Out of the mouths of babes.

[Denise Marsden]

Stationary bike was a story which inspired me to talk to my nine year old grand daughter about imagination and books or films. She told me that books are quite often better than movies because you can make the characters appear in your mind any way you want to'.Books are mind movies' she said and much better than looking at some other persons idea of how they think you see the characters.She read The Cat From Hell and I think we have another SK fan in the making,Ive asked her to wait for a little while before reading any more SK anyone got any advise about age and SK exposure?

[Moderator]

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon and The Eyes of the Dragon might be okay for her now.

[JohnDalglish]

Stationary bike was a story which inspired me to talk to my nine year old grand daughter about imagination and books or films. She told me that books are quite often better than movies because you can make the characters appear in your mind any way you want to'.Books are mind movies' she said and much better than looking at some other persons idea of how they think you see the characters.She read The Cat From Hell and I think we have another SK fan in the making,Ive asked her to wait for a little while before reading any more SK anyone got any advise about age and SK exposure?

Hi Denise,

When my son was ten and my daughter six, they both saw The Stand movie (which my wife and I had seen before) and both thought it was great, and we had to buy it on VHS forthwith and they watched it so often they wore it out.

At the time, I was reading them Grimm's fairy tales and my son bugged me to let him read Sai King and I thought, well, there's nothing heavier than Grimm in Night Shift so I let him read that, which turned him into a Constant Reader and he followed it with The Talisman and then The Stand and my daughter did the same at about ten.

And I credit Sai King with encouraging their literacy and teaching them that reading is FUN!

At 28 and 24 now they seem reasonably well-adjusted LOL, and have a re-read of Grimm's stories and Night Shift in sequence and see what I mean.

Although Eyes of the Dragon and Tom Gordon may be more conventional selections.

Good luck!

Long days and pleasant nights

[davemelnick]

In my opinion, it's: Eyes of the Dragon, The Green Mile (since they both directly relate to humanities).

[pike747]

I would encourage my children to read anything as often as they can. The clingy, over-protective, part of me might hesitate at Steve's work but the REAL part of me says get some of that, the sooner the better! Find the heroism in the mundane and learn that we can all rise above and conquer whatever challenges us. Oh and most of all I have some friends I'd really like you to meet.

[RandomMan]

I hated to read until I found a copy of The Dark Half.....this was when i was 12. I have loved to read ever since. I even asked for SK books for christmas!!!! If it gets a kid reading...I'm all for it. Obviously some books are more graphic than others....but I think most are suitable compared to todays television. If they can handle it, I would put them on the path to the Dark Tower. And, I agree about the other suggestions also...Eyes of the Dragon was my second book of SK's for me and I still love the story!!!

[Patricia A]

Little kids seem to really like R.L. Stein's books, I like them myself.
Goosebumps are the schizzle!
They're funny and really kind of scary and great to read with little kids, providing the kids like scary stories.
So far as tweens, young teenagers and Stephen King go, I'd recommend The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, it's a story that a boy or a girl could enjoy. If they like a sci-fi/fantasy twist to their stories, I'd go with Eye of the Dragon.
Around high school and up is when I think people can appreciate Stephen King a little bit better, esp It and Carrie, Christine too, oh and the Stand and Blaze and so on and so forth and such as is into infinity LOL.

[Ranger_Strider]

I don't know why people worry so much about what kids see or think about. Hansel & Gretel gave me serious recurring nightmares when I was five. That witch wanting to bake and eat lost children was much worse than watching a cow take a 45-70 slug between the eyes at slaughtering time when I was four. (What amazed me was how quick someting that was alive could be made dead.) But I understood that to eat we must kill, even at that age. Kids take in more than you know of horror before they ever reach the age of 9 or 10. I have found that the way people treat each other is the worst of it, and that just keeps on truckin'.

[JohnDalglish]

I don't know why people worry so much about what kids see or think about. Hansel & Gretel gave me serious recurring nightmares when I was five. That witch wanting to bake and eat lost children was much worse than watching a cow take a 45-70 slug between the eyes at slaughtering time when I was four. (What amazed me was how quick someting that was alive could be made dead.) But I understood that to eat we must kill, even at that age. Kids take in more than you know of horror before they ever reach the age of 9 or 10. I have found that the way people treat each other is the worst of it, and that just keeps on truckin'.

Hi,

Indeed, that's exactly why I let my own kids read Night Shift.

I'd just been through Grimm's Tales with them and I thought, hey, if they can take this stuff as childrens lit, they can take Sai King, as indeed proved to be the case.

Long days and pleasant nights