Best Books for a Nine Year Old Boy (This Week)

That title may be a bit misleading. I am going to tell you about the books my son enjoyed this week, not necessarily the best in his whole life. My husband recently posited a theory that I would get more readers if my posts had the word "best" in the titles. I titled this one to humor him, but if I really wanted to use the titles to gain readers, you would now be reading a post entitled "Banish Cellulite Forever" or "Easy, Delicious Meals in Ten Minutes or Less." As I am clearly unqualified to write about either of those topics, let me tell you about J.C. Greenburg's Andrew Lost books instead.
My son Aaron spent this past week enjoying the first three books in this series. He is a very strong reader and the reading level, probably about second grade, was not challenging for him, but he loved the subject matter. In the first book, Andrew Lost On the Dog, Andrew builds a shrinking machine which accidentally shrinks Andrew, his cousin Judy, and his robot Thudd down to tiny specks. The specks end up in the nose of the neighbor's dog. So begins a race against time to get back to normal. Aaron loved the plot, the gross details, and the four pages of related facts (about dogs and fleas) at the back of the book. Each book has a cliffhanger ending leading to the next, a style to which Aaron is unaccustomed. He's not sure if he likes it or not, saying that it is good if you have the next book, but "it stinks" if you don't. Luckily we had the next two books, Andrew Lost In the Bathroom and Andrew Lost In the Kitchen to keep him occupied in his downtime this week. We'll have to see if the library has more in the series. These are a good choice for readers who enjoy science and adventure.