Posted on 12/08/2013 6:53:26 PM PST by SeekAndFind
As a reader, the mother of four children, and an author, I want my kids to love to read and to approach reading as joy and nourishment. The following five works of fiction do not encourage and inspire the love of reading in children. They’re terrible books for kids. If you make your children read these they will develop a loathing for reading that will last their whole lives and may possibly poison their very souls. Let’s see why.
Note: Minor spoilers.
This is a set of four short stories set in the western United States and an excellent example of John Steinbeck’s famously spare, elegant prose. Beautifully written, with underlying themes of death and redemption, we can all agree that this is a classic. Did I mention the gruesome death of the title character, the beloved red pony? No? Want to watch your children sob in heartbreak and then continue on to read the next three stories with increasing puzzlement and despair as the complicated themes go over their heads and they must endure the agonizing death of another beloved horse? The Red Pony will not give your children a desire to read for pleasure. Just because a novel features a child doesn’t mean that the work is appropriate for them.
Yes, children should be exposed to stories of heartbreak, loss, and redemption, but there are much better novels than Steinbeck’s to share with your child. Hand over Old Yeller by Fred Gipson, Black Beauty by Anna Sewell, or Shiloh by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. Each of these books will make your child cry, but in the end will fill them with joy.
Oh, take that shocked look off your face. Of course this is a beloved classic and almost every school child has to read the story of Native American Karana and her tale of survival as a stranded young girl on an island off the coast of California. But why? Karana is an emotionless character who plods along in her adventure one grim day at a time. She makes a great sacrifice to save her brother, but her sacrifice is made useless when her brother dies shortly afterward. Scott O’Dell evokes the abundance of life and the beauty of the western coast, but Karana lives a spare, bleak life. She endures on the island for years, alone. In the end Karana is rescued by a passing ship, a passive ending to a sad tale.
Children need stories that teach them heroism, ingenuity, and success in the face of adversity. Try Hatchet by Gary Paulsen, The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford, or My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George. I never wanted to see Karana’s island after I finished Island of the Blue Dolphins. But Sam Gribley’s tree house in My Side of the Mountain? I wanted to go live there. Somewhere in my heart, I always will.
Don’t be surprised if your twelve year old comes home from school with this book as part of her required reading. All of mine did, and I read the novel and admired the gritty, urban life that Myers evokes in the story of Steve Harmon, on trial for murder after a botched robbery of a convenience store. Myers uses a nifty movie-script format interspersed with diary entries. This is an excellent book but it’s terrible for children. Why do I say this? Does exposing your child to a description of a homosexual gang rape sound like fun? Later in the story, your child will read about an anal butt plug insertion. My twelve-year-old children were assigned a novel that describes sodomy and sex toys.
Even worse, there is the sympathy that Myers creates for Steve, a terribly misled youngster who was involved in a murder. Pre-teens might identify with Steve so much that they think it’s okay to be found innocent of murder as long as you “didn’t really mean to.” Myers wrote a terrific book and I recommend it for older teens who can understand conflict without confusing it for absolution. Don’t give your children this book.
If you’d like your child to read a novel that describes the complexity and heartbreak of the accused, try To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, The Homelanders series by Andrew Klavan, or the always wonderful The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.
This trilogy written by the English author Pullman consists of The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass, called the His Dark Materials series. They were written as an opposition to C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia, a seven book fantasy series that intends to “inkle” a belief and love of Christianity in young children. His Dark Materials is intended to foster a belief in atheism in children. How charming.
Unlike an agnostic tale where God is not present, the His Dark Materials series is all about God, and is full of rage and bitterness at Him and His angels. Children often enjoy the tale of Lyra Belacqua and her Golden Compass, but they are really reading a revenge fantasy. Christian or not, this is not the kind of emotional bile you want your child absorbing.
If you want to show your children fantastical and wondrous worlds of magic and adventure, try The Chronicles of Narnia or the Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan.These stories will uplift, entertain, and suffuse your children with the joy of reading.
The worst of the five terrible books for your children is this one, and this is a story that your child will devour in delight. A Series of Unfortunate Events is a tale of nihilism and despair packaged in such a charming way that children and their loving parents will laugh and only wonder later why their stomachs feel queasy and strange. The author, Lemony Snicket, writes incredibly well. The three main characters, Violet, Klaus and Sunny, are orphan siblings who love and care for each other. Their adventures are thrilling. But this is a terrible, terrible series for your children. Why?
At the end of each book, Count Olaf, the villain, has successfully removed the children from a loving home, having killed the person the children have just learned to love, and has turned them back into orphans. In each book, Violet and Klaus come up with a brilliant plan to escape him, or to defeat him, but they always just barely manage to escape, and usually through some plot twist that doesn’t even come from their ideas. Ask a child who loves the series and they’ll tell you that Count Olaf is a great guy. He’s the winner, and who doesn’t love a winner? He never gets his heart broken, he is never sad, dejected, or lonely. He never cries himself to sleep. Violet and Klaus and Sunny survive, but in such abject misery that no one in their right mind would choose to be them. No child looks at Violet and says: “Look how beneficial it is to study and be smart and invent things.” No. The lesson is that no matter how smart you are, no matter how hard you work, the bad guys are always smarter, and will come out on top because evil pays. That is the overall message of these books.
Do you think children understand this? Let me share a story. As an author of a children’s adventure book for reluctant readers, I am often asked to speak at schools. I was recently explaining about heroes to a group of kids in an elementary school in Parker, Colorado, when a young girl raised her hand. She was a cheerful and sweet little girl with long blonde pigtails. I called on her.
“What about evil? I like books where evil wins,” she asked me. I stood speechless as the teacher explained with a laugh that, not to worry, her student was currently enjoying the Lemony Snicket books.
There are places where evil wins, but that place should not be in our children’s hearts. Want to share a wonderful tale with your children that teaches them that evil doesn’t pay? Read Holes by Louis Sachar or A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle.
I hope you’ve enjoyed my list. Which books did you despise as a youngster or love with all your heart? We all want to give our children the love of reading by sharing books with them that will encourage and inspire them, and avoid the books that don’t. Happy reading!
There are two schools of thought on this, and both have their pros and cons, and not every family will be the same, you may have to try both approaches to see which works best.
I like the idea of not necessarily creating the “forbidden fruit” of censorship, because if they want to, they will find a way to read it.
My approach is to explain to them why I believe a book, movie, or some teaching I don’t particularly agree with, is wrong and offer alternatives...If you do it the right way, it helps them to develop the one thing they need to have to succeed in life, a good “BS Detector.”
The Red Pony is a classic that should be read. I have never heard of it being assigned before senior high school where it is an appropriate read.
Island of the Blue Dolphin is just trash and shouldn’t be read by anyone.
Lemony Snickett is fun mostly for boys of the middle school years and her recommendation of A Wrinkle in Time is better suited again for high schoolers.
The other books I am unfamiliar with. Parents would do well to have their children read age appropriate classics ( where classic usually means things like Treasure Island, anything by Milne, Rudyard Kipling, Dr. Seuss, etc etc)
That’s what my parents did too. But my mother had this trick that I didn’t catch on to until I was nearly an adult. we had books everywhere (lots and lots of book cases crammed full of every type of reading material). Up on the top shelves were books carefully hidden so as not to draw attention to them. Those are the ones I went for. Read them voraciously. In my later teens I realized that the stuff I shouldn’t have read at a younger age were all on the bottom shelves and easily available. The books that were geared for my younger mind were the ones ‘secretly’ hidden away to make them more enticing and ‘taboo’. When I asked her about it, other just smiled and said ‘You read some fine literature’
“The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”
Oh, Hell yes. Again and again.
If you are recommending Tolkien then be sure to add Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia (though I consider those to be more appropriate for middle school and up)
I would add to this list (not that I necessarily concur with this particular list) Harriet the Spy.
It’s a “beloved classic”. But it starts with a note saying “Jesus hates you” and goes on to tell the story of a little girl who has what is essentially a nervous breakdown.
I remember as a kid how that book made me feel rather anxious and uneasy.
I'm sure you mean The Long Secret, also by the same author, Louise Fitzhugh.
That was far and away one of my favorite books. It addresses some pretty heavy themes: what is the nature of God? What does it mean to know God? Why is there injustice in the world? What does it mean to (physically) grow up? What is the nature of love and romance?
And finally: How does one deal with an evil parent? (Our heroine Beth Ellen Hansen wins in the end.)*
Great book, and as an adult I still love it.
SPOILER SPACE
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Yes, in the end we find out the identity of the person leaving the very angry (incisive, passive-aggressive) notes, but it is part of a long-overdue temper tantrum that results in eventual release from an evil and destructive parent, so the initial angry note should be taken in that context, I think.
It’s not censorship when a parent guides a child’s education. Censorship is a govt transgression.
There’s a lot of stuff to read out there and kids have no clue what is garbage and what is not. I spent too much time ingesting books with a liberal themes...I wish my parents bad steered me toward more wholesome literature so I wouldn’t have had to spend so much time later unraveling the junk I picked up.
A parent’s job is guidance...why wouldn’t that include reading?
Parents need not fear that and they should be overjoyed that their child has chosen to read as opposed to watching the dreck that is on television or getting engrossed in those infernal video games.
I have always encouraged my children to read. I've never snatched books away from them or lectured them on their choice of reading material.
When I was a child, I would read comic books, MAD Magazine and science fiction that many parents at the time forbade their children to have. I was allowed to read them to my heart's content and eventually I became bored with them. Eventually, I started reading real literature like Jack London, Mark Twain and Charles Dickens, not because my school teachers assigned it to me but because I had developed a love of reading and appreciated good writing. Yes, I also read some sexually explicit novels and even Playboy magazines as I reached puberty. But because it was not "forbidden fruit", it didn't have much appeal and I grew out of it quickly.
Me too. I’m re-reading ‘Tarzan of the Apes” after 40 or so years, after re-reading John Carter of Mars, following the movie.
There is a definite difference in books, reading as a man rather than a ten year old boy.
This is a note from Tar-zan/”White-skin” to Jane Porter after Tarzan has discovered she has defeated him.
“I am Tarzan of the Apes. I am yours. You are mine. .... Tarzan of the Apes loves you.”
Keep in mind that he cannot speak English, only write, but that’s quite a lot more than: “Me Tarzan. You Jane.”
Lemony Snicket ping….
Robert McCloskey is such a good illustrator as well.
I have to agree with Hatchet over Island of the Blue Dolphins. Gary Paulsen is quite an outdoorsman, and many of the events that the protagonist, an adolescent boy named Brian Robeson, experiences were based on Paulsen’s own adventures in the outdoors.
It is apolitical, but I still consider it conservative, in that it emphasizes self reliance, inventiveness, and hard work.
Some of the premises in the book are a little bit on the unbelieveable side at times, but not so much that they are out of the realm of possibility.
Even as an adult, I really got into the book. My students absolutely love it.
My wife went to Catholic school and between the nuns and her strict mother, she was turned off from reading forever. Instead she watches garbage on television.
I was blessed in that I had complete freedom as a child with respect to reading material. If I had a book in my hand, my mother was happy. Yes, I was exposed to some "inappropriate" content from time to time but all that did was help me become a more discriminate reader.
Do your children attend public school?
I am not sure that censorship is wrong, and I am a voracious reader.
The right book at the right time is fine, and since there is a lot of published garbage, a good discussion after a child reads the book at the right time is invaluable.
Me too, but it wasn't the result of being allowed or prohibited from reading anything.
I learned the love of reading on my own, and have read 30 to 80 books a year, both fiction and non fiction.
I never directed my daughter to read, but I did read to her in early life, and by example she picked up on it.
One Friday evening, when she was ten, I handed her a copy of Rendezvous with Rama, by Arthur C. Clark. By Sunday afternoon she asked for another similar book.
The imagination of children and hunger for knowledge is totally underrated, when cultivated from birth.
I guess so. I had forgotten I read the Long Secret.
I still have the same opinion.
As an adult reading about Fitzhugh it is understandable how her books would be uncormfatble in this manner.
you say kids go bad “from external factors”
but reading books that corrupt a kid’s morals or spiritual life is not an “external factor”?
Kids don’t go bad because of something they read. Those that go bad are either genetically predisposed to go that way or have other external factors that make it happen.
Reading is good. Totally good.
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Reading is not totally good. That is a empty statement.
There are things that are horrific out there that no child should be reading. A number of people “went bad” after reading Marx, Engles, Trotsky.
Learning judgment and discernment is just as important as reading.
I can't think of a single Steinbeck work that wasn't depressing. Not one of them has the slightest sense of hope or redemption.
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