ELEMENTARY SCHOOL SUMMER READING LIST

STUDENTS ENTERING GRADE 5

A Horse Called Hero by Sam Angus El Deafo by Cece Bell Forced to leave London for a new home in the country after their father refuses The author recounts in graphic novel format her experiences with hearing loss to join the military during World War II, Wolfie and his brother, Dodo, bond at a young age, including using a bulky hearing aid, learning how to lip read, with an orphaned foal that they risk their lives to rescue. Fiction; Lexile 880 and determining her "superpower." Graphic Novel; Lexile: 420

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate Batsuits and Capes: The Science Behind Batman’s Body Armor by Ivan is an easygoing gorilla. Living at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade, Agnieszka Biskup he has grown accustomed to humans watching him through the glass walls of Look inside to explore the real-world science and enginee ring that has his domain. He rarely misses his life in the jungle. In fact, he hardly ever inspired the Dark Knight's batsuit. Nonfiction; Lexile 900L thinks about it at all. Instead, Ivan thinks about TV shows he’s seen and about his friends Stella, an elderly elephant, and Bob, a stray dog. But mostly Ivan Batarangs and Grapnels: The Science Behind Batman’s Utility Belt by thinks about art and how to capture the taste of a mango or the sound of leaves Agnieszka Biskup with color and a well-placed line. Then he meets Ruby, a baby elephant taken Look inside to explore the real-world science and engineering tha has inspired from her family, and she makes Ivan see their home – and his own art – the gadgets on the Dark Knight's utility belt. Nonfiction; Lexile: 860 through new eyes. When Ruby arrives, change comes with her, and it’s up to The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett Ivan to make it a change for the better. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 570 A ten-year-old orphan comes to live in a house on the Yorkshire moors where Joshua Dread by Lee Bacon she discovers an invalid cousin and the mysteries of a locked garden. Favorites Besides being bullied, Joshua faces one more obstacle in middle school, trying & Classics; Lexile: 970 to hide his identity as the son of supervillains, the Dread Duo. Fiction; Lexile:

700

The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau A Siamese cat, an old bull terrier, and a young Labrador retriever travel In the year 241, twelve-year-old Lina trades jobs on Assignment Day to be a together 250 miles through the Canadian wilderness to find their family. Messenger to run to new places in her decaying but beloved city, perhaps even Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 1320 to glimpse Unknown Regions. Mystery; Lexile: 680

Extra Credit by Andrew Clements Batplanes and Batcopters: The Engineering Behind Batman’s Wings by As letters flow back and forth – between the prairies of Illinois and the Tammy Enz mountains of Afghanistan, across cultural and religious divides – sixth-grader Explores the real-world science and engineering connections to the features in Abby, ten-year-old Amira, and eleven-year-old Sadeed begin to speak and Batman's aircraft. Nonfiction; Lexile 880 listen to each other. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 830L Batmobiles and Batcycles: The Engineering Behind Batman’s Vehicles by Powerless by Matthew Cody Tammy Enz Soon after moving to Noble's Green, Pennsylvania, twelve-year-old Daniel Explores the real-world science and engineering connections to the features in learns that his new friends have super powers that they will lose when they Batman's road vehicles. Nonfiction;; Lexile 890 turn thirteen, unless he can use his brain power to protect them. Fantasy; Lexile: 800 The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich Omakayas, a seven-year-old Native American girl of the Ojibwa tribe, lives The Watsons Go To Birmingham – 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis through the joys of summer and the perils of winter on a island in Lake The ordinary interactions and everyday routines of the Watsons, an African Superior in 1847. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 970 American family living in Flint, Michigan, are drastically changed after they go to visit Grandma in Alabama in the summer of 1963. Favorites & Classics; The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm by Nancy Farmer Lexile: 1000 In 2194 in Zimbabwe, General Matsika’s three children are kidnapped and put to work in a plastic mine, while three mutant detectives use their special The Illuminated Adventures of Flora and Ulysses by Kate DiCamillo and powers to search for them. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 660 K.G. Campbell Rescuing a squirrel after an accident involving a vacuum cleaner, comic- Sidekicks by Jack D. Ferraiolo reading cynic Flora Belle Buckman is astonished when the squirrel, Ulysses, Scott Hutchinson, aka Bright Boy, the sidekick of Phantom Justice, begins to demonstrates astonishing powers of strength and flight after being revived. question how long he can remain in the shadow of the superhero after 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 520 discovering that his nemesis, supervillain sidekick Monkeywrench, might be one of the most popular kids at his school. Fantasy; Lexile 620 The Search for WondLa by Tony DiTerlizzi Living in isolation with a robot on what appears to be an alien world populated Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh with bizarre life forms, a twelve-year-old human girl called Eva Nine sets out Eleven-year-old Harriet, who is a spy and plans to be an author, keeps a secret on a journey to find others like her. Features “augmented reality” pages, in notebook filled with thoughts and notes on her schoolmates and people she which readers with a webcam can access additional information about Eva observes on her afterschool spy route, but when some of her classmates read Nine’s world. Fiction; Lexile 760 the notebook, they seek revenge. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 760

Coraline by Neil Gaiman Hero on a Bicycle by Shirley Hughes Looking for excitement, Coraline ventures through a mysterious door into a When their mother reluctantly joins the Italian Resistance against occupying world that is similar, yet disturbingly different from her own, where she must Nazi forces in World War II Florence, young Paolo and his sister, Costanza, challenge a gruesome entity in order to save herself, her parents, and the souls devise a way to use their bicycle to assist the movement. Historical Fiction; of three others. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 740L Lexile 880

Maximilian & the Mystery of the Guardian Angel: A Bilingual Lucha Libre One Dog and His Boy by Eva Ibbotson Thriller by Xavier Garza When lonely, ten-year-old Hal learns that his wealthy but neglectful parents A young fan of lucha libre Mexican wrestling makes a connection to his battling only rented Fleck, the dog he always wanted, he and new friend Pippa take hero, the Angel de la Guarda (the Guardian Angel). Humorous; Lexile 820 Fleck and four other dogs from the rental agency on a trek from London to Scotland, where Hal’s grandparents live. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 910L The Adventures of Beanboy by Lisa Harkrader Wheaton, Kansas, seventh-grader Tucker MacBean loves comic books, so when No More Dead Dogs by Gordon Korman his favorite comic has a contest to create a sidekick, he is hopeful that he can Eighth-grade football hero Wallace Wallace is sentenced to detention attending win, thereby fixing his struggling family. Fiction; Lexile 670 rehearsals of the school play where, in spite of himself, he becomes wrapped up in the production and begins to suggest changes that improve not only the The Hero’s Guide to Saving your Kingdom by Christopher Healy play but his life as well. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 610L The four princes erroneously dubbed Prince Charming and rudely marginalized in their respective fairy tales form an unlikely team when a witch Elvis and the Underdogs by Jenny Lee and Kelly Light threatens the whole kingdom. Humorous All his life Benji, now ten, has been sickly and he has long been targeted by the school bully, but after a seizure Benji gets a therapy dog that is not only big Portraits of Hispanic American Heroes by Juan Felipe Herrera enough to protect him, it can also talk. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee Twenty Hispanic American artists, scientists, athletes, activists, and political leaders are profiled in this stunning picture book, complete with inspirational The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis quotes and distinctive expressionist portraits. Nonfiction Four English schoolchildren find their way through the back of a wardrobe into the magic land of Narnia and assist Aslan, the golden lion, to triumph over the The Great Trouble: A Mystery of London, the Blue Death, and a Boy Called White Witch, who has cursed the land with eternal winter. Favorites & Classics; Eel by Deborah Hopkinson Lexile: 940 Eel has troubles of his own: As an orphan and a “mudlark,” he spends his days in the filthy River Thames, searching for bits of things to sell. He’s being Heroes and She-roes by Patrick J. Lewis hunted by Fisheye Bill Tyler, and a nastier man never walked the streets of Twenty-one poems celebrate and chronicle the actions of real-life persons (and London. And he’s got a secret that costs him four precious shillings a week to one dog) who have performed heroic acts in service of others. Poetry keep safe. But even for Eel, things aren’t so bad until that fateful August day in 1854 – the day the deadly cholera (“blue death”) comes to Broad Street. Heroes of Baseball: The Men Who Made it America’s Favorite Game by Everyone believes that cholera is spread through poisonous air. But one man, Robert Lipsyte Dr. John Snow, has a different theory. As the epidemic surges, it’s up to Eel and Meet the men who were and remain the heroes of baseball. These are men who his best friend, Florrie, to gather evidence to prove Dr. Snow’s theory – before did more than hit home runs or pitch perfect games--they changed the way our the entire neighborhood is wiped out. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 660L society perceives itself, and the goals we set for ourselves and our nation. Nonfiction; Lexile: 1080 Number the Stars by Lois Lowry Liesl & Po by Lauren Oliver In 1943, during the German occupation of Denmark, ten-year-old Annemarie A mix-up involving the greatest magic in the world has tremendous learns how to be brave and courageous when she helps shelter her Jewish consequences for Liesl, an orphan who has been locked in an attic, Will, an friend from the Nazis. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 670 alchemist’s runaway apprentice, and Po, a ghost, as they are pursued by friend and foe while making an important journey. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile Animal Heroes: True Rescue Stories by Sandra Markle 830L Learn about animals, both domestic and wild, who have become heroes when they came to the rescue of humans. Nonfiction; Lexile 880 A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park Tree-ear, a thirteen-year-old orphan in medieval Korea, lives under a bridge in Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery a potters’ village, and longs to learn how to throw the delicate celadon Anne, an eleven-year-old orphan, is sent by mistake to live with a lonely, ceramics himself. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 920L middle-aged brother and sister on a Prince Edward Island farm and proceeds to make an indelible impression on everyone around her. Favorites & Classics; Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson Lexile: 850 The life of a ten-year-old boy in rural Virginia expands when he becomes friends with a newcomer who subsequently meets an untimely death trying to World Without Heroes by Brandon Mull reach their hideaway, Terabithia, during a storm. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: Fourteen-year-old Jason Walker is transported to a strange world called 810 Lyrian, where he joins Rachel, who was also drawn there from our world, and a few rebels, to piece together the Word that can destroy the malicious wizard Tom’s Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce emperor, Surroth. Fantasy; Lexile: 710 While staying with his aunt and uncle, Tom discovers a beautiful garden that is visible only at night and meets a little girl from the Victorian era with whom he Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. travels back in time. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 860 Marshal by Vaunda Micheax Nelson This biography profiles the life of Bass Reeves, a former slave who was On the Wings of Heroes by Richard Peck recruited as a deputy United States Marshal in the area that was to become A boy in Illinois remembers the homefront years of World War II, especially his Oklahoma. Biography; Lexile 860 two heroes--his brother in the Air Force and his father, who fought in the previous war. Historical Fiction; Lexile: 730 Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman by Marc Tyler Nobelman Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster, two misfit teens in Cleveland, were more like Clark 8th Grade Superzero by Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich Kent than Superman. Both boys escaped into the worlds of science fiction and After half-heartedly joining his church youth group's project at a homeless pulp magazine tales. In 1934, they created the superhero, but it was four years shelter near his Brooklyn middle school, eighth-grade "loser" Reggie McKnight before they convinced a publisher to take a chance on their Man of Steel in a is inspired to run for school office on a platform of making a real difference in new format--the comic book. Biography; Lexile: 760 the community. Humorous; Lexile: 640

The Borrowers by Mary Norton Miniature people who live in an old country house by borrowing things from the humans are forced to emigrate from their home under the clock. Favorites & Classics; Lexile: 780

Winterling by Sarah Prineas The Hero Schliemann: The Dreamer Who Dug for Troy by Laura Amy With her boundless curiosity and wild spirit, Fer has always felt that she Schlitz doesn’t belong. Not when the forest is calling to her, when the rush of wind A biographical portrait of archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann, describing how through branches feels more real than school or the quiet farms near her his youthful determination to live a romantic and heroic life came true when he house. Then she saves an injured creature – he looks like a boy, but he’s really discovered the lost city of Troy. Biography; Lexile 910 something else. He knows who Fer truly is, and invites her through the Way, a passage to a strange, dangerous land. Fer feels an instant attachment to this Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream by Tanya Lee Stone realm, where magic is real and oaths forge bonds stronger than iron. But a The story of the thirteen women connected with NASA’s Mercury 13 space powerful huntress named the Mor rules here, and Fer can sense that the land is mission, who braved prejudice and jealousy to make their mark and open the perilously out of balance. Fer must unlock the secrets about the parents she door for the female pilots and space commanders who would soon follow. never knew and claim her true place before the worlds on both sides of the Biography; Lexile 980 Way descent into endless winter. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 720L The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing by Sheila Turnage Ninth Ward by Jewell Parker Rhodes When Miss Lana accidentally buys a haunted inn at the Tupelo Landing town In New Orleans’ Ninth Ward, twelve-year-old Lanesha, who can see spirits, and auction, Desperado Detectives – aka Mo LoBeau and her best friend Dale – her adopted grandmother have no choice but to stay and weather the storm as open up a paranormal division to solve the ghost’s identity before the town’s th Hurricane Katrina bears down upon them. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 470= big 250 anniversary bash. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 550L

Pie by Sarah Weeks The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan When Alice’s Aunt Polly, the Pie Queen of Ipswitch, passes away, she takes with Jason, Piper, and Leo, three students from a school for "bad kids," find her the secret to her world-famous pie-crust recipe. Or does she? In her will, themselves at Camp Half-Blood, where they learn that they are demigods and Polly leaves the recipe to her extraordinarily fat, remarkably disagreeable cat, begin a quest to free Hera, who has been imprisoned by Mother Earth herself. Lardo, and then leaves Lardo in the care of Alice. Suddenly, the whole town is Adventure/Fantasy; Lexile 660 wondering how you leave a recipe to a cat. Everyone wants to be the next big Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan pie-contest winner, and it’s making them pie-crazy. It’s up to Alice and her Esperanza and her mother are forced to leave their life of wealth and privilege friend Charlie to put the pieces together and discover the not-so-secret recipe in Mexico to go to work in the labor camps of Southern California, where they for happiness: friendship, family, and the pleasure of doing something for the must adapt to the harsh circumstances facing Mexican farm workers on the eve right reason. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 930L of the Great Depression. Favorites & Classics; Lexile 750L One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia Sidekicks by Dan Santat In the summer of 1968, after travelling from Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to When Captain Amazing feels he is getting too old to be a reliable superhero, he spend a month with the mother they barely know, eleven-year-old Delphine tries to hire a new sidekick, but his pets have different ideas. Graphic Novel; and her two younger sisters arrive to a cold welcome as they discover that Lexile 340 their mother, a dedicated poet and printer, is resentful of the intrusion of their visit and wants them to attend a nearby Black Panther summer camp. Historical Fiction; Lexile 750L

The Blossoming Life of Violet Diamond by Brenda Woods Violet has brown hair and brown eyes, while the rest of her family is blond. Her mother is white and her father, who passed away before she was born, was African American. She not only looks different from her family, but most of the other kids at school as well. Now that she has turned 11, Violet wants to learn about her African American heritage. Her journey is filled with joy as she grows and discovers her roots. 2016 Nutmeg Nominee; Lexile 670L

Favorite Series

The Chronicles of Prydain series by Lloyd Alexander Crispin series by Avi Poppy series by Avi John Bellairs Mysteries series by John Bellairs The Penderwicks series by Jeanne Birdsall The Dark is Rising series by Susan Cooper The Unicorn Chronicles series by Bruce Coville The Moffats series by Eleanor Estes Joey Pigza series by Jack Gantos Shadow Children series by Margaret Peterson Haddix Redwall series by Brian Jacques Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney Regarding the… series by Kate Klise Dog Friday trilogy by Hilary McKay Percy Jackson & the Olympians series by Rick Riordan Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling Septimus Heap series by Angie Sage Enola Holmes Mysteries series by Nancy Springer The Mysterious Benedict Society series by Trenton Lee Stewart Sammy Keyes series by Wendelin Van Draanen Adam Canfield series by Michael Winrip Enchanted Forest Chronicles series by Patricia Wrede Dear America series by various author