Reddit reviews The Dangerous Book for Boys

These are fantastic

http://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Book-Boys-Conn-Iggulden/dp/0062208977/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1344375194&sr=8-1&keywords=the+dangerous+book+for+boys

http://www.amazon.com/Daring-Book-Girls-Andrea-Buchanan/dp/0061472573/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b

I don't know a lot of titles for the youngest ages, though the Junie B. Jones and Magic Treehouse books are favorites of my mother's elementary-aged students. Speaking of magic, you can't go wrong with The Magic Schoolbus. Oh! And Where the Wild Things Are.

As suggested by /u/jpop23mn, the Berenstein Bears are great books for young readers (I loved them so much as a kid), and Dr. Seuss is classic.

For middle-schoolers, I recall enjoying Maniac Magee (though I don't recall much about it), lots of Bruce Coville's monster books, the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series, and one of my favorites, The Phantom Tollbooth. My sister enjoyed the Warriors series (and still reads them now as a college student). Then there's classics like Where the Red Fern Grows and Bridge to Terabithia, though those books cover some difficult subject matter (death).

Ghost stories are much beloved, and if you can find folklore and fable specific to various cultures, you can learn about other cultures while enjoying a good story!

Some other fantastic books to have around are The Daring Book for Girls and The Dangerous Book for Boys, both of which teach all kinds of fantastic information and skills while also being entertaining. I especially urge you to get the Daring Book for Girls if you have a daughter, because it not only teaches useful skills like changing tires and woodworking, but it also teaches about strong, independent, successful women through history. It promotes independence, self-esteem and self-confidence, which (in my opinion) are vital to any young person's upbringing, but especially women, since so much of the media and society seems bent on making women insecure, dependent and subservient. (Please excuse my politics.)

The Chronicles of Narnia are fantastic, if you don't mind that they're a religious allegory. When I was a kid, I read them for fun, and didn't give a damn about the religious aspect. (I'm agnostic.) Another good series is the Dark Materials series, though some parents avoid it because of Pullman's anti-religious sentiments. Again, I didn't care about that, I just enjoyed a good story.

Hopefully, with a big enough selection of books, your kids will be able to choose their own books by high school. But it's still nice to keep around some young adult and adult novels for the kids to explore. The Dragonlance novels are fantasy novels set in a D&D-inspired world, but this setting has more of a chivalric, idealistic mood, which is good for young adult readers as well as adults. You've also got the Harry Potter series, which is kind of a given...

The challenge is finding adult novels that are appropriate for your kids. If you are trying to avoid exposing your children to certain ideas before a certain age, then you'll have to personally read and consider each book before you put it on their shelf. If you're the kind of parent who allows their kid to read what they want to read, doing your best to answer their questions and put the stories into context, then it's a little easier. If your kid reads Jurassic Park, they're going to be exposed to an awful lot of violence, but they're also going to learn some fascinating scientific information as well. Crichton's books are science-fiction with a strong scientific background, so they're educational as well as thrilling, but they've got adult themes that might be better for more mature readers. (That being said, I was reading them at a young age.)

I hope this is a decent start. There are lots of good lists online, too. I'd suggest checking out GoodReads and various Amazon lists. Just remember that it's up to you to choose what you want your kids to be exposed to.

Edit: As a male, I have a distinct lack of experience with books aimed at young females. I would like to think that a good book can be enjoyed by boys and girls alike, but some books have more of a gender-focus than others.

If he's big on reading, I absolutely adore The Dangerous Book for Boys. It has a tremendous amount of amazing things to do and read about. It's not aimed at combatting toxic masculinity, but it presents itself as a work for boys in a very non-toxic way.

• The Daring Book for Girls
  
• The Dangerous Book for Boys
  
  Check the "Customers Who Bought This Also Bought" section for lots of fun stuff.

The Dangerous Book For Boys

And then the things they will need to work on all the projects. (Most others have mentioned most of the tools)

Included stuff.....

>The completely revised American Edition includes:

The Greatest Paper Airplane in the World

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

The Five Knots Every Boy Should Know

Stickball

Slingshots

Fossils

Building a Treehouse*

Making a Bow and Arrow

Fishing (revised with US Fish)

Timers and Tripwires

Baseball's "Most Valuable Players"

Famous Battles-Including Lexington and Concord, The Alamo, and Gettysburg

Spies-Codes and Ciphers

Making a Go-Cart

Navajo Code Talkers' Dictionary

Girls

Cloud Formations

The States of the U.S.

Mountains of the U.S.

Navigation

The Declaration of Independence

Skimming Stones

Making a Periscope

The Ten Commandments

Common US Trees

Timeline of American History

There are some others that amazon suggests if you want to grab a couple

Might I recommend: For Boys
And For Girls

I have two nieces and two nephews.

Also, might I suggest this book. I give it a solid recommendation!
https://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Book-Boys-Conn-Iggulden/dp/0062208977

I remember years ago when "The Dangerous Book for Boys" came out there was some uproar that galled at the concept of a book just for bys and decrying it for not being a unisex book. Yet there are tens of thousands of 'girls only' books on the market.

I'm fine with a book being targeted at just one gender, its a fact that we live in a gendered society. The hormones coursing through our veins make us have different emotions and drives. How we are raised also to a huge extent shapes our desires and emotions. A girl can be whatever she wants and is accepted, she can be prissy or a tomboy and they won't be ostracized at all. Boys on the other hand are conditioned to not show weakness or be soft, otherwise they are picked on, made fun of, or even punished f or acting outside of the 'norm'.

Where am I going with this? I don't know, but this is the society we have and if a bokk wants to target men, I'm fine with it.

One if my favorites:

The Dangerous Book for Boys https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062208977/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_QhQ7BbP4JGEFP

[The Dangerous Book for Boys.] ( http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0062208977/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/185-6547800-0282416) It taught me so many things that I never needed to know.

I have this book even though I'm a lady! Haha! Itself got a bunch of facts and info in it. Fun book. Might be a better one to own in hard back though