Give 'Rosie Revere, Engineer' a look
The Narnia books by CS Lewis are very good IMHO. But you might want to wait a year or two.
We go to the library a few times a month and pick out new books. Our reading list is always changing. Buying new books is pretty expensive, as we don't read most books repeatedly for more than a week or two.
Frog & Toad series by Arnold Lobel is a favorite.
Skulduggery Pleasant currently.
Read Harry Potter obviously. And His Dark Materials.
Greek Mythology (PG-3 version), God bless Sir Fry for his books. They are amazing.
Fairy tales I make inspired by some famous tale, but using local geography (mountains, woods, local trees, etc.).
Kid loves both. While early on he was just falling asleep, these days I have to stop because between his excitement and the three million questions the narrative might take 1.5 hours...
Mine love the D'Aulaire Book of Greek Myths and Book of Norse Myths. Can't get enough of 'em.
No kids, but I'm listening to His Dark Materials currently, and would recommend it to every parent. 5 and 6 might be a bit young for it, I would compare it to the third or fourth Harry Potter books in terms of maturity. Got great themes and messages too.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar ∞
Wizard of Oz to my 7 yo daughter and 4 yo son. They are just captured by the world and characters without ever seeing anything related to the movie.
Non-fiction: The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating
This prompted me to lay belly-down and listen to the snik-snik-snik sound of a slug munching grass.
Cars and Trucks and Things That Go is a timeless classic, with a fair bit of real world info about how roads are consrructed and paved, and has a TON of re-readability.
How Did That Get in My Lunchbox? is an age-appropriate look at where food comes from and the effort it takes from farm to lunchbox. Fantastic for giving a glimpse of how the world works.
Human Body Theater is maybe a bit advanced for 5-6, but got a lot of mileage at our house. Think 7th grade human biology in a cute comic book form - depends on the kids, but ours were engrossed.
The Hobbit
Only have a 1-year-old, but I can imagine reading Narnia to them when they're a bit older. Those books are amazing! Currently mostly reading Miffy (a classic in the Netherlands) and Peppa Pig ;)
I'm in the same boat with 2-year-olds. It's been years but Narnia is very Christian / bible coded right? I guess it's fine to read to a little one, but I'd be kind of hoping that doesn't become their favorite book series. Or am I overreacting? I'm not letting my kids near Ayn Rand when they are older :p. Phantom Toolbooth would be great.
Just realizing the irony of me complaining about Narnia and recommending PJ Library in the same comment section. Yea, Narnia is probably fine.
What I remember reading to my kids aged 5-10
The Hobbit
The Fellowship of the Ring (more for me but they liked to snuggle up and fall asleep to it)
Harry Potter 1-5 (the hardback versions with lots of pictures)
Eric the Viking - Terry Jones - a personal fav of mine
Various compendiums of Greek and Norse Myths
Dr Seuss books
What do people do all day - Richard Scarry
My son started reading the Beastquest books very early by himself and was happy to read independently from there. After that at around 8 he started reading diary of a wimpy kid and the 13 storey treehouse type books.
Calvin & Hobbes, Big Nate, Wimpy Kid. Calvin and Hobbes literaly got him to make a clone machine and got me to play Calvinball with him. lol
Just wanted to give a shout out to PJ Library for anyone (willing to claim that they are) Jewish. There is a free service where they send a free book a month. I'm ethnically Jewish but not religious at all. Don't support the current Isreali regime at all. Etc. And I love the books. They are not religious books. My kids favorite one is about a penguin and an elephant and going to grandma's house for dinner.
The Bravest Ever Bear.
The secret to writing a good childrens' book is writing something that an adult can read multiple times without going insane. The Bravest Ever Bear works by that metric.
By the way, note that His Dark Materials is atheist coded in the same way that Narnia is christian coded.
It was three decades ago, but I read The Phantom Tollbooth and The Hobbit to my daughter around that age.
Winnie the Pooh is my daughter's favorite
I think I read "Goodnight Moon" to our son every evening for three years - to the extent I got a red balloon tattoo.
After that we moved on to Aku Ankka (Donald Duck) cartoons, The Hobbit, and a lot of stories from Enid Blyton.
These days he's reading a lot of Harry Potter, and likes to have bits of encyclopedias read to him. We pick a topic and read for as long as he's interested. Flipping around to follow references and talk about them.
Curious George, especially the short stories. Also Harry Potter in the Mina Lima edition is truly a beautiful book (and a good story)
The Lemony Snicket 'Series of Unfortunate Events' books to our ten and seven year olds. It's fun doing all the villains' voices. After those are done I've lined up 'Kings of Space' by W.E Johns (author of the Biggles books) /because I remember reading that as a kid.
If you are looking for something non-mainline with exceptional drawings, you could check out Chiaki Okada's work.
My kids loved the "Spring" book with the ice bear (in germany it is called "Bist du der Frühling", but i did not find an english translation)
I`dont have kids yet, but when i do, I`ll definitely read Jules Verne to them. He was my favorite author when i was kid.
Late to the party. But magic schoolbus books might meet your needs? You can probably find one on any “sciency” topic you want.
I have over 200 kids books we got over time.
More recently, I've had some success making custom books and stories on a quick app I put up with open AI models. Even rendered some images and printed out a book. I end to end every story but with a hook. My kids look forward to every installment. I use the opportunity to slip in whatever's happening with them, when I feel it could land more.
I think these kind of custom stories are going to be a big part of parenting.
How I love this book! I’ve read it at least five times. It has helped me tremendously as a parent – and in every other aspect of my life. It’s in pure form, and it’s also a very fun read. In fact, I probably think more about its lessons in the context of adult interactions that I do of child interactions.
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish.
Aesop is great and all free https://read.gov/aesop/001.html
It has life lessons, just straightforward things like "don't brag unless you know you're worth it" or "just because they look nice doesn't mean they are". It's challenging enough for them and they'll ask a lot of questions, and they're able to even debate the moral of the story.
They're all really short. Easily 5 mins for today's TikTok attention span. It's an entry level into more interesting books.
We're reading "The Bedtime Book of Impossible Questions" (Isabel Thomas) at the moment and it's a lot of fun. Each page is standalone and my 6 year old loves it.
"Professor Astro Cat's Frontiers of Space" (by Dr Dominic Walliman (Author), Ben Newman (Illustrator)) is another good one we dip into occasionally with awesome visuals. Bit advanced for five, but can trigger some fun conversations.
When my kids were that age I read several of the Edge Chronicles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Edge_Chronicles
My childhood favorite is the Dragonlance Twins trilogy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonlance_Legends