invisible, was exciting surely, but didn’t really draw me in at first.
What could it actually be? Cliche, of course.
I wasn’t really thrilled to pick the book up, but then I couldn’t really put it down when I started reading Ross Welford’s writing once again.
Ethel (like, what a pretty name!) turned invisible after trying on some combination of medicines on the sunbed, the medicines that weren’t really tested before. Stupid, really, but bad choices make a good story.
And turns out that being invisible is pretty fun! She has her own share of laughs and jokes, and everything’s going pretty well, until she’s tired and wants to get back visible.
Rewind a bit—how exactly are you supposed to turn back visible again after experimenting on yourself? Ethel is battling this question and seems like her time is running out, when a new mystery enters the tale: a mystery of her birth, a secret that the adults hid from her.
What’s all this about? And lastly, does being invisible only mean not being able to see yourself in the mirror and having others not see you too? Or is it something more?
#3 Closer to Nowhere, by Ellen Hopkins
Beautifully written in verse, this book tells the story of Hannah, and how she got an annoying cousin brother, Cal, entering her peaceful life and single-child home, after the death of his mother.
Cal’s sad and lost, he has meltdowns and makes up fake ridiculous stories that “will be good practice for becoming a writer”.
But he also has a hard past, his mum’s no more and his dad’s supposedly not a good man. So his mum’s sister takes him in.
Hannah’s stoic and irritated. She wants to go to her dance rehearsals and is overly ambitious for her goals, but there’s this bitter feeling growing inside her when her mother lets Calvin get away with anything. And she’s sorry but she resents him.
He’s stealing in all her family time, he’s getting a place in her family that was reserved for her and her only. And everyone knows that these two aren’t coming together yet.
But the siblings’ bond is special. So of course, Ellen Hopkins does it full justification.
This book so truthfully displays the strong bond between Calvin and Hannah that I was delighted by how they at last got over all the hard feelings and found a common ground where they understood each other.
Calvin thought he was lost and couldn’t be found, and that Hannah’s family was only keeping him because they had no choice. He thought they wanted to get rid of him. He thought that no matter how much he walked towards that dream home of his, he was always closer to nowhere than he was to it.
But somewhere along the way, somewhere along the journey, both he and the readers will realize that it wasn’t true. And Calvin was now closer to his home than he was to nowhere.
Guess that’s a step forward.
#4 You Only Live Once, David Bravo, by Mark Oshiro
David is in a dilemma.
He’s adopted and there comes a stupid presentation in his class where he has to describe his family lineage. How can he explain that?
He’s got a complicated history, both his parents belonging to different cultures, and like, completely diverse places. He’s in for a challenge.
Still, like the courageous eleven-year-old he is, he gives it a try. But after the school presentation goes wrong in a humiliating way, and he gets sick for eating bad spinach in the school cafeteria, and he’s directly or indirectly the one responsible for his best friend spraining his ankle in a race, David is sure the day was awful and couldn’t get any worse.
That is, until he sees a dog that talks. Talk about weird.
The dog offers David a chance to redo one mistake in his life, one thing he regrets.
And so it begins.
Every time he tries to change one mistake, he ends up committing another. And the outcome never changes. Worsens, if anything.
What David doesn’t know is that the more he tries to find the perfect-something reality, the farther he’s going to get from it.
And when they try to redo one timeline, they couldn’t have guessed how bad it would actually get.
Now, everything is screwed.
David, no one knows the future! Everything is a guess! And if you keep living your life so frightened of what’s to come, you’re never going to choose anything!
Now they don’t have to just change the course of the future, they have to bring it back to the right path.
As the end drew closer, the anticipation grew, keeping me at the edge of my seat, guessing and then second-guessing myself about what might be the truth after all.
And when it finally came out in the end, it was definitely unexpected, but it all fit so perfectly together that I couldn’t help but laugh in surprise, scaring my family, and then keep on reading.
(No spoilers for you, though!)
#5 Finding Orion, by John David Anderson
Ms Bixby’s Last Day, also written by John David Anderson made me a real, die-hard fan of this author and his writing style.
And then this book came along in my To-Read list, and I have to say that none of my expectations were let down.
This book was straight up the point in all matters of family, love, loss and death.
Orion, the main character, is having a jelly bean, not jelly beans, a jelly bean for dinner when the doorbell rings. What comes in through the door is the whole next chapter of Orion and his family’s life, full of surprises and secrets and also a regretful history.
On top of it all, it comes disguised as a clown. A clown.
This clown delivers the news of Papa Kwirk (Orion’s grandfather) “kicking the can.”
Well, it comes suddenly and unexpectedly, that’s for sure.
The Kwirk family, thus, embarks on a journey to act according to Papa Kwirk’s will and search for his last remains, looking for different clues and coming to terms with different secrets they get to know in the way.
All throughout it, the author presents an amazing relationship between the characters, such that I feel like I always knew Papa Kwirk even though he’s not alive. There were some parts that I felt were greatly emotional and some which were amazing and humorous.
All in all, this is a great book to have in your hand when you want to laugh and cry and feel, all at the same time in one read.
#6 Ten Thousand Tries, by Amy MacKenzie
Has there ever been a more perfect book? Like, has there ever?
“You can overcome anything, if and only if you love something enough.”
That’s Golden for you. Soccer is why he’s living and breathing on earth.
With his mother being the coach, and his father having been a pro soccer player, Golden was obviously supposed to be fanatic for the sport too.
And he’s doing it all, thinking about getting a growth hormone prescription (Messi did it too!), putting in all his ten thousand hours to be the master, practicing hard to be his school team’s captain.
And nothing’s going right.
His father is sick with ALS and his mother can’t focus on his father and the soccer team and the kids all at once perfectly without messing up. But Golden is determined to not make any mistakes, and if there’s a little chance that his father will come out alive from this disease, Golden is hellbent to make sure he gets this chance.
He’s not going down without the ten thousand tries—at saving his dad, becoming the team captain, becoming the best soccer player he dreams to be.
He’s got his best friends by his side, his sisters sharing in the scary feeling of having a sick parent, and the kids in school always knowing his dad as a ‘legend’. But is all this support enough to save him?
Golden notices that he’s losing everything. His dad, his team, his best friends, even the game. And he’s doubting whether his love for all of them can even save them or not.
As his father’s condition worsens and a game results in an injury, Golden just decides to let it all out. He cries. In front of the whole team, he lets out his frustration for all that should’ve happened but didn’t.
What happens when things go wrong and there’s nothing you can do to stop it? You put in ten thousand tries before giving up on anything. But what if those ten thousand tries aren’t enough either?
This book made me cry.
Hey, why don’t you try reading self-help books and make a better version of yourself? (After going through this list, of course.) Here’s something.
7 Awesome Self-Help Books I Read Before Launching My Personal Blog.
#7 Ms Bixby’s Last Day, by John David Anderson
Let’s be honest, I never liked teachers.
There was just something about them that put me to edge. Mostly it was because I never liked schools either. They were big haunted houses where nerds’ spirits went to haunt after they died.
But the way JDA did it all, created a teacher everyone would like to have once in their life, I couldn’t help but appreciate—Ms Bixby and the author, still not the teachers.
Told through the P.O.V. of three close friends, this book provides an exceptional insight into their own lives, and the connection they shared with their teacher Ms Bixby, who’s not really among them anymore because she’s at the hospital.
The three friends one day decide to randomly skip school and take a trip to the hospital to meet their teacher.
Told in a humorous and dephtful way, this book revolves around all the hurdles they pass in the way, testing the limits to which they would go to celebrate the last day with their favourite teacher who’s helped them all in some way or the other.
And as Ms Bixby’s living her last day, we all get reminded how absolutely necessary it is to have a mentor you could look up to.
In this sweet tale of friendship and love, it happens just that. It felt so awesome to read from so many different perspectives and see the love all the kids in the class had harbored in their hearts for their teacher.
The end made me cry a bit, but I was all in to witness the last goodbye. It didn’t feel like a goodbye at all. And if you’re in for children’s books and are looking for books that make you cry here’s one.
“Everybody loves a good sob story, so long as it’s not their story.”
#8 The Ethan I Was Before, by Ali Standish
Ethan blames himself.
He blames himself for all that happened back in Boston—his best friend Kacey going through an accident, his family moving to Palm Knot, Georgia as if to search for normal, his brother hating him for having to leave behind everything they had back home.
Ethan hates himself too. Because he holds himself responsible for the reason everyone says that Kacey is never coming back again. She’s gone.
However, Ethan is stubborn enough to believe that there might be still a chance to save Kacey. He thinks it’s him. If he can find to way to get to her, he can save her, bring her back from where she’s gone.
But you can’t bring someone back from the dead.
“Believing in ghosts is dangerous. It gives you hope when there is none.”
So Ethan’s new life begins, full of regret for the past and a form of passivity for the future.
In this small town, they are living with their sporty Grandpa Ike who teaches him how to drive, and Ethan even manages to become friends with the new kid, Coralee.
He still can’t seem to let go of the past, though.
“We never know where life is going to lead, Ethan. What so many small decisions are going to add up to.”
But then, a hurricane is approaching their town. Ethan and Coralee have a fallout because of a misunderstanding, and Ethan’s past is creeping back onto him. Now’s the time the family needs each other the most.
In the middle of it all, can Ethan battle all the regrets of the past and let go of his much beloved best friend? Can he learn how to move on with life without anything holding him back?
Read in his deeply-heartfelt and grieving tale of love and loss.
“Sometimes a story is all you have. Sometimes that can be enough.”
#9 From Ant to Eagle, by Alex Lyttle
Okay, maybe this was the first book I cried about.
(No, I just realized it was Fred’s death in the Harry Potter series. I mean, everyone cried for that).
But this children’s book came pretty close.
Like, wow. One word, wow.
It has been some two or three years since I last opened this book, but the memory’s as vivid as ever.
It’s one of those unexpected books that make you cry, that hit uou in the gut out of nowhere.
My name is Calvin Sinclair, I’m eleven years old, and this is a story about my brother.
This. I didn’t know at that time that by the end of this book, I would be crying both for Calvin, and for this little brother he writes about. The relationship this author showed between the brothers was really amazing, and so truly described.
Like siblings often don’t, they didn’t really show their love to each other. That was only until ntil a situation brought them together and reminded them of what it truly felt like to have a brother and a family you could depend upon.
The emotion at the end was raw and devastating. And I am sure it would keep your heart throbbing all along, waiting for the conclusion and wondering what would happen then.
Nonetheless, you would all along be praying for the book to end on a happy note. I’m not gonna spoil it for you, so go get it yourself.
I am a teenager reading children’s books, and I would easily say it’s the best one out there. You’re not going to regret this.
#10 A Monster Calls, by Patrick Ness
At the end of this heartfelt book I really, truly, honestly, felt for the main character and the conflict he was going through in his life.
It was raw emotion, and something you could’ve never expected.
The conclusion was fabulous, and because I had seen such an amazing character development arc, I could really feel what he was feeling at that time.
He felt like family.
And that maybe, might’ve brought some tears to my eyes.
Colin’s mum is dying. He’s going through the trauma of her battling cancer and the trauma of being so distant from his father that he doesn’t know who that man is at all. Then there’s also this bully Harry who looks weird and creepy because of all the strange looks he’s been giving Colin, as if he’s up to something.
To top it off, now, there’s this scary monster tree that talks. He’s like the bad wolf, except that he tells three stories to Colin that look simple to the eye but hold fascinating morals and ethical dilemmas. And they’re meant to teach him something.
Will Colin be able to learn his morals? Will the tree be any useful, or just wreck his life? Most important of all, will Colin be able to acknowledge that deep, haunting secret that’s buried somewhere in the corner of his mind?
This secret can put his emotional state, and the image you’d have created for him by reading the book—all in jeopardy.
#11 Denis ever after, by Tony Abbott
This book is truly a masterpiece, in my eyes, mostly for portraying the deep, heartfelt relation between two twin brothers, one of whom is dead.
Matt is alive and twelve now. I’m one of those, but not both.
The book mainly revolves around the mystery that blankets the death of Matt’s twin brother.
I was guessing all along.
I remember writing this review of the book on the app I was reading it on. (Thought I’d share it with you!): “It’s so beautiful! So, so beautiful. The way the mystery untangles is mind-blowing, and I loooooved the relation between the brothers. How can Tony Abott always write the books I want to read? It’s really beautiful. It’s really awesome. It’s pretty. It’s sad. It’s happy. It’s perfect.“
So, you can pretty much see what I was feeling at that moment. I was feeling elated at finding such a beautiful tragedy. It was the utter sorrow to watch one of them go on living without his counterpart, while the other one walking around lifeslessly in the land of the dead.
People die and then fade away, but Denis wasn’t fading away, mainly because his alive brother Matt on the planet was still keeping him alive in his memories.
So it was like Matt wasn’t letting him go, and thus, Denis couldn’t move on either. It was sad, seeing Denis convince Matt to let him go, seeing him long for his best mate, his twin bro.
It was so utterly devastating that maybe I shed a few tears too. (Have I mentioned that I only cry for books’ characters?)
But it was beautiful in the end. Absolutely beautiful.
Children’s books are the most beautiful. They’re pure. This one showed me the pain of letting someone go and having to move on without them.
#12 See You At Harry’s, by Jo Knowles
I remember reading this book and feeling like this was what I’d been waiting for all along.
This was a treasure.
I remember highlighting pratically every part of it because of the depth and emotions I felt at every single page.
The characters were wow. The setting—an ice-cream parlour named, of course, Harry’s—was a really great place, owned by the narrator’s family. And I like the simplicity in showing how all of the kids going there after school and just having that sweet treat.
Fern, the narrator, was a great character, sweet, kind, and so awesome.
And everything semed to be fine, until one day, a disaster seemed to strike Fern’s family. (Dundundun.)
This book made me laugh and cry along the way, because there were some great parts when I felt so blessed for having found this book. But there were also some parts when I was genuinely upset for Fern and her family and was just counting on them to save themselves from the sorrow and start to heal.
Even though it pointed out some mature topics like bullying, and more, as you’ll see, I think it would still be safe for kids to read this to get an insight of the problems in the outer world.
If I had to summarize in one sentence, I would say that it was one roalercoaster ride, surely.
And Jo Knowles delivered a punch with all her diverse characters and a dozen different storylines working all at once, and still not creating a mess. If you’re looking for realistic fiction books for kids, then it’s a must, you know, for everyone.
#13 Wonder, by RJ Palacio
I just recommend this book to everyone. This is a book for every child. And every adult.
I just can’t stop recommending it because it’s fab.
It tells the tale of a kid August who was says in the book how he looks different than everybody else. In fact, he was observed making this comment:
My name is August, by the way. I won’t describe what I look like. Whatever you’re thinking, it’s probably worse.
All throughout the book, witnessing various forms of bullying and humiliation, the only thing I could do was cringe whenever someone said something bad to him.
And I was impressed because he showed up at school everyday, and he was so brave for coping through all of that crap they threw at him.
And at the end of it, I was sure that August was a really nice kid, and I was ready to knuckle-punch anyone who dared say anything mean to him.
This book will teach your kid to stand up for himself or herself in the world out there that is so cruel and such a bad place. There are jerks around every corner.
August stood up to those jerks; he didn’t give up, even when he was just ten years old.
I mean, we can learn something from him.
This book might also give you some lessons too, or it might help you think back in nostalgia to the day when you were a kid yourself.
No matter what, it’s a great book to read whatever age you are. You might just end up knowing the wonderful story of a wonderful kid.
#14 My Life As A Potato, by Arianne Costner
Funny. One word. Hilarious.
This book was seriously an icebreaker on my stressful routine when I read it after putting aside all the work and the tensions and picking up my tablet at the end of the day.
And what’s more fascinating—I completed reading this book in just twenty-four hours. (Yes, I keep a count.)
It even has a comedic beginning: “I don’t know what I did to deserve it, but the fact is clear: I, Ben Hardy, am cursed by potatoes. That demon veggie has been out to get me for years.”
It kickstarts as Ben and his family moved to South Fork, Idaho—which is also known as “the Potato Capital of the World.”
Seriously. So of course, Ben’s bound to be the new kid in school now. And of course it isn’t as planned.
Ben pulls a stunt in the cafeteria and unfortunately gets caught by the principal himself; of course it wasn’t in the plan!
From there begins his thrilling middle school journey.
He’s faced with very weird situations along the way, the prime one being him disguising as the school’s basketball mascot (which is a potato, obviously). And now he’s gotta find a way to survive like this—at the same time keeping his “mascot identity” hidden.
Ben’s narrative is interactive and the author’s writing style is great.
Moreover, sprinkled with lively illustrations every once and now, this book is a must. Doesn’t matter if you’re an adult already and well past the middle-grade reading age—I think this book will look funny to almost everyone who has an ordinary functioning humor.
#15 Speechless by Adam P. Schmitt
This book made me cry. Cry ugly, if you must know.
It’s narrated by Jimmy, who just talks all throughout the book about his cousin, Patrick with such fervor you’d think they would be very close and would be one of those cousins who never stayed apart as kids and who got their diapers changed together.
The problem is that Patrick’s dead. Really. Even though, until the very end, I was kind of hoping that Patrick might’ve been faking it just to play a prank on his family, it turned out he was really gone. Gone.
And I cried because of that.
The author shifts the timeline between the past and present, between a time when Patrick was alive and one when he was not.
This is Jimmy recalling every memory he had with Patrick. Because Jimmy’s given a task on Patrick’s funeral—to give a speech. Except he doesn’t know what to say. Also, he’s nervous about speaking in front of all these people about what Patrick meant to him.
Come to think of it, what did Patrick really mean to him? They were always fighting. Patrick was always annoying Jimmy. Patrick’s father was always scolding Patrick. Patrick was always impulsive, in fact, people kinda blamed him for the accident that caused his younger sister to turn partially deaf.
What could anyone say about Patrick? Everyone’s speechless. I was too.
The emotion between these pages, the imperfect family relations, the guilt, the regret, the sorrow was really overwhelming and hard to handle. This was such a beautiful book.
And the speech Jimmy said last, couldn’t have justified it any better. Just thinking about this book made me sad again.
How Did You Like These Children’s Books?
So these were the book reviews of 15 middle grade and children’s books that I liked best, the books I would just hope that all tweens, and even the older kids liked and devoured. Comment below what books had really won your heart as a kid. Is there any book I’ve yet to read that you think should’ve been included in this list?
What would you like to see next?
For more book recommendations, check this posts out:
6 Heartfelt Middle Grade Books to Read For When You’re Feeling Low.
