Grade 8 Reading List

Recommended by educators at top U.S. gifted and talented schools

An excellent reading list for 8th graders, starting with classic fiction books, followed by fantasy fictions, and ending with non-fiction titles. 

Classics

  • The Fault in Our Stars
  • The Once and Future King
  • A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
  • Flowers for Algernon
  • Jane Eyre
  • Little Women
  • The Power of One
  • Something Wicked This Way Comes
  • A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Fiction

  • The Book Thief
  • Speak
  • I Am the Messenger
  • Elephant Run
  • The Fault in Our Stars
  • Heart of a Samurai (2011 Newbery Honor)

Fantasy Fiction

  • The Raven Boys
  • Ender's Game (The Ender Quintet)
  • Shadow and Bone (Grisha Trilogy)
  • Divergent
  • Insurgent
  • Allegiant
  • Four
  • The 5th Wave
  • Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
  • The House of the Scorpion (2003 Newbery Honor)

Non-Fiction

  • Revenge of the Whale: The True Story of the Whaleship Essex
  • Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side Of The All-American Meal
  • In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
  • Swimming to Antarctica: Tales of a Long-Distance Swimmer
  • Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition
  • Born On A Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
  • Master of Deceit: J. Edgar Hoover and America in the Age of Lies