Books Every Guys Should Read

Hi all you Hep Cats in that cool land a name of "Blog." Tis I, the Slickest Summer Library Ninja of all Bill. To keepo your Summero Readingo interestingo, I have selected, along with some of my buds, some great reads. Here are my supper cool selections (remember to at any time suggest your own by commenting on our post):


I'm the good looking one in the middle!

The Last Apprentice Series by Joseph Delaney - Train to be a Spook (to find out what a Spook is exactly ya gotta read man) and fight ghosts, boggarts, witches and other things that go bump in the dark. This series is about a young boy named Tom, who is The Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, who is being trained to be a Spook. This is a exciting and scary series assured to make readers turn pages at a startling pace.

The Undersea Adventures of Capt'n Eli Volumes 1 & 2 by Jay Piscope - The first volume of this GN Series introduces us to the main character Capt'n Eli. Many other cool characters (good and bad guys - The Sea Ghost, Circe, Baron Hydro (major bad guy) and his Hydrons, and many more) are packed into this "too cool for school" Series. Coolest character ever, Commander X is also introduced in the first Volume. Cheek em out for action packed adventure!!!!!!!!

Commander X and Circe!!!!!!

Also be sure to check out the online adventures of Commander X by clicking HERE and HERE!!!

The Stoneheart Trilogy by Charlie Fletcher - This series is about a 12 year old boy named George and his soon to be friend Edie (a Glint - to find out what that means read the books). While on a school visit to a museum in London, George looses his temper and breaks a small carving of a dragon on the face of the building. He soon finds out that this stupid act has brought him into a London he never knew existed. A London where statues are very much alive and fall, generally, into two categories either Spits or Taints (again to find out what this means you'll have to read the books). A fragile truce lies between them and George finds himself inadvertently breaking said truce and causing all out war between the two fractions. George and Edie meet many allies and enemies throughout this exciting such as The Gunner, The Black Friar, The Sphinxes, Dragons, Gargoyles, a Minotaur, The Clocker, The Walker, among many others. All these characters are wonderful and fascinating; jammed into a fast moving story that will keep you enthralled from beginning to end.

The Tunnels Series by Roderick Gordon & Brian Williams - This series (which has 3 books out so far) rocks!!!! The main character of the book is 14-year-old Will Burrows who along with his archaeologist father, Dr. Burrows, shares a passion for digging tunnels into the earth in search of buried historical items. Will’s family is extremely “different” and to say the least dysfunctional. Will is an extremely pale boy and picked on non-stop at school. That is until he befriends another outcast by the name of Chester, who is a rather large intimidating boy, and gets him interested in digging. Life is going pretty good for Will between digging with his father and digging independently with his new friend Chester. That is until Dr. Burrows goes missing and Will finds that right in their basement is a tunnel that leads to a subterranean world populated with people time left behind. What are Styx? What wonders and horrors dwell deep beneath the Earth? This series is full of twist and turns and just when you think you know what’s going on, it kicks into another gear to throw you for a loop.

Here are some more in which I will just give the titles:

Diary of a Wimpy Kid Series by Jeff Kinney

The Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanagan

The Stonekeeper Graphic Novel Series by Kazu Kibuishint

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

Runemarks by Joanne Harris

The Bone GN Series by Jeff Smith

This is just a smattering of all the good reads out there, so get out there, find them (many are at your local library), and enjoy. Happy Summer Reading all,
Bill

And now for something completely different

Hey, everyone, it's Iron Guy Carl. The Iron Guy believes that reading is one of the coolest things a guy can do. Yeah, there's X-box and Wii and other cool stuff, but reading is right up there with all that. Unfortunately, a rumor has gotten out among guys that reading is not cool. Well, the Iron Guy is on a mission to smash that rumor like the Hulk smashing a bad guy! And one of the way I plan to do that that is by letting you know what good books are out there. That's why I'm posting a list of Books Every Guy Should Read. These are books that I and other guys have read and can guarantee that they ROCK! Here's the list (and they're not in any order--I just listed them as I thought of them):

The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn and Hal Iguldden. Don't let me hear you say there's nothing to do--the book is FULL of cool and fun guy stuff. Plus you'll get to read some of the best stories ever!

The Percy Jackson books by Rick Riordan. You've probably heard of these, but if you haven't read them, drop whatever you're doing and get them! More action, excitement, and humor than any other series I know.

The 39 Clues books (by different authors) Once again, more fun and excitement than just about any other series. Two kids go all over the world to find the 39 Clues that will make the owners the most powerful people on earth--and keep their evil cousins from finding the Clues first!

Call it Courage by Armstrong Sperry. Based on a Polynesian legend, the story of a chief's son who's afraid of the ocean and steals a canoe to see if he can prove he''s not a coward. Along the way he fights a hammerhead shark and gets chased by cannibals!

Black Whiteness: Admiral Byed Alone in the Antarctic by Robert Burleigh. In the 1930's Admiral Byrd tried to see if he could survive alone in the coldest place on earth. This story is unbelievable!

The Last River: Major John Powell and the Colorado River Expedition by Stuart Waldman. Another amazing story of survival. Major John Powell lost an arm in the Civil War but led an expedition down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon!

Hatchet by Gary Paulsen. One of the best fictional survival stories around. Young Brian crash lands in the Canadian wilderness with no food, no survival gear, and only a hatchet to help. An incredible story.

How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell. An extremely funny guy story! One boy bets another boy $50 to eat 15 worms in 15 days. Could you do it?

The Alvin Ho books by Lenore Look. Good for younger and older guys, these two books about second-grader Alvin Ho, who's afraid of everything, will make you laugh out loud!

N.E.R.D.S by Michael Buckley. More extremely funny stuff with lots of secret agent action too. Read it to find out what N.E.R.D.S. stands for!

The Hound of the Baskerville by Arthur Conan Doyle. The Sherlock Homes stories are still entertaining guys after all these years and this one may be the best. Sherlock Homes takes a case that involves a murder, a vast inheritance, and a gigantic hound that may or may not be part of an old family curse! A character in C. S. Lewis's book That Hideous Strength gets captured by the bad guys and spends a night in his cell thinking that "everything he read as a boy was garbage except for Sherlock Holmes." Don't let that happen to you!

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. I read this when I was 10 and enjoyed it a lot. Tom Sawyer gets into trouble all the time but doesn't know what trouble really is until he accidentally witnesses a murder! This one is funny and exciting!

The Tripods books by John Christopher. Maybe the best Evil Aliens Take Over the Earth series ever!

The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells. The original Evil Aliens Take Over the Earth story and still the best! (This is not the cover for the book. It's from an old comic I read as a boy and thought it was cool!)

Stone Fox by John Gardiner. A young boy tires to save the family farm by entering a dog sled race but has to go against the Native American racer Stone Fox, who has never lost. An exciting story with an unexpected ending.

Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld. An "alternate history" story about World War I in which Europe is divided into Clankers and Darwinists. (got to read it to find out what that means!) Enough action and things that blow up for any guy!

The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau. A terrific sci-fi story about an underground city built to survive a world war. The only thing is that everyone has forgotten why the city was built and how to maintain it and now food is running out and the lights may go out. I've heard from a lot of guys about how good it is.

The Roar by Emma Clayton. Here's another book that made a lot of guys tell us how good it is. Even guys who say they don't like to read like this one! It's a sci-fi story about a time in which in which everyone on Earth is crammed into tiny little England because of the Animal Plague which threatened the whole world. Things are not as they seem, however, and two twins discover the Secret that the bad guys desperately keep hidden. What is it? Gotta read to find out!

The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. One of my all-time favorites and perhaps the best book for guys about growing up. There's an epic bear hunt, thunderstorms that last two weeks, and the real possibility of starvation.

Yeah, it's a big thick book but I started one night at a halfway point and didn't stop until I reached the very end!

D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths by Ingrid and Edgar Parin D'Aulaire. Every guy likes Greek mythology, right? This is the one book about them that every guy should read, then, because it's still the best!

So what do YOU think? Did we leave any books out? Send us a comment or suggestion via the handy "Comment" tab below this post!

OK, Bill, how'd you like to do the honors and sign us out?

Peace out and Read out all,

Iron Guy Carl and Library Ninja Bill