Category Must Read Middle Grade

Ugly Robert Hoge Ages 9-11 When Robert Hoge was born, he had a tumor the size of a tennis ball in the middle of his face and short, twisted legs. Surgeons removed the tumor and made him a new nose…

Trouble River Betsy Byars Ages 8-12 Safety is downriver—but first there’s trouble ahead. As soon as Dewey Martin sees the Indian creeping toward the cabin—and toward his unsuspecting grandmother—he knows what to do: knock him down and take off before…

The Tiger Rising Kate DiCamillo Ages 9-11 Walking through the misty Florida woods one morning, twelve-year-old Rob Horton is stunned to encounter a tiger—a real-life, very large tiger—pacing back and forth in a cage. What’s more, on the same extraordinary…

Thimble Summer Elizabeth Enright Ages 8-12 A few hours after nine-year-old Garnet Linden finds a silver thimble in the dried-up riverbed, the rains come and end the long drought on the farm. The rains bring safety for the crops and…

The Witches Roald Dahl Ages 7-10 This is not a fairy tale. This is about realwitches. Grandmamma loves to tell about witches. Real witches are the most dangerous of all living creatures on earth. There’s nothing they hate so much…

The Witch of Blackbird Pond Elizabeth George Speare Ages 10-13 Sixteen-year-old Kit Tyler is marked by suspicion and disapproval from the moment she arrives on the unfamiliar shores of colonial Connecticut in 1687. Alone and desperate, she has been forced…

The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle Avi  Ages 10-13 Thirteen-year-old Charlotte Doyle is excited to return home from her school in England to her family in Rhode Island in the summer of 1832. But when the two families she was…

The Teacher’s Funeral Richard Peck Ages 8-12 If your teacher has to die, August isn’t a bad time of year for it,” begins Richard Peck’s latest novel, a book full of his signature wit and sass. Russell Culver is fifteen…

The Summer of the Swans Betsy Byers  Ages 9-13 All summer Sara Godfrey has fretted over herself, her impossible body, her terrible new haircut. One moment she’s elated, the next, she’s in tears. And she can’t figure out why. Maybe…

The Soft-Hearted Sheep Dog Sylvia Green  Harvey, a sheepdog, who is so timid that he’s afraid of sheep! No one seems to want him.