Which books would you recommend to inspire a love of reading in a 12 year old child?

Obligatory Lolita post passing through.

I wouldn't. I don't care about the education of people around me. They don't deserve it.

Perhaps My Side of the Mountain

I really enjoyed Redwall in middle school, but got pretty bored with the extreme repetition. I think it actually ended up helping encourage me toward more difficult material.

Good. Nobody should have to endure being "educated" by a dipshit like you.

MY DIARY DESU

This is a good bet. 11 year old me had a huge hard on for those books.

If the kids a boy, Matthew Reilly's books would do

Ignore everything else in this thread and just give the child a collection of the Narnia books. Sneak a KJV bible in there too.

ask them what they like, first

Lolita

Aesops fables mayb?

>the once and future king.
Seconding this. Probably the book I would credit the most for fostering my interest in reading.

The Fault in our Stars nigga

>12 year old
>child

Fucking americans

What do you call a 12 year old you dumb francophone?

I tutor a 13 year old and a 10 year old and I assigned them to read Lord of the Flies and Hatchet over the summer respectively. The 13 year old is pretty chubby and wears glasses so I'm a little worried he's going to identify a bit too much with Piggy.

A series of unfortunate events. One of the few good YA series

I would have read him Gilgamesh at age 5.

Give him some Don Rosa Scroodge comics. They're on Ulysses level compared to superhero pulp. He'll take it from there, if he likes reading, if not you can't help it, and he'll be drug addict in his 30's watching sitcoms and late night joke shows.

Seconded!

City of Thieves

Beautiful story with enough action to keep a young kid entertaining. Decent prose, judicious use of metaphor.

Changed my life, that book.

Entertained*

Also it's by David Benioff

Not enough info. The first thing to figure out is what the child is into. Then you need to evaluate their reading level. When I was 12 I was devouring sci-fi and classics. Other 12 year olds were into crap like the Hardy Boys and Jack London.

Figure out what the child likes and find a book with similar subject matter. My friend's kid loves astronomy and trains, so I got him some books about each and he can tell me all about them. Now he's branching out into light sci-fi, since he's used to reading. I figure he's a few years out from telling me how great Muad'dib is.

Roald Dahl books without a doubt.

>Jack London
What's your f*ing problem?

This

whatever he wants to read. seriously, don't try to tell someone, specially a passionate 12 year old, how he should do the thing he likes. if he likes harry potter, just leave it be. maybe with time try to have conversations about "better" books and try recommending some, but don't interfere directly, otherwise the kid might aswell just drop reading for once

I agree, but I also did enjoy books I never asked for as a kid.

>Which books would you recommend to inspire a love of reading in a 12 year old child?
The Holy Bible.

Redwall

>This is a good bet.
Mmm. Let's see where it goes.
>11 year old me had a huge hard on for those books
And here we are.

this. War And Piece, Pride And Prejudice (abridged for kids, obviously) were some of my favorite books growing up.

Also, get her the Alice books and The Little Prince. Undeniably the greatest children's books of all time.

Perhaps get her some classics that border the line between YA and children's books, like To Kill A Mockingbird.

>have kids
>make sure they pick at least 75% of their own books, with a few thrown in by me
>watch moms pick 100% of their little boys books
>all cutesy shit
>then complain that their kids cant read

The secret diary of Adrian Mole 13 and 3/4
xoxo

This. Forever this.