Free book recomandations for a 5 year old

Sorry for the touchstones. They are wrong, but I can't find a way to edit them.

I was talking to a friend who asked me that. My idea was to move on from the the little children stories with two pages of text written in big letters and lots of drawings into the classics.

My first suggestion was The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. I have tried rereading it again. It's a pain. For a 16 year old it might sound very good. But it's full of slavery, religion, poverty. The characters are well built, but it implies too many explanations. I'm not suggesting my friend raise a Gauthama Siddartha, free from mundane worries.

I went on and said Black Beauty. Quite a lot of religion. Also some social change. The child liked the story. Laughed at the funny parts. Cried when sad. The mother told me it was a bit too strong for a child that small.

Next I gave them Heidi. And I am thinking of The Wonderful Adventures of Nils Holgerson for later on.

What else would you recommend? Only books that are free, please.

Edit: fixed the touchstones. Thank you MarthaJeanne!

Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Black Beauty

Heidi

They all worked fine for me. Oh, yours all show up in authors. You must have used double brackets. Single ones are for titles.

Free meaning classics not under copyright? Does your friend have a public library available?

https://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Category:Children%27s_Bookshelf

Children books date fast. but

I would suggest. E Nesbit childrens stories, The Book Of Dragons is the junior end , The rose and the ring. The Princess and the Goblin , or The king of the Golden River.
The Children of the new forest Guaranteed to turn kids into royalists but a cracking yarn.
Maybe some tanglewood tales and the various coloured fairy books by Andrew Lang oh and one must not forget
Rudyard Kipling

all will stretch vocabulary and viewpoints.

E. Nesbit Has lots of great books, I prefer the fantasy ones, like Five Children and It, but her other ones are good as well.

All of the Oz books by L. Frank Baum. There are a bunch that follow The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, some that I like even better than the first one.

The Little Princess, Pollyanna, and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm are a few more to look into, especially if the child is a girl.

Heidi is probably ok. I wouldn't have tried those first two myself.

I'll third the E. Nesbit suggestions -- those should be good.

I have been reading The Secret Garden with my 5 year old, and she loves it.

other ideas:
The Magic Pudding
The Wind in the Willows
Five Little Peppers and How They Grew
The Story of Doctor Doolittle
Understood Betsy
Anne of Green Gables
Little Women

I second Anne of Green Gables.

Thank you MarthaJeanne. It was so obvious, yet so tricky ;-)

Yes 2wonderY. I want to be able to upload them to an ereader.

As for the library - I have the library card and use it quite often.

Yes, Simon. I know of that category. I just wanted to cut some corners, based on the Tom Sawyer experience. I find it hard to explain to a 5 year old what slavery is, why people still endorse it. Same goes for religion. Jumping over the religion part in Black Beauty, I found it quite an interesting read myself. Certainly not Hemingway, but quite a lot of social ideas. I was left with the impression that is PETA stuff to protect the animals. Rereading it before telling my friend brought in new ideas: the story can be also used to tell the story of women, ostracized people, untouchables, and so on.

Thank you for your answer. I am going to check them all out.

Yes KarenElissa! How could I forget the Oz serie? Thank you for the list. I'll check them all.

merrystar: Heidi is very ok. I have reread about a third these days and so far it has not dated a bit. It is also an excellent starter to talk about the days not long ago when there was no electricity and car meant a horse drawn buggy.

Than, amysisson, I'll make that the next one on my reading list.

And sure, if you have more suggestions, do add to the list!

My grands enjoyed Pinnochio at that age.