So You Want To Get Kids Reading With The Charlie Joe Jackson Books
Charlie Joe Jacksons Guide To Not Reading is the tagline people use when talking about AM Davis's children's book series. The protagonist is a kid who would rather do literally anything than read, which is why so many reluctant readers actually connect with it. The books work because they're honest about that feeling instead of pretending reading is some magical experience from page one. The series consists of multiple titles, starting with Charlie Joe Jackson's Guide to Not Reading (2013). The sequels are Charlie Joe Jackson Gets Lost in the Library, Charlie Joe Jackson Tries Anything But Reading, Charlie Joe Jackson's Summer of Reading, and a few more following his adventures. They're widely available through standard book retailers, school supply lists, and library systems. There isn't an official free download from the publisher, so any site claiming to offer a PDF is probably distributing pirated material. You're better off buying a copy or borrowing from your local library. The books sell for around $8-10 in paperback, which is standard for middle-grade fiction. The approach here is straightforward: you give a kid who claims to hate reading a book where the main character also claims to hate reading. That creates a mirror effect. The kid isn't being sold on reading as a noble pursuit. They're reading a book about a kid avoiding reading, which somehow makes it less threatening. The humor carries the whole thing. Davis writes in first person with a very specific comedic voice — sarcastic, exaggerated, and self-aware. That voice is what keeps pages turning even when the plot is thin.
I've watched this play out in practice with several students over the years. The typical pattern is: kid picks up the book because the cover and title promise not to be a chore, reads one chapter and laughs at something, then says they'll finish it tomorrow, and actually do. The trick is that the chapters are short enough that finishing one feels like a win. That's not an accident. The pacing is deliberately built around short attention spans without calling it that.
Things People Miss About Using These Books
The biggest mistake I see is treating it as a reading curriculum. It's not. It's a bridge. If you try to analyze the books for comprehension or assign essays on them, you've already broken the mechanism. The whole point is that the kid reads it because they want to, not because they have to. Once you attach homework to it, the magic fades fast. I learned that the hard way with a student who stopped touching the second book after I gave him a reading journal to fill out. He came back three months later voluntarily, but it cost us time. Another thing: these books only work if the kid picks them themselves. I've seen adults grab the series and hand one to a reluctant reader with a pitch about how funny it is, and the kid immediately puts it down. There's a fine line between recommendation and pressure, and you can feel when you've crossed it. Let the kid hold the book, flip through it, decide. The buy-in has to come from them.
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What This Approach Doesn't Fix
The Charlie Joe Jackson series is excellent for kids who are mildly resistant or who've had bad early reading experiences. It is not going to help a child who has a diagnosed learning disability like dyslexia that hasn't been addressed. No amount of humorous middle-grade fiction is going to solve a decoding problem. If a kid is struggling because they can't actually process the words on the page, they need targeted intervention — orthographic mapping work, phonics support, audiobook pairing — not just another book they're going to stare at and feel bad about not finishing. I've watched this series fail in those cases because the kid wants to engage but physically can't keep up with the text. That's on the support system, not the book, but it's worth stating plainly. Also, the series runs out of steam after a while. The third and fourth books follow the same formula without adding much. If a kid devours the first two in a week, don't expect the third to land with the same impact. It's fine as filler, but it's not going to rewire anything.
Practical Setup
Leave a copy of the first book somewhere the kid will actually see it — not on a shelf labeled "reading list" but somewhere casual. A coffee table, a car glove compartment, a bathroom book caddy. The low-friction placement matters more than people realize. I keep one on the desk in my office, and kids who pass through will pick it up without any prompt from me. That's the whole strategy in one move: remove the authority figure from the equation and let the book sit there until someone decides to check it out.
