Home > Kids' Page > Booklists > 5th - 6th Grade Booklist

Alton, Steve. THE MALIFEX.
While Sam and his parents are on vacation in southern England , Sam accidentally awakens Amergin, apprentice of the wizard, Merlin, and begins an age-old battle against the evil Malifex. ( Fantasy )

Balliet, Blue. CHASING VERMEER.
When seemingly unrelated and strange events start to happen and a precious Vermeer painting disappears, eleven-year-olds Petra and Calder combine their talents to solve an international art scandal. ( Mystery)

Bauer, Joan. STAND TALL.
Tree, a six-foot-three-inch twelve-year-old, copes with his parents' recent divorce and his failure as an athlete by helping his grandfather, a Vietnam vet and recent amputee, and Sophie, a new girl at school. (Realistic Fiction)

Choldenko, Gennifer. AL CAPONE DOES MY SHIRTS.
It is 1935 and 12-year-old Moose Flanagan is forced to move to Alcatraz Island when his father takes a new job as a prison guard and electrician. Among the prisoners is the notorious criminal, Al Capone. ( Historical Fiction )

Creech, Sharon. HEARTBEAT.
In a series of poems, twelve year old Annie, talks about her life. She writes about running, her mother's pregnancy, her grandfather's ailing health, her best friend Max, and all of the different ways an apple can change. ( Realistic Fiction)

Dale, Anna. WHISPERING TO WITCHES.
In Joe Binks' first encounter with witches, he is bewitched into getting off at the wrong station during a train ride in England . He becomes friends with Twiggy, a witch-in-training and gets involved in trying to find the missing page of the greatest magic book in history. ( Fantasy )

Danziger, Paula and Martin, Ann M. P.S. LONGER LETTER LATER.
Elizabeth 's best friend, Tara-Starr moves to another state and the two girls continue their friendship by writing letters throughout the year. Read their letters to find out their new problems and how they solve them. ( Realistic Fiction)

Farmer, Nancy. THE SEA OF TROLLS.
Mythology, as well as history, is used to create this exciting adventure set in 793 A.D. Viking "berserkers" kidnap Jack, an apprentice wizard, and his sister Lucy. On his quest to save his sister's life, Jack discovers worlds he never knew existed. (Fantasy)

Frost, Helen. SPINNING THROUGH THE UNIVERSE: A NOVEL IN POEMS FROM ROOM 214.
A collection of poems written in the voices of Mrs. Williams, her fifth grade students, and a custodian about their interactions with each other, their families, and the world around them. Each different poetic form is explained in detail in a "Notes on Forms" section at the end of the book. (School Story)

Hannigan, Katherine. IDA B…AND HER PLANS TO MAXIMIZE FUN, AVOID DISASTER AND (POSSIBLY) SAVE THE WORLD.
Ida B is very happy being home schooled and spending her free time outdoors talking to the brook and the trees. Suddenly, her whole life changes when her mother gets cancer. Ida B now has to go to public school and her parents are forced to sell a part of the orchard to pay for medical bills. (Realistic Fiction))

Henkes, Kevin. OLIVE'S OCEAN.
Twelve-year-old Martha's Cape Cod vacation is haunted by a journal entry left be a dead classmate. Martha also deals with her relationship to her grandmother, her feelings for an older boy and her plans to be a writer. (Realistic Fiction)

Hickman, Janet. RAVINE
Ulf and Jeremy both live near a ravine, but in different worlds and different times. When the portal invisibly opens, Jeremy and his dog Dutchess find they are in Ulf's world, where ancient warriors are battling in a war. ( Fantasy )

Ibbotson, Eva. THE SECRET OF PLATFORM 13.
When the door to the magic island finally opens after nine years, a strange group of rescuers goes in search of their kidnapped prince. Over the next nine days the rescuers must find him or else the door to the Island will close for another 9 years. ( Fantasy )

Konigsburg, E. L. THE OUTCASTS OF 19 SCHUYLER PLACE.
This book is a companion novel to Silent to the Bone. When her parents go to Peru , twelve-year-old Margaret Rose is "dumped" at the hated Camp Telequa . Fortunately, her two eccentric great-uncles rescue her but little does she know that her uncles themselves are in need of rescue. (Realistic Fiction)

Lubar, David. FLIP.
Eighth grade twins Taylor and Ryan find a mysterious disk that allows them to be transformed into legendary figures from the past but they find out that it's being yourself that is really hard. ( Fantasy)

Martin, Ann. HERE TODAY.
Eleven-year-old Ellie Dingman is taking care of her younger brother and sister while her mother tries to break into show business. To make matters worse, Ellie is forced to deal with being an outcast at school. ( School Story)

McCutchen, H. L. LIGHTLAND.
Join Lottie and her best friend Lewis as they travel to Lightland, a magical land of memories. They confront the dreaded Night King in an effort to save the kingdom from his rule. ( Fantasy )

McMullan Margaret. HOW I FOUND THE STRONG: A CIVIL WAR STORY.
In the spring of 1861, ten-year-old Shanks wishes he could fight in the Civil War with his father and 14-year-old brother. As the story progresses, the sometimes graphic telling of the horrors of this war has Shanks thinking differently. (Historical Fiction)

Nimmo, Jenny. MIDNIGHT FOR CHARLIE BONE. Children of the Red King. Book 1.
Charlie, a descendant of the Red King, discovers he can hear voices when he looks at a photograph and his life changes forever. He is now forced to attend Bloor's Academy for gifted children where the other students also have mysterious powers. ( Fantasy )

Orlev, Uri. RUN, BOY, RUN.
This is an extraordinary account of one boy's survival of the Holocaust. Srulik is only eight years old when he finds himself all alone in the Warsaw Ghetto. He escapes into the countryside where he spends many years hiding, and despite the odds, he miraculously survives. ( Historical Fiction)

Patneaude, David. COLDER THAN ICE.
Josh Showalter, an insecure and overweight sixth-grader, hopes for a new start when he transfers to a school in northern Idaho , but he and his new friends are soon the target of a cold-hearted bully. (School Story)

Paulsen, Gary. HOW ANGEL PETERSON GOT HIS NAME.
This is a book of short stories about Gary Paulsen's life growing up in the late 1940's and early 1950's. The stories tell about the small town adventures he had with his friends when he was approximately 13 years old. ( Biography)

Philbrick, Rodman. THE YOUNG MAN AND THE SEA.
After his mother's death, twelve-year-old Skiff Beaman decides that it is up to him to earn money to take care of himself and his father, so he undertakes a dangerous trip alone out on the ocean off the coast of Maine to try to catch a huge bluefin tuna. (Adventure)

Ryan, Pam Munoz. BECOMING NAOMI LEON.
Gram, Naomi and Owen live at Avocado Acres Trailer Rancho and are quite happy until her absent mother resurfaces to claim her. Naomi runs away with her great-grandmother and younger brother to look for their father. ( Realistic Fiction) 

Snyder, Zilpha Keatley. THE GHOSTS OF RATHBURN PARK.
Lost in the woods of Rathburn Park , eleven-year-old Matthew weighs the odds of dying from thirst, embarrassment, or at the hands of the forest's reputed ghostly inhabitants. (Mystery)

Spinelli, Jerry. MILKWEED.
In this story of heartbreak, hope and survival, Misha, an orphan in Nazi-occupied Warsaw during World War II, befriends a Jewish girl and her family. (Historical Fiction)

Weeks, Sarah. SO B. IT.
After spending her life with her mentally retarded mother and agora phobic neighbor, twelve-year-old Heidi sets out from Reno , Nevada , to New York to find out who she is.(Mystery)

Wetter, Bruce. THE BOY WITH THE LAMPSHADE ON HIS HEAD.
Shy fifth-grader Stanley Krakow spends his time trying not to be noticed and pretending to be a superhero or a record-breaking athlete, until one day he meets someone who really needs him to be a hero.

Wilhelm, Doug. THE REVEALERS.
Tired of being bullied and picked on, three seventh-grade outcasts join forces and, using scientific methods and the power of the Internet, begin to create a new atmosphere at Parkland Middle School .

Willner-Pardo, Gina. MY MOM AND OTHER MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE.
Eleven-year-old Arlie is troubled by the sudden arrival of a new girl in school with an uncanny resemblance to Arlie's mother, who is in a coma after an automobile accident. (Fantasy)

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