Pendragon

If your son is interested in the genre--although I am not certain that I would completely call it fantasy--may I recommend the Percy Jackson and the Olympian series?  I think that it is probably about the same RL as the Pendragon series. 

I teach seventh grade non-readers, and they were all but falling out of their desks when I starting the reading Book 1--The LIghtning Thief--to them during testing week.  I think that they are great reads for both young readers and adults.  In fact, my dh took my copy of the first book with him on field exercises this week.

I have posted reviews of all four of the books that have been published so far on the book challenge if you wanted to do a search for them to see if your son would be interested.  The author is Rick Riordan.

You posted just in front of me.

I haven't read them, but another series that is popular with my students is the Ranger's Apprentice series by John Flanagan.  I have book 1 in my TBR, and several of my male students got onto me last year when I mentioned that I had it and hadn't read it yet.  They were a group of my readers, so I would think the books are pretty good.  (In fact, we had just been to the library where one of them checked out--ummmm, Book 4, maybe--and the rest of them were trying to read it over his shoulder!)

Another set that is probably more horror--if Christian fiction can fall under that--than fantasy is Frank Peretti's Veritas Project books.  There are only two of those, however.  I have read book 1 The Hangman's Curse, but not the second book Nightmare Academy.

There is also Lois Lowry.  Her stuff is more sci-fi, and some of my students found The Giver unsettling, but for the most part they truly enjoyed it.

Deb--It looked like almost a simultaeous post!  What better recommendation for Percy than that, huh?

J

the two Frank Peretti books to another bloggers son here who reads a lot. He really liked them. I loved them and being christian fiction no bad words, plenty of action, and high morals. There is another series Anthony Horowitz, Alex Rider series. He's like a young James Bond with a very cool Gameboy that does some really cool things just changing out the game cartridges. I love these books. The first is Stormbreaker, then Point Blank, Skeleton Key which is the next one I need to read. they're paperback until the last one but there's quite a few till then. The Spiderwick Chronicles were another really good read and now there's Beyond the Spiderwick. I love the kids books too and try to keep up with my students. Diary of a Wimpy Kid, books 1 and 2. Enough for now but I can probably come up with more if you run low.

Both Debbie and I are teachers.  I think that she teaches on the elementary level, but I know that it is PE.  I'm not even certain what school it is, but I have some good things to say about it because struggling writers can be paired with a teacher "writing buddy."  The state writing test here in Texas can be a big problem for some of the kids, and as a middle school teacher, I think that it is lovely to hear about a school that is trying to head problems off at the pass.  The two elementary schools in my district do zilch.  (Sorry, tangent there). 

I teach 7th grade Language Arts, and our campus has a great librarian, which is nice because we have some very low-level readers and a huge ESL population.  The librarian on my campus has led me to some great reads, but mostly I go by what I see my students reading, especially my non-readers, which is about 80% of my classroom population.  (The other 20% is made up of avaricious readers who inhale things like Twilight and the Harry Potter books in 2 or 3 days.  I have no in-betweens).

An additional series for youth that I have heard about is the young James Bond series by Charlie HIgson.  I have book 1 of that in my TBR as well, but I don't know much about it.  It is something that I stumbled across at a UBS.  I am hesitant to recommend it, but it might be something you could check out for your son.

I have a son who inhales books as well, so I can feel your pain one the books that come out in HB first.  Mine son, however, must be about the age of your younger son, and on that note, I would like to recommend the Stink books by Megan McDonald (the author of the Judy Moody series).  My son loves those!  Unfortunately, they come out in HB first.  Also, there is the Geronimo Stilton series (all PB, as far as I know).  Both of those series are a slightly lower RL than Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but they have some of the same cartoonish characteristics that parts of the Wimpy Kids books have.  The Geronimo Stilton books also have horrible puns and things that those upper elementary aged boys seem to like.  (For example, the cat villian in one that my son recently read was Professor Paws von Volt).