Here are 100 books that Diary Of A Wimpy Kid fans have personally recommended if you like
Diary Of A Wimpy Kid.
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I started drawing comics in the first grade and have never stopped. My syndicated comic strip, Cow & Boy, ran for eight years, and now I write and draw the middle-grade fantasy series Quest Kids. I am so fortunate to have cobbled together my love of comics into a career and to have been inspired by so many talented people along the way. Below is a collection of some of the best.
My newspaper comic strip had just finished its run, and I was looking for my next big thing. That’s when I came across Diary of a Wimpy Kid.
The drawings were simple and hilarious, and the clever writing didn’t seem to be just for kids. Greg Heffley has this flawed prickly everyman edge which makes him easy to identify with. But as good as this book and series are, I was more impressed with the new way Jeff Kinney had found to sneak comics into chapter books.
The launch of an exciting and innovatively illustrated new series narrated by an unforgettable kid every family can relate to
It's a new school year, and Greg Heffley finds himself thrust into middle school, where undersized weaklings share the hallways with kids who are taller, meaner, and already shaving. The hazards of growing up before you're ready are uniquely revealed through words and drawings as Greg records them in his diary.
In book one of this debut series, Greg is happy to have Rowley, his sidekick, along for the ride. But when Rowley's star…
I’ve always been fascinated by family dynamics and have studied human development and psychology. I’m also a lifelong voracious reader and treasure my childhood reading experiences. Last but not least, I have three kids. Arguments and hurt feelings are inevitable but kids don’t love a lecture. A good story can bring understanding without being boring or pedantic. And we all know reading with your kids at bedtime is vital, but can’t we as parents ask for a little enjoyment too–maybe even a good laugh?!
The second in a long-running graphic novel series, middle schooler Greg Heffley is tormented by his older brother Rodrick who is threatening to reveal his most guarded secret, but readers are delighted every step of the way.
When my kids would choose this graphic novel to read with me at night, I knew we’d both be shaking with laughter. This is an especially great choice to lure reluctant readers – mine devoured each new one in the series and can’t get enough. The movies are hilarious too!
The highly anticipated sequel to the #1 NEW YORK TIMES bestselling book!
Secrets have a way of getting out, especially when a diary is involved.
Whatever you do, don't ask Greg Heffley how he spent his summer vacation, because he definitely doesn't want to talk about it.
As Greg enters the new school year, he's eager to put the past three months behind him . . . and one event in particular.
Unfortunately for Greg, his older brother, Rodrick, knows all about the incident Greg wants to keep under wraps. But secrets have a way of getting out . .…
I have always been a romantic at heart, although it took time for me to realize and act on this as I was conditioned from an early age to be scholarly and rational (life-allowing). One of my favorite silent films as a teenager was a love story that focuses on a forbidden relationship between a British girl and a Chinese man at the turn of the twentieth century, called Broken Blossoms; it left an indelible impression. Eventually, I myself became involved in a life-changing romantic relationship with a Chinese man. I now love exploring the vicissitudes of the human heart at the crossroads of cultural differences in my writing.
This book is indeed a “creation of comic genius,” as Nick Hornby blurbed. The movie didn’t do anything for me; I found Renée Zellweger quite blah, and Hugh Grant was playing the British cad as usual. However, the book was so funny I had a hard time putting it down.
Basically, it is about Bridget, a British “Everywoman” who falls into the clutches of her slimy boss, Daniel, while on a quest for the traditional Holy Grail of womanhood—true love. One of the things I most enjoyed about this chick-lit classic was the rather graphic booze-and-smoking sessions, as well as the eccentric minor characters, especially Bridget’s mother. My mother is also a maverick and very much a free spirit, so this really resonated with me.
A dazzlingly urban satire on modern relationships? An ironic, tragic insight into the demise of the nuclear family? Or the confused ramblings of a pissed thirty-something?
As Bridget documents her struggles through the social minefield of her thirties and tries to weigh up the eternal question (Daniel Cleaver or Mark Darcy?), she turns for support to four indispensable friends: Shazzer, Jude, Tom and a bottle of chardonnay.
Welcome to Bridget's first diary: mercilessly funny, endlessly touching and utterly addictive.
Helen Fielding's first Bridget Jones novel, Bridget Jones's Diary, sparked a phenomenon that has seen…
I never actually stopped reading children’s literature. Even as a grown-up, I figured out a way to read picture books every day. After earning a master’s degree in education, I found myself back in the library reading to students. I love reading funny books; they are more engaging and more likely to get kids reading and keep them reading. I love humor and think it is perfect in the shorter format of picture books.
I love to read this as the school year is beginning. Children can identify with feeling different on the first day of school.
I love how Penelope (the main character who happens to be a T Rex) is blithely oblivious to the impact she has on the students around her. The tables are turned when she crosses paths with a hungry goldfish.
It's the first day of school for Penelope Rex, and she can't wait to meet her classmates. But it's hard to make human friends when they're so darn delicious! That is, until Penelope gets a taste of her own medicine and finds she may not be at the top of the food chain after all. . . . Readers will gobble up this hilarious new story from award-winning author-illustrator Ryan T. Higgins.
I was once a little girl who loved reading, and now I'm a mother who shares that passion with my kid. Over the past few years, I've been revisiting my own childhood favorites with him (it's been a serendipitous mix of work and pleasure as I was also researching a book on one of the all-time great children's book authors, Judy Blume). The novels I've recommended here are ones that seemed to spark pleasure in the most discerning—and honest—of audiences: an 8-year-old. And unlike some old books that will go unnamed, they didn't make me cringe as a 21st-century parent.
When I had my son almost nine years ago, I dreamed of the day I’d be able to share my favorite childhood books with him. Matilda, which I remembered as a riveting, oddball page-turner, did not disappoint. As I read to him, we cheered for tiny Matilda to topple the mythically bad school principal, Miss Trunchbull, and we laughed until we cried when Matilda’s mother scolded her kind-hearted teacher, Miss Honey, for reading too much.
We still quote the line to each other that cracked us up: “Looks is more important than books, Miss Hunky.” I don’t know why it’s so funny, my son said at the time, but it is.
12
authors picked
Matilda
as one of their favorite books, and they share
why you should read it.
This book is for kids age
8,
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10, and
11.
What is this book about?
Puffin Audiobooks presents Roald Dahl's Matilda, read by Kate Winslet. This audiobook features original music and sound design by Pinewood film studios.
Matilda Wormwood is an extraordinary genius with really stupid parents.
Miss Trunchbull is her terrifying headmistress who thinks all her pupils are rotten little stinkers.
But Matilda will show these horrible grown-ups that even though she's only small, she's got some very powerful tricks up her sleeve . . .
Kate Winslet's award-winning and varied career has included standout roles in Titanic, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Finding Neverland, Revolutionary Road and The Reader, for which she…
The heroes and heroines in the Seven Kingdoms Fairy Tales face challenges inspired by my own fears, like giving a presentation in the front of the class, getting lost in an unfamiliar place, finding my place in a new school, or working out how to be fair to my friends when we disagree about the rules. Fears tell us a boring life is “safe.” They hide our extraordinary life behind their backs. I write books for and about kids attempting things that are absolutely positively “not for them”. Because kids are the bravest people around. That’s why they’re so magical.
Another hilarious tale about trying something new!
Ten-year-old Zoe Elias sets out to find fame when she starts piano lessons, but the road to Carnegie Hall isn’t as straightforward as she expects. Then her Dad accidentally purchases an electric Hammond organ at the local shopping mall, Zoe is propelled into a whole new world.
I love the way her ambition gradually grows into compassion for others, and making music for the joy of it.
Ten-year-old Zoe Elias dreams of playing a baby grand piano at Carnegie Hall. But when Dad ventures to the music store and ends up with a wheezy organ instead of a piano, Zoe's dreams hit a sour note. Learning the organ versions of old TV theme songs just isn't the same as mastering Beethoven on the piano. And the organ isn't the only part of Zoe's life that's off-kilter, what with Mum constantly at work, Dad afraid to leave the house, and that odd boy, Wheeler Diggs, following her home from school every day. Yet when Zoe enters the annual…
Ever since we were kids, we associated the summer with voracious reading. We loved competing in those Summer Reading Challenges to see who could read the most while school was out. (Lauren often won; Rachel was a slower but equally enthusiastic reader.) As we grew up, we realized that a specific type of book exists that aligns with the summer mood–like a bikini, but make it literature. Summer reads can be emotional but not too heavy and contain moments of sadness without dragging us into the abyss. (For winter, we recommend the collected works of the Nobel Prize-winning Icelandic novelist Halldór Laxness.)
We have both been huge fans of Adelle Waldman since she came out with her whip-smart romantic satire, The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P, around a decade ago. Her follow-up, our last pick, was stunning to us, not only because it's so good but because it's inspiring to see how a writer doesn't have to get cornered in by the "brand" she unwittingly establishes when she publishes her debut.
This book is set a world away from the Brooklyn coffee shops and house parties that the Nathaniel P. literary hipsters frequent; it all takes place in a big box store in upstate New York called Town Square, which may as well be Target.
It makes you chuckle, think, and feel, largely due to its well-researched content. Waldman immersed herself in the world in which her new book is set, taking a job at Target while she was writing it.…
Every day at 3:55 a.m., members of Team Movement clock in for their shift at big-box store Town Square in a small upstate New York town. Under the eyes of a self-absorbed and barely competent boss, they empty the day's truck of merchandise, stock the shelves, and scatter before the store opens and customers arrive. Their lives follow a familiar if grueling routine, but their real problem is that Town Square doesn't schedule them for enough hours-most of them are barely getting by, even while working second or third jobs. When store manager Big Will announces he is leaving, the…
I was born and grew up in Seoul. My bestselling debut novel has been longlisted for the 2024 Women’s Prize for Fiction and the 2024 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize and shortlisted for the 2024 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing. My book is inspired by my great-aunt, one of the oldest women who had escaped alone from North Korea. It is available from Harper Perennial in the U.S. and Virago in the UK. The novel’s translations continue to meet readers worldwide, including in Italy, Romania, Greece, Denmark, Spain, Switzerland, and South Korea.
I both love and hate Zenia as a heroine in this witty, page-turning literary fiction by Atwood. Zenia is one of the cleverest and the most malicious female protagonists I’ve ever known: she constantly deceives her friends with her kaleidoscopic lies; she screws money out of them, and she even steals their men.
Would I want to be friends with her in real life? Probably not. But as a literary character, she stuns and captivates me and allows me to ponder the female transgression that lurks in all of us.
Zenia is beautiful, smart and greedy, by turns manipulative and vulnerable, needy and ruthless; a man's dream and a woman"s nightmare. She is also dead. Just to make sure Tony, Roz andd Charis are there for the funeral. But five years on, as the three women share an indulgent, sisterly lunch, the unthinkable happens; 'with waves of ill will flowing out of her like cosmic radiation', Zenia is back...
I was born and brought up in the north of England. I have a degree in English and taught English Literature to older teenagers for many years. The period between 14 and 19 is an age group that has always fascinated me. It’s a time when people are accumulating experience and trying to understand themselves and their lives. The books I’ve chosen all put young people in challenging situations and excel at showing how they respond, handling, in sensitive and insightful ways, the moods and tensions of growing up. Most of my own novels have young heroes and heroines, although they’re read by people of all ages.
I love this book, a beautiful celebration of young love set in the summer 1997.
It’s easy to identify with Charlie Lewis, his failed school career and his shambolic home life. He meets the rich and privileged Fran Fisher, whose background is totally different from his. The contrast between them is beautifully drawn and I felt for Charlie as he tentatively moved towards a girl he feels is out of his reach. His insecurity is moving.
The Romeo & Juliet link which is obvious from the title is well handled, enriching without being intrusive. There’s a heart-rending sense of nostalgia that reminds you of what it’s like to be trying to find your feet as a teenager.
“A tale of first love that hits all the right notes . . . [it] just might be the sweetest book to brighten your late summer.” —The Washington Post
"Dazzles with wit.”—People
From the bestselling author of One Day comes a bittersweet and brilliantly funny coming-of-age tale about the heart-stopping thrill of first love—and how one summer can forever change a life.
Now: On the verge of marriage and a fresh start, thirty-eight year old Charlie Lewis finds that he can’t stop thinking about the past, and the events of one particular summer.
I’ve been a fan of horror stories since I was a kid. As an introverted and shy kid, I used to joke with my best friend about how I felt like a ghost and wished I had the power to be invisible. After I became a children’s book author/illustrator, I became fascinated with ghost picture books and started collecting them. Ghost picture books not only fulfilled my spooky necessities but also gave me warmth and heartfelt emotions.
Rebecca Green is one of my favorite artists and storytellers. So, when I saw her debut author-illustrator picture book, I was so thrilled.
This book is one of the most adorable books I’ve ever read. Written in like a guide step-by-step style, I learned not only how to befriend a ghost, but the fantastic art is a feast to my eyes.
I love the limited palette and soft pastel tone in the book. It created a vintage and warm feeling for the story.
What do you do when you meet a ghost? One: Provide the ghost with some of its favourite snacks, like mud tarts and earwax truffles. Two: Tell your ghost bedtime stories (ghosts love to be read to). Three: Make sure no one mistakes your ghost for whipped cream or a marshmallow when you aren't looking! If you follow the essential tips in How to Make Friends With a Ghost, you'll learn how a ghost can be the perfect companion for rest of your life and beyond...
"Green's picture-book debut is a guidebook that will be useful for anyone lucky enough…
