Reading list
Three books this week, one for each age.
Week of 18 August 2026
Grades 4 to 9
Frindle
Andrew Clements
A grade five decides that a pen is now called a frindle, and the whole town has to argue about whether he is allowed. It reads in two evenings and it is secretly the best explanation of where words come from that a ten year old will ever get. Reluctant readers finish it, which is the hard part.
Link comingGrades 10 and 11
The Westing Game
Ellen Raskin
Sixteen strangers are named in a will and told that one of them is a murderer. It is a logic puzzle wearing a novel, and the reader is given every clue the characters get. Almost nobody assigns it any more, which is a shame, because a student who finishes it has practised deduction for two hundred pages without once being told that is what they were doing.
Link comingGrade 12
On Writing Well
William Zinsser
The best book in English on writing clearly, and the one a grade twelve writing university applications actually needs. Zinsser argues that clutter is the disease of bad prose and then removes it in front of you, sentence by sentence. Students who read chapter two write noticeably shorter and better essays afterwards.
Link coming
I read every book on this list. Wesley earns a small commission if you buy through these links. It costs you nothing and it never changes what gets recommended.