One of life’s very best pleasures (for any bookworm) is finding yourself 3 books deep into an amazing series.
You don’t have that same kind of anxiety about racing through the book because you know the story will continue on to another 3 books. Or perhaps it’s just me who starts to grieve the end of a book before I’ve even finished it?
Anyway, before I reveal a little too much about the inner workings of my mind, what about book series for 10 year olds?
A 10 year old who’s a reader will probably have a few series under their belt by this age. It might be the Magic Tree House books, Roald Dahl, Land of Roar or even The Faraway Tree Adventures.
Whatever it is, they will probably feel at home in a good series. And it definitely makes things easier when they have plenty of books to get stuck into instead of you having to brace yourself for when they inevitably finish their book on a Friday evening as you’re packing to go on holiday…
So here are five book series for 10 year olds that they can read in order without running out, all from our shelf for 10 year olds. Beetle Boy, Scarlet and Ivy, Warriors, Tales from the Five Kingdoms and Percy Jackson. Plus the ones you’ve already heard of, further down.
It took me a little time to become this kind of reader but I got there eventually and Judy Moody is the first series that I remember getting really stuck into. And then I went through Jacqueline Wilson like a plague of locusts. So I have a lot of sympathy for the parent standing in a bookshop thinking “but she’s read all of those”.
What a good series does for age 10
Book 1 has to be a great standalone. This is just in case the child who decides it’s not for them doesn’t feel like they’ve been cheated out of a good story when they don’t continue with the rest of the series.
But from then the reins can come off a little. Sometimes this leads to more and more world-building, which makes book 4 feel like stepping into another universe as opposed to reading another book 1 just with a different plot twist.
In my opinion, the most successful ones are the ones where the hero grows up as the reader does, which is why a series started at 10 can still be going at 12 (or 25 in the case of some of us).
For each of the five below I’ve said which book to start with, how many there are, and who it suits. I haven’t listed the running order. That’s on each author’s page.
Five book series for 10 year olds
Beetle Boy by M. G. Leonard
Beetle Boy
Start here if they liked Roald Dahl’s villains but want a longer story.
Darkus is miserable. His dad has disappeared, and now he’s living next door to the most disgusting neighbours ever. Then a giant beetle called Baxter comes to his rescue. Between them they set about solving the mystery of the disappearance, especially once links emerge to the cruel Lucretia Cutter and her taste for beetle jewellery. The answer might be inside a coffee-mug mountain that’s home to a million insects, if Darkus and Baxter are brave enough to go in.
Book 1 of a trilogy (Revenge of the Beetle Queen is next), and it gets darker as it goes. A 10 year old is the right age to start. It’s British and funny, and gross in places in the way 10 year olds like.
The Lost Twin (Scarlet and Ivy) by Sophie Cleverly
Scarlet and Ivy 1 – The Lost Twin
For the Malory Towers reader who wants a real mystery in it.
When troublesome Scarlet mysteriously disappears from Rookwood School, terrifying Miss Fox invites her quiet twin sister Ivy to take her place. Ivy reluctantly agrees, hoping to find out what happened. Only at Rookwood can she unlock the secrets of Scarlet’s disappearance, through a trail of diary pages hidden all over the school. Can she solve it before Miss Fox suspects? Or before something worse turns up?
Six books, and The Whispers in the Walls is book 2. When they’ve read all six, I’ve got a whole list of books like Scarlet and Ivy waiting.
Warriors: Into the Wild by Erin Hunter
Warriors 1 – Into the Wild
An animal story, but with proper fighting and death in it. Not one for the squeamish.
For generations, four Clans of wild cats have shared the forest according to the laws laid down by their warrior ancestors. But ThunderClan is in grave danger, the sinister ShadowClan grows stronger every day, and noble warriors are dying, some of them more mysteriously than others. Into all this walks an ordinary house cat called Rusty, who may turn out to be the bravest warrior of them all.
Fair warning, this series is enormous. It runs to dozens of books and gets darker, so it’s one to start at 10 and still be reading at 12. Fire and Ice is book 2. If they get to the end and want more cats, books like Warrior Cats is where I’d go next.
The Robe of Skulls (Tales from the Five Kingdoms) by Vivian French
The Robe of Skulls
For a child who likes a bit of funny fantasy, this is a series that keeps things light all the way through.
All is not well in the crumbling castle high above the mountain village of Fracture. The sorceress Lady Lamorna has her heart set on a new robe. A very expensive new robe. To get the cash she’ll stop at nothing, including kidnapping, blackmail and more than a little black magic. But she reckons without the heroic Gracie Gillypot, not to mention a gallant if rather scruffy prince, two chatty bats, the wickedest stepsister ever, a troll with a grudge and some very Ancient crones.
Six in the series, and the same crowd turns up in each (The Heart of Glass has the dwarves). For a 10 year old who’s had enough doom for one term.
Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
Percy Jackson and the Olympians 1 – The Lightning Thief
Probably the one most recognised (for good reason).
Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson is about to be kicked out of boarding school. Again. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t seem to stay out of trouble. But can he really be expected to stand by while a bully picks on his scrawny best friend? Or not defend himself when his maths teacher turns into a monster and tries to kill him? Nobody believes Percy about the monster. He’s not sure he believes himself. Until the Minotaur chases him to summer camp.
Five books (The Sea of Monsters is next). If they’ve done Harry Potter and want the next big thing, hand them this. And once they’ve finished all five, there’s a what to read after Percy Jackson list waiting.
The ones you’ve already heard of
Alex Rider, obviously. Stormbreaker is book 1 and it’s a good fit at 10, so I’ve given the whole series its own page, the best Alex Rider books. Artemis Fowl is the criminal-mastermind one and there are nine of those. A Series of Unfortunate Events is thirteen books of the same joke and 10 year olds adore it. Skulduggery Pleasant is the skeleton detective, darker and funnier, and probably one for the top end of 10.
Two more that get less attention. Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede is a princess who runs away to live with a dragon because she’s bored (four books). And Aggie Morton, Mystery Queen is a girl detective solving proper murders, three of them on our shelf, for the child who’s nearly ready for grown-up crime.
If they’re racing through
Then it’s time for the shelf for 11 year olds, and specifically Murder Most Unladylike, which is where a lot of Scarlet and Ivy readers end up. Robin Stevens has a whole shelf of them at 11, and the tone is a step up.
Just so you know…
Each of these series is stocked on Little Reads. It exists for the reader who keeps getting to the end. 3,000+ hand-picked books, £7.99 a month after a 7-day free trial. Cancel anytime. A free account comes with 100+ free books if they want to test the water first.
We’re a library and we don’t do lessons, so nobody here sets levels or quizzes or checks whether book 6 was “too easy”. That does mean we’re no help if the reading itself still needs work. But if you’ve got a 10 year old who finishes a series and immediately asks what’s next, that’s who we stocked the shelves for.