All Selections by Students Should Be Approved by the Parent

Lexile scores represent an approximate reading level. This level does not account for appropriateness of content for a particular grade or reading level.

All selections by students should be approved by the parent.

Recommended Reading List for Grades 4-12
Lexile / Title / Author
Third and Fourth Grade = about 500-800
550 / When Jeff Comes Home / Catherine Atkins
560 / Sarah, Plain and Tall / Patricia MacLachlan
570 / * If You Come Softly / Jacqueline Wood
570 / And Then There Were None / Agatha Christie
580 / Ghost Boy / Iain Lawrence
590 / Night / Elie Wiesel
590 / Searching for David's Heart: A Christmas Story / Cherie Bennett
590 / Shattering Glass / Gail Giles
590 / Stargirl / Jerry Spinelli
600 / Killer's Cousin / Nancy Werlin
600 / Ordinary People / Judith Guest
600 / Pistachio Perscription / Paula Danziger
600 / The Pinballs / Betsy Byars
610 / Killer Angels, The / Michael Shaara
610 / Sun Also Rises / Ernest Hemingway
620 / * MC Higgins the Great / Virginia Hamilton
620 / Justin and the Best Biscuits In the World * / Mildred Pitts
630 / Homecoming / Cynthia Voight
630 / Of Mice and Men / John Steinbeck
630 / Sadako and the thousand Paper Cranes * / Eleanor Coerr
640 / A Taste of Blackberries / Delores Buchanan Smith
640 / Kid in the Red Jacket / Barbara Park
640 / Sweetgrass / Jan Hudson
640 / The Plant that Ate Dirty Socks / Nancy McArthur
650 / * Brave, The / Robert Lipsyte
650 / * Fallen Angels / Walter Dean Myers
650 / How to Eat Fried Worms / Thomas Rockwell
660 / Cut / Patricia McCormick
660 / Holes / Louis Sachar
660 / Miracles' Boys / Jacqueline Woodson
670 / *Color Purple, The / Alice Walker
670 / Long Way From Home / Wartski
670 / Monster / Walter Dean Myers
670 / Monster / Walter Dean Myers
680 / Gathering Blue / Lois Lowry
680 / Grapes of Wrath, The / John Steinbeck
680 / Speak / Laurie Halse Anderson
690 / And the Earth Did Not Devour Him / Thomas Rivera
690 / Kim/Kimi / Irwin
690 / Remembering the Good Times / Richard Peck
700 / * Children of the River / Linda Crew
700 / * Native Son / Richard Wright
700 / Bunnicula / Deborah and James Howe
700 / The Hundred Penny Box* / SharonBell Mathis
700 / Where the Red Fern Grows / W. Rawls
700 / Yang the Youngest and his Terrible Ear * / Linsy Namioko
710 / * Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman / Ernest Gaines
710 / Dicey's Song / Cynthia Voight
710 / JurassicPark / Michael Crichton
710 / Mrs. Mike / Benedict & Nancy Freedman
710 / The Skates of Uncle Richard / Carol Fenner
720 / Blood and Chocolate / Annette Klause
720 / Body of Christopher Creed / Carol Plum-Ucci
720 / Burning Up / Caroline Cooney
720 / Killing Mr. Griffith / Lois Duncan
720 / Mouse Rap, The / Walter Dean Myers
730 / Apprentice, The / Pilar Molina
730 / Breaking Boxes / A.M. Jenkins
730 / Farewell to Arms, A / Ernest Hemingway
730 / Friends, The / Rosa Guy
730 / Hello, My Name is Scrambled Eggs * / Jamie Gilson
730 / In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson* / Bette Boa Lord
740 / * Hoops / Walter Dean Myers
740 / * Join-In: Multiethnic Anthology / Donald Gallo, ed.
740 / After the First Death / Robert Cormier
740 / After the First Death / Robert Cormier
740 / Hold Fast / Kevin Major
740 / Invitation to the Game / Hughes
750 / * Lesson Before Dying, A / Ernest Gaines
750 / * Slam! / Walter Dean Myers
750 / Colin Powell: Straight To The Top * / Rose Blue & Corinne Naden
750 / Misty of Chincoteague / Marguerite Henry
750 / Smack / Melvin Burgess
750 / The Trumpet of the Swan / E. B. White
750 / The Westing Game / Ellen Raskin
750 / Yearling, The / Marjorie Rawlings
760 / * Contender, The / Robert Lipsyte
760 / Friendship and the Gold Cadillac * / Mildred Taylor
760 / Give the Boy a Gun / Todd Strasser
760 / Give the Boy a Gun / Todd Strasser
760 / Lisa Bright and Dark / John Neufeld
760 / Night Shift / Stephen King
760 / Sixteen: Short Stories by Outstanding Writers for Young Adults / Donald Gallo, ed.
770 / A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver / E.L. Konigsburg
770 / Help Wanted: Short Stories About Young People Working / Anita Silvey, ed.
770 / Lord of the Flies / William Golding
770 / My Brother Sam is Dead / James Collier/Chris Collier
770 / Nightjohn / Gary Paulsen
770 / Sign of the Beaver * / Elizabeth George Speare
770 / Soulfire / Louis Hewett
770 / The Chocolate Touch / Patrick S. Catling
770 / Tuck Everlasting / Natalie Babbitt
770 / Wave, The / Todd Strasser
780 / * Bearstone / Will Hobbs
780 / That Was Then This Is Now / S.E. Hinton
780 / The Borrowers / Mary Norton
790 / * Big Wave, The / Pearl S. Buck
790 / * PlaceWhereSea Remembers, A / Sandra Benitez
790 / Catcher in the Rye, The / J.D. Salinger
790 / Famous AllOverTown / D. Santiago
790 / Izzy, Willy-Nilly / Cynthia Voight
790 / Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH / Robert C. O'Brien
790 / No Easy Answers / Donald Gallo, ed.
Fifth and Sixth Grade = about 800-1000
800 / * Glory Field, The / Walter Dean Myers
800 / * Summer of My German Soldier / Bette Greene
800 / * Walkabout / James Marshall
800 / Doing Time: Notes From the Underground / Rob Thomas
800 / Homeless Bird / Gloria Whelan
800 / The Great Gilly Hopkins / `Katherine Paterson
810 / Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde / Robert Louis Stevenson
820 / * Clover / D. Sanders
820 / * Sing Down the Moon / Scott O'Dell
820 / Chocolate War, The / Robert Cormier
820 / Citizen of the Galaxy / Heinlein
820 / Howard's End / E.M. Forster
820 / Someone Like You / Sarah Dessen
820 / Swallowing Stones / Joyce McDonald
820 / Swallowing Stones / Joyce McDonald
820 / Z for Zachariah / Robert O'Brien
830 / Summer of the Swans / Betsy Byars
840 / * Bless Me Ultima / Rudolfo Anaya
840 / For Whom the Bell Tolls / Ernest Hemingway
840 / Jane Eyre / Charlotte Bronte
840 / Johnny Tremain / Esther Forbes
840 / Slave Day / Rob Thomas
840 / Strider / Beverly Cleary
850 / A Swiftly Tilting Planet / L'Engle
850 / Child Called It / Dave Pelzer
850 / Inherit the Wind / Jerome & Lee Lawrence
850 / Slaughterhouse-Five / Kurt Vonnegut
850 / Tales from GoldMountain:Stories of the Chinese in the New World / Paul Lee
850 / The Witch of Blackbird Pond / Elizabeth George Speare
850 / When the Legends Die / Hal Borland
860 / * Cry the Beloved Country / Alan Paton
860 / * Julie of the Wolves / Jean Craighead George
860 / * The Learning Tree / G. Parks
860 / Master Puppeteer, The / Katherine Paterson
860 / The Cay / Theodore Taylor
860 / The Mouse and the Motorcycle / Beverly Cleary
870 / * House on Mango Street, The / Sandra Cisneros
870 / * Ishi, Last of His Tribe / Theodora Kroeber
870 / * Light in the Forest / Conrad Richter
870 / * Song of Solomon / Toni Morrison
870 / * To Kill A Mockingbird / Harper Lee
870 / Alas, Babylon / Pat Frank
870 / Brave New World / Aldous Huxley
870 / James and the Giant Peach / Roald Dahl
870 / Shane / Jack Schaeffer
870 / So Much to Tell You / John Marsden
870 / We All Fall Down / Robert Cormier
880 / * Brian Piccolo: A Short Season / Jeannie Morris
880 / Anthem / Ayn Rand
880 / Jacob Have I Loved / Katherine Paterson
880 / Jacob, Have I Loved / Katherine Paterson
880 / Leaving Home / David French
880 / Stranger, The / Albert Camus
880 / Things They Carried / Tim O'Brien
880 / WutheringHeights / Emily Bronte
890 / * Beardance / Will Hobbs
890 / * Things Fall Apart / Chinua Achebe
890 / Day They Came to Arrest the Book, The / Nat Hentoff
890 / Dragon of the Lost Sea / Lawrence Yep
890 / Fahrenheit 451 / Ray Bradbury
890 / Gathering of Flowers, A: Stories About Being Young in America / Joyce Thomas, ed.
890 / Things Fall Apart / Achebe
900 / * Nectar in a Sieve / Kamala Markandaya
900 / * One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich / Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
900 / Day No Pigs Would Die, A / Robert Newton Peck
900 / Dubliners, The / James Joyce
900 / Red Badge of Courage, The / Stephen Crane
900 / Sounder * / William Howard Armstrong
900 / The Enormous Egg / Oliver Butterworth
910 / * Flowers for Algernon / Daniel Keyes
910 / Dear Mr. Henshaw / Beverly Cleary
910 / Old Yeller / Fred A. Gipson
920 / Bluest Eye, The / Toni Morrison
920 / Child of the Owl / Lawrence Yep
920 / City of Gold and Lead, The / John Christopher
920 / Dreamland / Sarah Dessen
920 / Legend on Tarik, The / Myers
920 / Stuart Little / E. B. White
920 / Where the Lillies Bloom / Vera & Bill Cleaver
930 / Canyons / Gary Paulsen
930 / Grey King, The / Susan Cooper
930 / No Promises in the Wind / Irene Hunt
940 / Old Man and the Sea, The / Ernest Hemingway
950 / * Black Boy / R. Wright
950 / Adventures of Tom Sawyer / Mark Twain
950 / Passage to India, A / E.M. Foster
950 / Pigman, The / Paul Zindel
950 / Where the Heart Is / Billie Letts
960 / * Awakening, The / K. Chopin
960 / Slake's Limbo / Felice Holman
970 / * Picture Bride / Yoshiko Uchida
970 / A Jar of Dreams * / Yoshiko Uchida
970 / Bless the Beasts and Children / Glendon Swarthout
970 / Rosa Parks: My Story * / Rosa Parks
970 / Tales Mummies Tell / Patricia Lauber
970 / You Don't Know Me / David Klass
980 / Confession of a Teenage Baboon / Paul Zindel
980 / Ironman / Chris Crutcher
980 / Space Challenger: the Story of Guion Bluford * / Jim Haskins & Kathleen Benson
980 / The Black Pearl / Scott O'Dell
990 / * Crime and Punishment / Fyodor Dostoyevski
990 / * Obasan / Joy Kogawa
990 / Adventures of Huck Finn, The / Mark Twain
990 / Childhood's End / Arthur C. Clarke
Seventh and Eighth Grade = about 1000-1150
1000 / * Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad / Ann Petry
1000 / Freak the Mighty / Rodman Philbrick
1000 / Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The / Douglas Adams
1000 / Hobbit, The / J.R.R. Tolkien
1000 / Island of the Blue Dolphins / Scott O'Dell
1010 / Brothers Karamazov, The / Fyodor Dostoyevski
1010 / Go Ask Alice / Anonymous
1010 / Pearl, The / John Steinbeck
1010 / Throwing Shadows / E.L. Konigsburg
1020 / Portrait of a Lady / Henry James
1020 / Shoeless Joe / W.P. Kinsella
1030 / * Go Tell It On the Mountain / James Baldwin
1030 / Madame Bovery / Gustave Flaubert
1040 / * Farewell to Manzanar / Jeanne Houston
1040 / * Kaffir Boy / Mark Mathabane
1040 / Babe the Gallant Pig / Dick King-Smith
1040 / In Cold Blood / Truman Capote
1040 / Working Days / Anne Mazer, ed.
1050 / * Amistad: A Long Road to Freedom / Walter Dean Myers
1050 / * Heart of Darkness / Joseph Conrad
1050 / * Parallel Journeys / Eleanor Ayer, et al.
1050 / * Uncle Tom's Cabin / Harriet Beecher Stowe
1050 / * Winesburg, Ohio / Sherwood Anderson
1050 / Malcom X: Any Means Necessary / Walter Dean Myers
1060 / * Invisible Thread, The / Yoshiko Vehida
1070 / * I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings / M. Angeou
1070 / Great Gatsby, The / F. Scott Fitzgerald
1070 / The Story of Women who Shaped the West * / Mary Virginia Fox
1080 / * Their Eyes Were Watching God / Thomas Rivera
1080 / * To Sir With Love / E.R. Braithwaite
1080 / Hard Times / Charles Dickens
1080 / Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass / Frederick Douglass
1080 / Voyage of the Frog / Gary Paulsen
1090 / 1984 / George Orwell
1090 / Gulliver's Travels / Jonathan Swift
1090 / Woodsong / GaryPaulsen
1100 / Across Five Aprils / Irene Hunt
1100 / Eleanor Roosevelt / Russell Freedman
1110 / Candide / Francois Voltaire
1110 / Lost Garden / Lawrence Yep
1110 / One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest / K. Kesey
1110 / Separate Peace, A / John Knowles
1120 / Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man / James Joyce
1130 / Odyssey, The / Homer
1130 / Pudd'nhead Wilson / Mark Twain
1130 / Tale of Two Cities / Charles Dickens/Bantam
1130 / Up A Road Slowly / Irene Hunt
1140 / Catch 22 / Joseph Heller
Ninth-Twelfth Grade = about 1150-1500
1150 / Moves Make the Man, The / Bruce Books
1150 / Wizard of EarthSea, The / Ursula K. LeGuin
1160 / Ethan Frome / Edith Wharton
1160 / Tess of the DiUrbervilles / Thomas Hardy/Signet
1170 / Animal Farm / George Orwell
1170 / Call of the Wild, The / Jack London
1170 / Catherine Called Birdie / Karen Cushman
1170 / Frankenstein / Mary Shelley
1190 / Pride and Prejudice / Jane Austin
1200 / Moby Dick / Herman Melville
1230 / Great Expectations / Charles Dickens
1240 / * Color of Water, The / James McBride
1340 / Hunchback of Notre Dame, The / Victor Hugo
1340 / Pygmalion / George B. Shaw
1340 / Scarlet Letter, The / Hawthorne
1340 / Walden / Henry David Thoreau
1350 / Secret Sharer, The / Joseph Conrad
1390 / Hamlet / Shakespeare
1390 / Utopia / Thomas Moore
1450 / Billy Budd / Herman Melville
NP = not prose; this item is not Lexiled
NP / American Dream - Zoo Story / Edward Albee
NP / As You Like It / Shakespeare
NP / Beowulf / England in Literature/Anonymous
NP / Canterbury Tales / G. Chaucer
NP / Crucible, The / Arthur Miller
NP / Death of a Salesman / Arthur Miller
NP / Doll's House, A / Henrik Ibsen
NP / Fences / August Wilson
NP / Glass Menagerie / Tennessee Williams
NP / Hamlet / Shakespeare
NP / Julius Caesar / Shakespeare
NP / King Lear / Shakespeare
NP / King Lear / Shakespeare/Folger
NP / Macbeth / Shakespeare
NP / Merchant of Venice, The / Shakespeare (Folgers)
NP / Midsummer Night Dream, A / Shakespeare
NP / Othello (Glasgow) / Shakespeare
NP / Our Town / Thornton Wilder
NP / Out of the Dust / Karen Hesse
NP / Piano Lesson / August Wilson
NP / Raisin in the Sun, A / Lorraine Hansberry
NP / Romeo and Juliet / Shakespeare
NP / St. Joan / George Bernard Shaw
NP / Street Car Named Desire, A / Tennessee Williams
NP / Tartuffe / Jean Moliere
NP / Tempest, The / Shakespeare
NP / Twelfth Night / Shakespeare
NP / Waiting for Godot: A Tragicomedy in Two Acts / Samuel Beckett