Ask Lorna: how can I get my dyslexic son reading? Barrington Stoke aims to address precisely the problem you highlight: books to excite older readers, but written in the kind of language dyslexic children won't find off-putting. They are printed on thick off-white paper using a rounder font than is usual, which I'm told is also a big help, and each book is banded two ways, giving a recommended reading age as well as an interest age. But most importantly, Barrington Stoke publishes stories from the best children's writers, including Michael Morpurgo, whose books you say your son has previously enjoyed, and also - for young teenagers - Alan Gibbons, Kevin Brooks and Malorie Blackman. There is nothing worthy about any of this; just good stories, simply told. The Edge titles are also worth bearing in mind, as many of these are printed using a similar kind of dyslexic-friendly paper and font, and they cover a range of material - from factual books (Action Force: Special Forces by Jim Brush, Edge, £7.99) to spin-offs of the Choose Your Own Adventure stories I loved as a child (in I Hero: Dragon Slayer by Steve Barlow and Steve Skidmore, Edge, £4.99, you have to find and destroy a dragon). A dyslexic friend recalls that the thing that made him persevere with reading when he was a child was his obsession with war stories. So keen was he to learn more that he would pore over history books with a dictionary at his side. Is there a topic that might do the same for your son? Often factual books like this can provide a way in for children who struggle with reading. The Comic Strip series (Bloomsbury, various prices) by Tracey Turner and Sally Kindberg is terrific, and might appeal - a kind of Horrible Histories for young teenagers with books on Greek myths, space and dinosaurs (coming later this year) told in comic strip form. I've had the good fortune to visit a number of independent bookshops across the country in the past few weeks, as I've been judging the Telegraph magazine's best small shops in Britain awards. One bookseller I met is evangelical about audiobooks as a tool for dyslexic children. Her niece, of a similar age to your son, read Cressida Cowell's How To Train Your Dragon with the help of the audiobook (Hodder, £5.99 pbk, £13.99 unabridged audiobook), and found it hugely liberating not to have to ask for help. There are a huge number of extremely good recordings around. If your son likes adventure, why not try him on Michelle Paver's Wolf Brother, set 6,000 years ago in the snowy wastes of northern Europe (Orion, £6.99 pbk, £16.99 unabridged audiobook, read by Ian McKellen) or, for a gritty family story, what about Annabel Pitcher's My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece (Indigo, £6.99 pbk, £14.99 unabridged audiobook, read by David Tennant), this week shortlisted for the Waterstones children's book prize? Books about Charles Dickens for an 11-year-old