Tara’s ESL Blog: Best Fictional Novels for ESL Students

Here is a list of my favorite short novels in English! You can read these on your own, or with me! 

All of these books are considered “easy-reading” with short chapters and useful vocabulary. To learn more about each book, just click the links below where you will be taken to the Spark Notes Plot Overview – try to read the first paragraph. Then to check your understanding, do the multiple choice questions at the bottom! Have fun, choose a story and read on!

1. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl (*approx. 176 pages)

2. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho (*approx. 163 pages)

3. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (*approx. 384 pages)

4. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (*approx. 359 pages)

5. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (*approx. 128 pages)

1. In which story does an airline pilot meet a little boy in the desert?

• The Little Prince
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• The Da Vinci Code
• Ender's Game
• ''The narrator, an airplane pilot, crashes in the Sahara desert. The crash badly damages his airplane and leaves the narrator with very little food or water. As he is worrying over his predicament, he is approached by the little prince, a very serious little blond boy who asks the narrator to draw him a sheep. The narrator obliges, and the two become friends.''

2. In which story do five children and their parents get invited to a magical factory?

• The Alchemist
• The Little Prince
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• Ender's Game
• ''Mr. Willy Wonka, the eccentric owner of the greatest chocolate factory in the world, has decided to open the doors of his factory to five lucky children and their parents. In order to choose who will enter the factory, Mr. Wonka devises a plan to hide five golden tickets beneath the wrappers of his famous chocolate bars. The search for the five golden tickets is fast and furious.''

3. In which story does a little boy go to Battle School and is trained to save the world from destruction?

• Ender's Game
• The Da Vinci Code
• The Alchemist
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• ''Ender Wiggin, the third in a family of child geniuses, is selected by international military forces to save the world from destruction. Before being chosen Ender wears a unique monitor that allows the heads of the military to see things as Ender does. Ender's brother Peter and his sister Valentine also wore this monitor, although neither was selected, nor did they have it for as long as Ender, and Peter will never forgive Ender for this.''

4. In which story are the main characters hunting for the Holy Grail?

• The Little Prince
• The Da Vinci Code
• Ender's Game
• The Alchemist
• ''In the Louvre, a monk of Opus Dei named Silas apprehends Jacques Saunière, the museum’s curator, and demands to know where the Holy Grail is. After Saunière tells him, Silas shoots him and leaves him to die. However, Saunière has lied to Silas about the Grail’s location.''

5. In which story does a man go to Egypt in search of his destiny and treasure?

• The Little Prince
• The Da Vinci Code
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• The Alchemist
• ''A recurring dream troubles Santiago, a young and adventurous Andalusian shepherd. He has the dream every time he sleeps under a sycamore tree that grows out of the ruins of a church. During the dream, a child tells him to seek treasure at the foot of the Egyptian pyramids. Santiago consults a gypsy woman to interpret the dream, and to his surprise she tells him to go to Egypt.''

For more information about reading books with me, click this link: Reading-4-Fluency. For more information about taking classes, please send an email to [email protected]

*Page approximations are based on an average taken from UK/USA and Paperback/Illustrated/Hardback variables. It should be noted that PDF versions tend to be shorter in pages. PDF is recommended in class as it allows for note-taking.