Children’s Books That Are Really for Adults

A book for children can transport the young reader to other places and times. Or it can help an immature reader to step into the shoes of an older person and vicariously experience their excitement and intrigues.

But there are fables for adults too. Some may be disguised as children’s tales, with an innocent narrator who tells us far more by what they leave out than what they describe.

Alternatively, a child narrator can offer us a satirical viewpoint by their naïve interpretation of events. This wide-eyed perspective in a challenging landscape may present the adult reader with an ironic tale with lessons far beyond the years of the tale teller.

In later stages of high school, some of these books can be an ideal entry point for a young adult reader to advance into more mature and sophisticated literature.

Here are our top 20 picks for children’s books that are really intended for adults. As you can see, we have a number of them already in our catalogue:

 

1. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

2. The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker

3. Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll [B0430]

4. Animal Farm by George Orwell [B0071]

5. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

6. The Book Thief  by Markus Zuzak [B1995]

7. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne

8. Canada by Richard Ford

9. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon [B1816]

10. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery [B2046]

11. Jim the Boy by Tony Earley

12. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini [B1860]

13. Lord of the Flies by William Golding

14. The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers

15. Perfect by Rachel Joyce

16. Room by Emma Donoghue [B2110]

17. The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd [B2005]

18. The Shadow of the Wind by Carols Ruiz Zafon

19. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee [B0037]

20. What Maisie Knew by Henry James

What do you think? What other books could we add to this list?