The books I'll be giving to my kids

This is something that's been on my mind for a while...regardless of when I'll actually have kids (my guess? A looooooong time from now), I'd like for them, over their lifetime, to read the same books that have affected me profoundly and made me a better man. The original plan, which still stands, is to pick at least one of these books as a birthday present each year, to complement some other cool toy or tool for exploring the world. Hope they still make those handheld microscopes, and that kids don't become so web-savvy that my kids discover this before I get to give these pieces to them! (...or maybe I should, and let them go get 'em from the library themselves)

I've been putting it off for a while, so I figure I should probably just start now, put them all down, and revise the list as time goes on...

Age 2 (bedtime reading):
Love You Forever (not part of my childhood, but a very good addition regardless)

Age 3:
A Charlie Brown Christmas
Selected Archie comics (although I'm scared this one will be hard, since our collection is probably going to be thrown out soon)
Charlie Brown's Book of Questions and Answers vol. 1-5
The Chronicles of Narnia (bedtime reading)

Age 4:
Charlotte's Web
Dear Mr. Henshaw
Highlights Magazine
The World Almanac (I think there was a young person's edition that I loved. Circa 1992?)

Age 5:
The Happy Prince
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
The Chronicles of Narnia (start reading on your own)

Age 6:
Flash Issue #91 and #0
Batman: To Kill a Legend
James and the Giant Peach
Encyclopedia Brown series (although unlike me, I hope that being around my kids will make it easier for them to actually think it through, so that they won't be lazy like I was and flick to the end to appreciate the elegant solution)

Age 7:
The Phantom Tollbooth
Harry Potter Series (all of it?)
To Kill a Mockingbird
Steven Caney's Invention Book

Age 8:
The Alchemist
What Do You Care What Other People Think?
(I'd put Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! here, but I'd probably want to skip over the dating and strip club stuff till later on)

Age 9:
Education of Little Tree
The Way Things Work (not mine, but it's the Engineer's tome!)

Age 10:
Some of the Dorling-Kindersley Stephen Biesty's Incredible Cross-Sections books
Strength to Love (a collection of Martin Luther King sermons)

Age 11:
Enders Game
The Elements of Style

Age 12:
Sophie's World
The Ten Faces of Innovation

Age 13:
The Little Prince
Games for the SuperIntelligent
Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman!

Age 14:
The Grapes of Wrath
East of Eden
Mere Christianity

Age 15:
How to Win Friends and Influence People
The Four Loves

Age 16:
(Something about good, sound decision-making)
Chasing the Dragon
The Winter of our Discontent
The Screwtape Letters

Age 17:
The Millionaire Next Door
The Effective Executive (so that they don't get all sorts of misconceptions about leadership the way I did)
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information (and the rest of Tufte's series)
The Feynman Lectures on Physics

Age 18:
The Future of Investing--Jeremy Siegel
A Severe Mercy
If You Want to Write
Godel, Escher, Bach (maybe...)

Age 19:
Blue Like Jazz
Made To Stick
Start With No

Age 20:
A Grief Observed
Russell Clough's collection of life lessons
The Tipping Point

Age 21:
Don't Sweat the Small Stuff
Marketing High Technology
Downward Mobility--Jonathan Lipps


...admittedly, as they get older, this list will have to adapt to match what they're starting to do in the world. I wish the business books were less specialized towards business, and I wish I had more in this list to instill true courage and character.

Hope more books pop up over time that I can fit into this list.