ESL book for intermediate speakers?

Is it really for fun? or is it homework?

Some of my high school students have been given books that movies were based on to read. However, they were way above them and it was a battle all the way. Not much fun.

There are a lot of graded readers out there that are done with limited vocabulary and the lower levels are all written in present tense and a little higher levels are written in simple past on up.

They have a lot of classics, like City Mouse and Country Mouse, Alice in Wonderland ...

If you really want it to be light and fun, I'd say go with a graded reader of a story they already know.