I'm hoping to make this an evergreen list of book series that I have the luck to find for extensive reading.
Some of this might be children's series, but for languages like Russian, I can't really be too picky cause my vocab is absolute гавно лол.
We'll start with my native language, because I had the pleasure to grow up reading fiction, and I consumed a lot of good content that greatly helped in expressing myself better in school and writing. (Harry Potter is a given, that's why it's not on the list).
English
Children's Lit (and Teen)
Hardy Boys Mysteries | Franklin W. Dixon |
Nancy Drew Mysteries | Carolyn Keene |
Tunnels | Roderick Gordon & Brian Williams |
Warriors | Erin Hunter |
The Sisters Grimm | Michael Buckley |
Fablehaven | Brandon Mull |
The Dwarves (originally a German series!) | Markus Heitz |
Magic Tree House Series (superb for first readers!) | Mary Pope Osborne |
The Great Illustrated Classics | Various Authors |
Merlin Saga Series | T.A. Barron |
The Last Apprentice | Joseph Delaney |
Diary of a Wimpy Kid | Jeff Kinney |
Percy Jackson Series | Rick Riordan |
Ranger's Apprentice | John Flanagan |
Artemis Fowl | Eoin Colfer |
The Chronicles of Narnia | CS Lewis |
A Series of Unfortunate Events | Lemony B Snicket |
Redwall | Brian Jacques |
Maximum Ride | James Patterson |
For Adults
The Sword of Truth | Terry Goodkind |
Otherland | Tad Williams |
The Wheel of Time | Robert Jordan |
The Kingkiller Chronicles | Patrick Rothfuss |
Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn Trilogy | Tad Williams |
Codex Alera | Jim Butcher |
The Dresden Files | Jim Butcher |
The Sword of Shannara Trilogy | Terry Brooks |
Greatcoats (fairly explicit) | Sebastien de Castell |
Mistborn Trilogy | Brandon Sanderson |
Short Stories in ___ for Beginners (technically for adults lol) | Olly Richards |
Harry Fox Adventures | Andrew Clawson |
Portuguese
Children's
Coleção Vaga-Lume | Vários autores |
Adult
Tomas Noronha (PT-PT, not BR-PT) | José Rodrigues dos Santos |
Russian
Children's
Adult
If you have any recommendations that aren't in English, especially for Russian children's series that are interesting, please let me know.))
Para a vida e para a aprendizagem,
Tom
Hi Tom! I'm struggling with my second José Rodrigues dos Santos "tijolo" :) I've abandonned "Imortal" in the middle (it's too boring too finish, honestly). I'm now trying "O jardim dos animais com alma", it seems slightly better, so hopefully I'll stick with it 😅 It has really useful everyday vocabulary, so I hope I'll continue... But both books are like a series of elementary school level, excessively long lectures (about informatics/genetics in case of Imortal and animal ethology in case of Jardim), interwoven with fragments of a far-fetched plot... This author was recommended to me as a "Portuguese Dan Brown", so I can't complain... I don't think I would ever finish a Dan Brown in any language 😆 What about you? Which books of the series have you read? Is Tomás Noronha credible in any of them? I have the impression he's only going around asking dumb questions and listening to the answers with his mouth open in amazement 😅 I'm sorry 😅(in Imortal he takes his host's vocal assistant for his wife... I mean... how can we suppose this guy is capable of solving any mystery?)
So to suggest some books in Portuguese that I actually liked, suitable for beginners/intermediate learners, I would mention Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen, A Fada Oriana + A Menina do Mar, and my personal favourite, Nuno Amado, À espera de Moby Dick + Manual de Felicidade para Neuróticos. They are in European Portuguese, as this is the language I'm learning.
@Lokus, to be honest I only read the first book in the Tomas Noronha series , O Codex 632 or something. It took me a while to get through too because there were large parts where it was very very dry and boring. I mostly put it on there because I wanted an example of an original Portuguese language book series for adults to enjoy.)) The rest of the book series I've found in Portuguese (save for Coleção Vaga-lume), have been translations of American works, of which have mostly been vampire/werewolf fiction, which I'm not a super fan lol. Also, I've never read Dan Brown lol. Será se ele é assim como Tomas Noronha mas em vida real? :)
@Lokus, also, if you want a word that means "tome/really large book" in Portuguese, there's the fantastic word of "calhamaço." :)