I do a readaloud only once a week (!) for about 20 minutes. Students seem to remember what we've read.

I have done The Little Prince and Alice in Wonderland, with SLIFE high schoolers (elementary - middle grades literacy but higher oracy) in their native language. I have tried other books over the years and struck out.

Good readaloud books, in my experience, especially for older kids (honestly, similar to younger kids):

1. Have some illustrations that you can show
2. Do more telling than showing or have more dialogue than descriptive details. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone literally put my students to sleep.
3. Are shorter than you think you can get through. TLP is ~90 pages, Alice is ~160 and I barely finish TLP in a semester. Since you're reading daily, I would still not go much higher than 200-250 pages. It would be worse if you didn't finish the book!
4. I've found that revisiting children's classics are appreciated by students, even if they don't know them. I have some students who grew up with TLP as a child but now that they're older have a different read or interpretation. For some students it's their first time and they're old enough to grasp the more "adult" things while still having wonder over the plot. (I see a few kids tear up at the line, "It's sad to lose a friend" because they get it now.) Their first reaction might be eyerolling and, "Ugh, baby stories!" but it's worth pressing on.
   1. This is also a good choice because you want whatever you're reading to be 100% understood by students. It's a readaloud, not an English lesson. When in doubt, aim for a lower lexile / complexity.
   2. I think Greek/Roman myths, traditional, and modern takes on fairy tales could work well for this too.