Living Books, Reading Lists, Book Reviews & Ratings

If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

It is not always easy to find good, clean, well written, wholesome books for kids. Here are a few websites and links for you to explore with living books, reading lists, book reviews and ratings.

Unsure about your child’s reading level? Take the Reading Level Assessment from The Good and the Beautiful 🙂

Living Books & Book Lists

1. The Good and The Beautiful Book List The Good and the Beautiful Book List has helped countless families bring uplifting, clean, parent-approved books into their homes. Browse their top recommended books for kids on your child’s level with the peace of mind that every single book has been carefully screened.

2. Sonlight Curriculum: Just Great Books Sonlight Curriculum was founded on the principle that great books make great libraries, and great libraries are the core of great education. So if you have eager readers who want more good books, you want to build your home library, or simply want extra books, browse their curated book collections here. Shop all Sonlight selected books in their online store.

3. Charlotte Mason Books & Book Lists & Charlotte Mason Living Books Libraries & Ambleside Online Master BookList & Ambleside Online Book Helps For those who adore Charlotte Mason and her education philosophy will know all about “Living Books” and the benefit of using Living Books rather than textbooks to convey ideas. Living Books, whether fiction or non-fiction, are more than just interesting books that make a topic come alive. A true Living Book has the best material, from the best minds, or at least the real story from someone who was there or has a real interest in their subject. There is a high standard in literary excellence and, while she advocated the use of many books, quality is to be preferred over quantity.

4. Cathy Duffy Readers & Literature grades 1-8 and Cathy Duffy Readers & Literature grades 9-12 Cathy Duffy has been reviewing curriculum for the homeschooling community since 1984. She also reviews other resources she believes are important for those interested in homeschooling, education, the origins debate, and related political and spiritual topics.

5. Libraries of Hope Forgotten Classics by Series from The Well Educated Heart.

6. 100 Books You Should Read by the Time You Turn 20 You’ll find books for younger kids on here as well as for teens and young adults. It should be noted that any of the books on the list are well worth reading long beyond the age of 20 by BlogSheWrote.

7. 100 Fabulous Books That Will Make You Love History A huge list of books for teaching history to use in your homeschool or just for fun by Alicia Hutchinson. She split them up by Ancient History, Medieval History, Early American and Modern American History.

8. 100 Childrens Books for Kids of Any Age by Joy in the Journey. A list of 100 great books for kids. This list of children’s books includes titles for all ages from Preschool through Junior High.  

9. Treehouse Schoolhouse Free Book Lists These carefully curated book lists feature living books with beautiful illustrations. Enjoy timeless classics and discover new favorites with both fiction and non-fiction selections.

10. Reading Lists: The Gospel Coalition Christian Classics Reading Lists for grade levels.

11. The Massive Guide to Homeschool Reading Lists We’ve gathered our top reading lists, sorted them by relevant categories and organized them alphabetically.

12. GoodReads Listopia 2024 What are your friends reading? Chances are your friends are discussing their favorite (and least favorite) books on GoodReads.

Book Reviews & Ratings

Are you concerned about disrespect, inappropriate language and material, and low educational value in the books your children are reading? Most top booklists for kids include popular books without considering the effect that poor-quality literature and inappropriate content have on children, see these links for reviews and ratings.

1. Rated Reads Rated Reads is a book rating resource for those who don’t like excessive vulgar language, violence or explicit sex in their otherwise good books.

2. Book Cave Book Cave Rated Books Database with Movie-like ratings for books to help connect readers with the right books for them.

3. Common Sense Media Book ratings (also movies and other media). Reviews for what your kids want to watch (before they watch it).

4. Compass Book Ratings Compass Book Ratings provides a standardized rating system so everyone can more easily evaluate their reading options. These book reviews are for parents, teachers, librarians, readers, and anyone looking for a book that best fits their preferences.

5. How to find clean books to read I have been searching and I want to let you in on a few of the ways that I have discovered to help me in my quest to find clean books to read.

6. Library of Clean Reads This is a blog that reviews books. They have 3 different reviewers sharing on this site. They review books and rate them with the following: C = clean. S = sex. V = violence. P = profanity. PA = paranormal.

7. Novel Book Ratings Rating system tracks use of profanity, violence and sexual content in novels.

8. Plugged In Book Reviews Plugged In is an entertainment guide with faith-based reviews on movies, videos, music, TV, games and books by Focus on the Family.

9. The Literate Mother Every book posted on their site is personally read and objectively rated in four categories: language, violence, sexual content and adult themes. This information helps parents and concerned adults suggest or discourage certain books, discuss sensitive material or simply strike up a conversation with a child about the book he or she is reading.

10. Homespun Light Search hundreds of clean reads and book reviews of books free of sex, profanity, and graphic violence.

Bookworm: Free eBooks and eLibraries

Who doesn’t love the look and feel of a real book and to lose yourself in its pages? But the reality is that real books are expensive and often you just run out of space! Here are a few links and websites with eBooks and eLibraries that are free. eBooks are great to save space and money, you can usually download it in a variety of formats (e.g. Mobi, Epub, PDF, DOC, DOCX, TXT, RTF, HTM, HTML, PNG, GIF, JPG, JPEG, BMP) and import it to read on any compatible device. eReaders are great like Kindle, Kobo, Nook, and Boox etc. and alternatively you can also download an eReader app and read your eBooks on your device of choice.

1. Gutenberg Project Gutenberg is a library of over 70,000 free eBooks that are sorted into Bookshelves that are hand-curated collections of eBooks that have similar topics.

2. Open Library The ultimate goal of the Open Library is to make all the published works of humankind available to everyone in the world. Open Library is a project of the non-profit Internet Archive, and has been funded in part by a grant from the California State Library and the Kahle/Austin Foundation. They even have a Star Trek Collection and more in their Curated Collections.

3. OverDrive Free ebooks, audiobooks & magazines from your library. All you need is a public library card or access through your workplace or university. Always free – no fees or subscriptions. For example Hermanus Public Library.

4. BookBub Online bookshop, with free deals on eBooks.

5. Christianbook.com Free eBooks for kids to download.

6. Living Stream Ministry Free Online Library Living Stream Ministry has one goal: to supply spiritual food for the nourishment of all believers that they may grow in the divine life for the sake of the building up of the Body of Christ.

Online Book Shops for Text Books and Leisure Books

1. Christian Classics Ethereal Library The mission of the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) is to build up the church by making classic Christian literature widely available and promoting its use for edification and study by interested Christians, seekers and scholars.

2. Creation Ministries South Africa: Apologia Books Apologia Books for sale and Creation Magazine.

3. Exclusive Books They opened their first store on King George Street in Johannesburg in 1951 and have since expanded to over 40 stores with one in Botswana, one in Namibia, and one that can only be found in the sky – http://www.exclusivebooks.co.za. While they may be online, at heart they remain as they started out: a quirky local bookstore staffed by the keenest of readers and still crazy about books after all these years.

4. Homeschool Books Shop Homeschool curricula like Cambridge International books and much more, including Afrikaans.

5. Prestantia Education Online Bookshop Browse our range of Cambridge International Primary, Secondary 1 (Checkpoint), IGCSE, AS and A Level endorsed and recommended books, combine this with our top-quality practical hands-on Science Equipment for a learning experience that is both exciting and

6. Reader’s Warehouse Readers Warehouse was created by two brothers who grew up with a passion for books and reading. Having grown up with a father who was a famous author and publisher they were brought up with a keen understanding of the value of books and reading.

7. School Suppliers Online book store for South African and International Textbooks, e.g. CAPS, Jolly Phonics, Oxford and Cambridge, Singapore Maths etc.

8. The Book Connection Fun, Affordable And Low Stress Learning Materials For Home Educators And Tutors To Encourage Reading, Spelling And Math Skills. The Book Connection is a small home based business which sells curriculum and books to home-schoolers in South Africa. They have a variety of quality resources available to parents wanting easy, engaging learning materials that are open and go!

9. BookMall Buy second hand or pre loved books at bargain prices. All those hard to find books, in one place. Your online book store.

10. Wordsworth Books is an online bookstore in South Africa and it also has a selection of Afrikaans children’s books and Afrikaans Teens & Young Adult fiction.