Hello!

It is SUMMER!! (Cue all my lovely friends in the Midwest saying, “Summer? Oh, yeah, I’ve heard of it!”)

But, after a very cold winter and spring, I think that summer is finally here! And what better way to spend some free summer days than to unleash your inner bookworm and read! That’s certainly my plan, so I thought I’d share a list of some good books I’ve read to give you some recommendations!

FANTASY

• The Door Within trilogy by Wayne Thomas Batson. I discovered these wonderful books at my church library a couple years ago. Pulling them off the shelf for a quick skim, I soon got lost in them and had to buy them! These books are a Christian allegory.
• The Berinfell Prophecies series by Wayne Thomas Batson and Christopher Hopper. After getting these recommended to me by my friends, I finally listened to the audiobooks of the first two books and loved them!! I got the third book for Christmas after dropping some not-so-subtle hints to my parents. 🙂 I love, love these books, but because these can get pretty intense, I wouldn’t recommend these books to anyone under 12.
• The Wingfeather Saga by Andrew Peterson. Read these. Read them now. 🙂 🙂 I’m not trying to be pushy, but these books are AMAZING!!! I just finished these, and I absolutely LOVED them.
• The Songkeeper Chronicles by Gillian Bronte Adams. I recently discovered these fantasy books by a young author, and they are wonderful.
• The Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien and The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. These might seem like a no-brainer to put on here, but you should really read them if you haven’t. If you want classic examples of heroism, love, sacrifice, bravery, and friendship, read these classic fantasies.
• The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander. Actually, I heard about these books from a school worksheet when I was in 4th grade! 🙂 They are also wonderful, classic fantasies. They are heavily based off of Welsh mythology and do contain some magic from that mythology, so these may not be for you if you’re uncomfortable with any magic.
• The Prince Warriors series (and the sequel, The Winter War) by Priscilla Shirer and Gina Detwiler. My sister and I actually gave these books to my brother for Christmas one year, but as soon as he read them, I stole them from him and devoured them. I loved them so much that I immediately started fangirling when I found there was a sequel and bought it BEFORE THE RELEASE DATE on Walmart.com!
• The Jack Staples series by Mark Batterson and Joel N. Clark. These books are really good. Really, really good. The authors wrote them to be a partial Christian allegory in an extremely creative way. This is another set of books that I wouldn’t recommend to anyone under 12 because of some mildly gory descriptions and violence.
• The Dreamtreaders trilogy by Wayne Thomas Batson. I received these books for Christmas and read all three in less than a week. I loved them. They are a little weird, but it’s a creative, interesting, good kind of weird. (Make sense? 😉
• The Green Ember series by S.D. Smith. These. Are. So. Amazing. My family reads these aloud together, and we all love them. They’re middle-grade books, but I love them, my parents love them, and so many of my teenage friends love them. Read them. Then come fangirl with me.
• The Knights of Arrethtrae series by Chuck Black. I have to admit, I wouldn’t recommend these books so much for their stories as for their themes, although the stories are interesting. But if you’re the kind of person who loves to see applicable themes in stories and loves to think deeper, these books are for you.

I have sooo many fantasy books that I love, but that should suffice for now. 🙂

CONTEMPORARY (honestly, I don’t know if all of these fit into this category *exactly*, but here goes)

• Red Rock Mysteries by Jerry B. Jenkins and Chris Fabry. I love these books so much. They focus on 13-year-old twins figuring out middle school and life while also solving super intriguing, suspenseful mysteries.
• The Cooper Kids Adventures series by Frank E. Peretti. I first read these when I was around 10-11. I loved them then, and I love them now. They’re fairly short books, but they are so suspenseful and amazing with strong Christian protagonists and themes. I wouldn’t recommend these to kids under 10 because of some creepy elements (and I’d wait a couple years to read book 6 because it’s pretty creepy for younger kids).
• The Wars of the Realm trilogy by Chuck Black. These are a mix of science fiction and contemporary. I was a little skeptical of these because I’m not usually into supernatural books, but they are very well-thought-out and contain biblical references from which the author drew his connections.
• Holly’s Heart series by Beverly Lewis. I found these at my church library and liked them a lot! The characters are so real, and they are in no way perfect but realistically flawed. I really enjoy these books, but at the same time I don’t agree with every perspective presented on teen dating or teen girls having boyfriends. So, if you read these, just keep that in mind. Maybe you’ll agree with the author’s views on that sort of thing, and maybe you won’t. I just wanted to point that out. 🙂

HISTORICAL

• The Lost Girl of Astor Street by Stephanie Morrill. I follow the blog Go Teen Writers, hosted by three wonderful Christian authors, one of them being Stephanie Morrill. I went to the library and checked out TLGOAS, and I recently finished it. It’s good, and I enjoyed it, but I would recommend it to girls age 15 and up because of some content that would be too heavy for younger readers. (This is a YA book, so it makes sense.)
• Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes. This is probably my favorite historical fiction book! It follows a young silversmith’s apprentice living in Boston during the time of the Revolutionary War. I love how this book perfectly balances Johnny’s own story with historical events.
• Born Again by Charles W. Colson. This is actually a nonfiction book that I read for school last year, and I absolutely loved it. It was so convicting, inspiring, and enlightening because I learned so much about Watergate and the other events during Nixon’s presidency. This is NOT a light or short read, but it’s worth the time. I would not recommend this book to anyone under 14.
• The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom. Do not read this nonfiction book unless you want to think deeply, be inspired, and be convicted. I read The Hiding Place in 8th grade, and it was one of my favorite books of the year. Again, I would not recommend this for anyone under 14.

NONFICTION

• Secret Keeper by Dannah Gresh. If you are a teen girl who wants to honor God with the way you dress, READ THIS BOOK!! I read it probably fifteen times before buying my own copy. It’s a super quick, easy read and such an encouragement to the teen girl who’s struggling with dressing modestly. It helped me so much, and it made me want to share this book with every teen girl. 🙂

I honestly have not read much nonfiction, but there are a few books that I’ve received over the years (e.g., Do Hard Things, This Changes Everything, and A Young Woman After God’s Own Heart) sitting on my shelves that I intend to read this summer!

I hope you enjoy this list and that you’ll be able to find something of interest to you! (Also, I understand that not everyone has the same “book rating system” that I do when I say that I wouldn’t recommend certain books to people under a certain age, so please research them and discover if they’re right for you!)

Your turn! What are some books that you want to read this summer? Do you have any recommendations for me? Tell me in the comments!