Science Fiction and Fantasy Books that instill moral values in kids (subconsciously)

i.e., The books that will keep your child from growing up to do stupid things

August 16, 2025

As I was driving to work one day in an unusual state of extreme satisfaction with my life, having gotten a full night’s sleep for once and having had the rare opportunity to make breakfast with the kids before seeing them off to school with their grandparents, I couldn’t help but reflect that there have been many times in my life where I could have morally turned a corner that would have led to an entirely different state of things.

This ol’ goblin was young once. And this ol’ goblin remembers a point in time in a young woman’s life when you hit your early twenties, discover a vestige of financial freedom, have the energy to stay up til 3 AM drinking and bounce off to work at 8 AM the same day, and where the likelihood that you will do extremely stupid shit increases dramatically.

And without going into too many details, let’s just say that during my bacchanalian era (did I say that right?), there was a particular fork in my adventure when I very nearly went down the path that involved a married man, who may or may not have been professionally senior to myself, and a late night when he had driven me home after we had both had way too much cheap wine.

And sometimes, when I recall that night, I feel a small sense of curiosity mixed with a not-small quantity of relief that I got out of my car and went up to my apartment alone and passed out on my bed with all my clothes on. And I wonder what would have happened to my life if I had not taken the road less Gossip Girl -lled.

Perhaps nothing, right? Perhaps I could have had my fun and we would have both woken up and gone to work and no one would have had been the wiser.

But as we all know from playing Baldur’s Gate 3, perhaps that road would have instead led to a disaster of overblown proportions, involving the real-life equivalent of everyone in the town dying, i.e., the breakup of a wonderful marriage and estrangement from children for him, and professional humiliation and a less impressive LinkedIn profile for me.

(I realize now that perhaps all the recent hullaballoo about the Coldplay CEO and his CHRO may have stirred up some memories. I do pity them a bit, because trust me, we have all been there or there-adjacent one way or another. And anyone who denies it is flat out lying)

After sufficiently contemplating the Doomsday scenario, I pat myself on the back and congratulate myself for having made the correct choice in that particular adventure, and then, much as I marvel at my own brilliance in selecting the correct chaotic good choices in Baldur's Gate, I wonder how it is exactly that I had ended up making the right choice that night (which, though it may seem like I had just drunkenly fallen asleep, was the moral equivalent of saving the entire town of halflings). Certainly, nothing in my choices during my twenties would lead me to believe that I would. I had both before and after that night done things that I would lock my daughter in her room forever for if I ever found out she was even thinking them. Also, at that point in my life I was actually quite keen on (in truth, infatuated with) that married guy.

And I came to the conclusion that somewhere down the line leading up to that night, starting from my childhood and in the years after, somehow, unobtrusively, something had instilled in me a tenuous moral thread that kept me from doing something I would have regretted for the rest of my life.

And after further reflection (it was a long drive to work), and having eliminated factors in my life that historically have not truly influenced my core as a person and my choices (religion, school, ethics class, parents), I came to the conclusion that that something was books.

Somewhere in between my borderline atheistic outlook and complete disregard of conventional authorities and social norms, the books I had read when I was young had managed to instill in me an extremely tenuous moral thread that had led me down the true chaotic good path that is my character in both virtual reality and reality-reality. And that was, apparently, enough too keep me from making a very big mistake.

And while I don’t pretend to my clairvoyant, and I cannot say for certain that going down any of the “evil” alignments would not have led me to a better life than I have today, like living on an island filled with servants and fanning myself with money, most days I genuinely cannot imagine how I can be any happier than I am right now. I have my kids and my PS5/Nintendo Switch/gaming PC (what riches) and enough money to buy every new RPG that comes out and a husband who makes the best seafood pasta in the world. I think my life turned out pretty swell.

And so, in honor of the Coldplay CEO and the CHRO (someone make a song, it rhymes!), and if you have kids that will someday have to choose their own adventure whilst not giving a crap about anything their mum or dad might say, here are eleven books that may create in them a tenuous moral thread (I really can't think of any other way to describe it) that just might prevent them from doing an incredibly stupid thing that they will regret forever:

1.        The Bible – LOL just kidding, this isn’t that kind of blog.

2.        The Berenstain Bears series – Before even approaching any good alignments, every kid needs a solid foundation on not to eat too much junkfood, to do their chores, not to watch too much TV, to share their toys, to tell the truth, the list goes on. These fun and frolicking bears are the best way to inculcate a basic love of being a Good Kid. I swear to God, if I had a nickel for every Gen-Zer I saw on the interweb whose main problem could have been solved if they had been slapped with a particular Berenstain Bears book when they were seven, I would have enough money to buy Tiktok (to shut it down).

3.        Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle by Betty MacDonald – If I learned anything strictly “moral” from this book it wasn’t by any conscious imbibing, because all I can really recall of it right now is that it was terrifically funny. It’s about this old lady who has a set of unusual and amusing cures for naughty children. Also, to be honest, this is not a fantasy or science fiction book and does not really belong in this blog. I just really enjoyed reading it when I was younger, and I think parents will enjoy reading it to their kids and kids will enjoy feeling smug at how the naughty kids get tricked by this old lady into being good. A little ethical schadenfreude learned early on never hurt anybody.

4.        The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling – the OG series on good triumphs over evil, right? In one of the most fantastic worlds ever built, to boot.

5.        The Hobbit (and of course, The Lord of the Rings after) by J.R.R. Tolkien – I really don’t know why… there is nothing in this that is overtly “moral”, as this series is above all a grand adventure. But this book (The Hobbit more than Lord of the Rings, actually) became seminal comfort reading for me when I was a kid. I think it’s because when you read it, you can't help but absorb one of the most important life lessons - that you need to be brave enough to do the right thing, no matter how small you are or how insignificant you feel.

6.        The Nancy Drew series by Carolyn Keene– all of them, the old yellow hardcover books from the fifties, the modern ones (still pre cellphone times though) from the eighties/nineties, the ones where Nancy is only twelve or so. How many times can one read about how crime doesn’t pay? An infinite number of times, apparently, as there are an infinite versions and ages of how Nancy Drew saves the day with her detective genius, innate goodness, strawberry blond hair, and long legs.

7.        A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett – another comfort read for a child, but it is such a beautiful telling of life and poverty lived in dignity, and what money cannot buy. I do believe that this book is nearly better than any in explaining to a child that doing what is right has nothing to do with what people tell you, but comes from who you want to be inherently as a person.

8.        Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl– a chaotic good adult starts with a chaotic good child, am I right? The funniest and cleverest book on why it pays to be a good kid, and again, that one’s economic or social class has nothing to do with your worth.

9.        The Animorphs series by K.A. Applegate– I don’t even know if you can buy this anymore, but once upon a time this was the essential sci-fi adventure for us nineties kids. Looking back, I think a kid will really take to heart from this series the importance of surrounding yourself with good people and having evil-fighting adventures together (literally for the books, metaphorically for kids, of course). I would go so far as to say that this series is practically a space opera, as it has a nearly endless, world-hopping scale where a bunch of kids gain the power to turn into animals, and use it to fight galactic crime.

10.   The Jedi Apprentice series – I am getting an itch to head over to my parents' house and dig up these old paperbacks. If your kid is like me and hates Sunday school, Bible lessons and whatnot, these books are a must. Even young kids need to believe in something, and the belief that the Force must be used for good is an excellent place to start. I mean, it is entirely within the realm of possibility that your kid can hate waking up to go to church but still want to use the Force for good! Every kid, no matter how naughty or lazy or disobedient, secretly wants to be a Padawan, and that right there is a universal truth. This book is also wonderful in presenting morally obscure choices and problems, which you will then adventure through the galaxy solving. Another space opera but this time with the sexiest wisest, bravest, most unflappable mentor one could ask for, Liam Neeson as Qui-Gonn Jinn.

11.   Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales – Considering, you know, who he is, I honestly don’t know if he was just being a troll before his time, but I genuinely LIKE his fairy tales and think they are wonderfully memorable. The Happy Prince is a particularly sad and beautiful one. I don’t know what it is about his stories, but they seem to present doing the right thing in a sad but realistic way. There’s a lot of reality in these fantasies.

12.   Teen Angels series by Cherie Bennett– these are treasures I found hidden in my grade school library and my fourth-grade pals and I could not get enough of them. We checked them out nearly every week for a year. They are basically proof that the nineties was the best decade to live in. The series is about three American teenage girls who died when they were 18. Their deaths were a result of unfinished personal-growth type business in their lives, so they end up in “Teen Heaven” where they have to go back to Earth for missions helping trouble teenagers get back on the right path, and by doing so so these "Teen Angels" can earn enough Angel Points to ascend to real Heaven. Holy fuckign shit I cannot make this up! Nothing this earnest would ever have a prayer (pun intended) in this cynical day and age, but this shit was gold when I was eleven! It was sexy and Christian and just made you want to do the right thing by people while being a fiery redhead from Tennessee! I wonder when Netflix will pick this up.

moral books for kids, sci fi books for kids, fantasy books for kids