Hopkins Summer Reading 2021

Page created by Max Sullivan
 
CONTINUE READING
Hopkins
guide to

Summer
Reading
2021
A Greeting from the Committee                                    Contents

Welcome to the 2021                                              Guidelines                            2

                                                                 A Word About Content                   2
Summer Reading Guide!                                            Required Books                         4

                                                                 List for Grades Seven and Eight
In this publication, you will find reading recommendations              General Fiction                 5
that range across genre, identity, era and region, put                  Historical Fiction              9
together by your peers, your teachers, and your librarians.             Nonfiction                     10
If you are looking for Victorian romance, modernist poetry,             Plays + Poetry                 12
cultural critique, or hard sci-fi, you are in the right place.          Mystery                        13
If you are hankering for a play or a novella or a graphic               Science Fiction + Fantasy      14
novel, welcome. If you do not know what you are looking
for yet, that’s even better.                                     List for Grades Nine through Twelve
                                                                        General Fiction                19
The Summer Reading Committee has been working all                       Historical Fiction             33
year to bring you an intuitive, streamlined publication that            Nonfiction                     39
will introduce you to new authors, new ideas and new                    Philosophy                     51
texts. We have trimmed and edited, opened up space on                   Plays + Poetry                 53
our metaphorical shelf, and added new titles that we feel               Autobiographies + Memoirs      60
appeal to the adventurous, modern and diverse interests                 Mystery                        65
of Hopkins School.                                                      Science Fiction + Fantasy      68
                                                                        Short Stories + Essays         73
On the inside cover, you’ll find a bookmark. Think of this as
a summer companion designed to keep your place in your
current read, as well as help you discover other titles of
interest. It has suggestions which will inspire you to explore
the Guide more broadly, and it will travel with you into your
new school year as a reminder of the books you’ve enjoyed
over the break.

We are so excited to share the Guide with you. We know
you will find great things to read this summer, and we
are looking forward to the fall, when we can come together
again and discuss all the places we travelled from the
comfort of our reading chairs.

Happy Reading!

Sincerely,
the summer reading committee
Students Maisie Bilston ‘22, Alima Conde ‘25,
  Andrew Cotaj ‘22, Leela DeSilva ‘22, Aaron Gruen ‘21,
  Ava Hamblett ‘22, Ramey Harper-Mangels ‘21,
  Amelie Khiar ‘22, Finnbar Kiely ‘22, Abigail Kruger ‘23,
  Alexandra Mathews ‘22, Caroline McCarthy ‘22,
  Sebastian Merce ‘22, Kainda Nzinga ‘25, Isabel Pizarro ‘24,
  Eesha Rao ‘22, Prairie Resch ‘21, Lucy Reymond ‘26,
  Christopher Ruano ‘22, Sofia Schaffer ‘23, Lauren Sklarz ‘22,
  Nati Tesfaye ‘22, Cora Turk-Thomas ‘26, Kaelin Vasseur ‘25
Faculty Advisers Catherine Casanova, Brad Czepiel,
  Leah Fry, Gabriela Gerstenfeld, Alexandra Kelly,
  Jennifer Nicolelli, Thom Peters
Guidelines                                                             solely for academic purposes. Any use of the word out-
                                                                           side of these parameters will be treated as Very Serious
    Your years at Hopkins and the years that follow are your best          Misconduct as outlined in the Hopkins Student Handbook
    for reading; for becoming a good reader; for becoming a habit-         and, therefore, subject to disciplinary consequences which
    ual reader; for reading both to enjoy and to learn from books.         may include expulsion.
    The Summer Reading Guide should start, not finish, your quest
    for intellectually engaging and pleasurable reading.                 There are texts in the Guide that include usage of the “n-word.”
                                                                         Regardless of an author’s identity or purpose for using the
    Each grade is assigned one required book for English class.          word, reading the word has the potential to cause harm. We
    Since the required book will be discussed during opening             encourage parents and guardians to engage in conversations
    English classes in September, it should be read toward the end       with their children about their reading choices and to even
    of the summer. As usual, students will be expected to write          read along with them. Researching a title before engaging with
    on the required book, and to either write on or discuss the          the text may be appropriate for some readers. If a parent or
    other three texts they choose when they return in the fall. In       student needs additional support in regards to encountering
    addition, many History courses have a required reading book.         specifically triggering content, please contact Head of the
    Be sure to check out the list to see if your History course is one   Summer Reading Guide Committee Jenny Nicolelli, English
    of them.                                                             Department Chair Joe Addison, and Director of Equity and
                                                                         Community Becky Harper.

    A Word About Content                                                 Please adhere to the following requirements:
    Titles in the Hopkins Summer Reading Guide do not include            ~~ Students must read the required books for their grades
    explicit content warnings. However, there are books in the              and three other previously unread books from the appro-
    Guide that feature emotionally and intellectually challenging           priate lists. Required reading for History courses does not
    content, such as: ableism, abuse, alcoholism, drugs, eating dis-        count toward these three additional titles.
    orders, homophobia, racism, sexual violence, suicide, violence,
    and xenophobia. Additionally, the Hopkins School policy on           ~~ The list represents authors and offers short descriptions of
    the “n-word” is as follows:                                             specific works to entice students. Students may read any
                                                                            book by an author on the appropriate list, except in the
      Hopkins School represents a diversity of lived experiences,           case of the required books.
      backgrounds, and identities. In order to maintain a sup-
                                                                         ~~    Students entering grades 7–8 may read authors from the
      portive, affirming, and safe environment for all and respond
                                                                              list for students entering grades 7–8, as well as authors
      to the necessity for anti-racist practices, we, as the Hopkins
      Community ban the use of the “n-word” (used here as a
                                                                              from the list for students entering grades 9–12. Students
      stand-in for the racial slur) among our community members               entering grades 9–12 will only receive credit for authors on
      and on our campus, including online and on social media.                the latter list.

      The history and legacy of this racial epithet continue to          Use these additional criteria to help guide your selections:
      communicate hate, incite violence, and cause harm in our
                                                                         ~~ Many History courses have a required book. Consult the
      world. Hopkins bans its use, in all contexts in which the
                                                                            list below to see if you need to read a required book for
      word might be spoken or written, whether in a classroom
      setting or otherwise, including the listening to and singing          the History course you are signed up to take next year.
      along to music; in conversation, whether academic or                  Reading for History courses is additional to the four
      socially; and otherwise, on and beyond Hopkins’ campus.               books required for English classes.
                                                                         ~~ Students taking Atlantic Communities II or Atlantic
      However, to avoid overlooking or erasing the word’s
                                                                            Communities III in Hopkins Summer School are not
      prevalence in history and culture, Hopkins still allows for
      teaching texts and materials that contain the “n-word.”
                                                                            required to do the summer reading normally required for
      Hopkins demands its community members approach the                    those courses.
      appearance of this word in classroom contexts with critical        ~~ For advanced Classics or Modern Language students, a
      care and serious consideration.                                       challenge would be to read a book in its original language,
                                                                            rather than an English translation.
      To be clear, as a school, we ban any use of the word from
      members of our Hopkins Community. We restrict the
      appearance of the “n-word” to reading and listening, and
2                                                                                                                                            3
7–8
    Required Books                                              List for Grades Seven and Eight
                                                                    Students entering grades 7–8 may read authors from this
    required reading for english                                    and from the list for students entering grades 9–12.                 general
                                                                                                                                         fiction

    GRADE 7
    A Crack in the Sea by H.M. Bouwman                          general fiction
    GRADE 8                                                     Alexie, Sherman
    The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas                                The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
                                                                   Winner of the National Book Award for Young People’s
    GRADE 9                                                        Literature. A decision to leave the Spokane Indian Reservation
    The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline                          to attend the local white high school alters Junior’s life in many
                                                                   ways. His experience is both hilarious and heartbreaking.
    G R A D E 10
    Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri                         Barrie, James M.
                                                                   Peter Pan
    G R A D E 11                                                   Peter Pan and Wendy fly to Neverland—but fall into the
    On Writing by Stephen King                                     clutches of the infamous Captain Hook.

                                                                Cameron, Bruce
    G R A D E 12
                                                                  A Dog’s Purpose
    Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
                                                                  This touching book chronicles a dog’s journey through
                                                                  several lives via reincarnation, and how he looks for his purpose
                                                                  through each life.
    required reading for history
                                                                Cisneros, Sandra
    AT L A N T I C C O M M U N I T I E S I I                       The House on Mango Street
    The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton                    This poignant album of memories follows a Mexican-American
                                                                   girl who, in the midst of poverty, struggles for education and
    AT L A N T I C C O M M U N I T I E S I I I                     self-esteem in the Hispanic section of Chicago.
    Hiroshima by John Hersey
                                                                Dickens, Charles
    AP® EUROPEAN HISTORY                                           David Copperfield
    The Great Mortality by John Kelly                              The story of David Copperfield’s growth from an innocent,
                                                                   naive, and easily exploited child to a prudent, commanding,
    AP® US HISTORY                                                 and loving adult.
    Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis
                                                                Enzensberger, Hans Magnus
    PHILOSOPHY                                                     The Number Devil
    Choose one text from the Philosophy section of the Guide.      In a series of dreams, Enzensberger brings together the surreal
                                                                   logic of Alice in Wonderland and the existential geometry of
                                                                   Flatland with the kind of math everyone would love, if only
                                                                   they had a number devil to teach it to them.

                                                                Gardner, Sally
                                                                   Maggot Moon
                                                                   Set during the 1950s in an alternate timeline where England is
                                                                   under a totalitarian regime, Maggot Moon starts off as a novel
                                                                   that seems to follow a dyslexic boy’s struggle in school—until it
                                                                   slowly reveals its darker, overarching themes.

                                                                Greene, John
                                                                   Looking For Alaska
                                                                   Focused on high school juniors at a Georgia boarding school,
                                                                   Greene’s novel is for today what Catcher in the Rye and
                                                                   A Separate Peace were for their times. An honest chronicle of
                                                                   how convoluted and confusing growing up has become.

4                                                                                                                                        5
7–8                                                                                                                                                   7–8
          Haddon, Mark 				                                                      Oliver, Lauren
             The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time                      Before I Fall
general      This book is the touching story of Christopher John Francis            A compelling, emotional, and beautiful novel about what it            general
fiction      Boone, a boy with autism who has a unique perception of                means to live and die. Mia dies in a tragic accident, yet has the     fiction

             his world. When a neighbor’s dog is murdered in the middle             unique opportunity to relive her death and change the past.
             of the night, it leads to an interesting, and at times hilarious,      What if you could get a second chance at life?
             series of events.
                                                                                 Palacio, R.J.
          Juster, Norton 				                                                       Wonder
             The Phantom Tollbooth                                                  August Pullman is a boy who has been homeschooled for his
             Milo, restless and discontented, travels to the Lands Beyond           entire life due to facial disfigurement. Wonder tells the story of
             with the aid of a mysterious tollbooth.                                August’s difficult, but successful, first year in school.

          Kincaid, Jamaica 			                                                   Paterson, Katherine
             Annie John                                                             Jacob Have I Loved
             The story of a charming, sensitive and talented young girl is          A nostalgic and beautifully-written story that follows Louise
             rendered in prose as lushly beautiful as the Caribbean setting in      Bradshaw as she grows up during World War II on a small
             which she grows up.                                                    Chesapeake island. Throughout her childhood, she struggles to
                                                                                    find her own identity while living in the shadow of her popular,
          King, A.S.				                                                            talented twin sister. As Louise reaches adulthood, however, the
             Ask the Passengers                                                     previously unchanging world around her evolves into one in
             Astrid Jones is a high school senior who, at age 10, moved from        which she thrives.
             the Upper Westside of Manhattan to Unity Falls, Pennsylvania,
             where she becomes frustrated with her life and the hypocrisy of     Power, Rory
             small-town society.                                                   Wilder Girls
                                                                                   Quarantined on a remote island school, Hetty and her friends
          Lockhart, E.				                                                         are the victims of a vicious disease called the Tox. Hetty follows
             The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks                      the rule and stays within the confines of the school’s fence,
             Lockhart’s book is a delightful exposé of private schools,            waiting for the outside world to provide a cure, that is, until
             privileged social castes, and the weird relationships between         Byatt goes missing.
             best friends and their respective romantic partners.
                                                                                 Reilly, Matthew
          London, Jack 				                                                          Ice Station
             Call of the Wild                                                        A team of U.S. divers vanish under the Antarctic ice shelf
             Set in Alaska in the late 1800s, this novel chronicles the              after making an unexpected discovery. The Marines sent to the
             adventures of Buck, a powerful tide-water dog, and his abusive          station are soon plunged into a desperate fight for survival.
             owners. Man and brute rage contend in harsh surroundings.
                                                                                 Rosoff, Meg
          Lundin, Britta 				                                                       How I Live Now
             Ship It                                                                A spirited and candid story of war, love, hunger, and the
             When Claire’s favorite TV show, Demon Heart, goes on tour              absence of adult supervision, told by an outspoken teenage girl
             to the Idaho Comic-Con, she has the opportunity to ask about           living with her English cousins.
             her ship, Smoke Heart. When her hopes are viciously crushed
             by Forest, the actor who plays Smokey, Claire is invited to         Ryan, Pat Muñoz
             go on tour with the Demon Heart cast and crew. Can she                 Becoming Naomi Leon
             convince the steadfast director to make SmokeHeart canon?              Naomi discovers her heritage and her identity when her absent
             And what’s the deal with Tess, the amazing fanartist she keeps         mother reappears.
             running into?
                                                                                 Saenz, Benjamin Alire
          Merrill, Jean 				                                                        Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets
            The Pushcart War                                                        of the Universe
            The pushcart peddlers organize to keep the trucks from                  Set in El Paso, Texas in 1987, the novel follows two
            replacing them in an uproarious battle in the streets of                Mexican-American teenagers, Aristotle “Ari” Mendoza and
            New York.                                                               Dante Quintana, their friendship, and their struggles with
                                                                                    racial and ethnic identity, sexuality, and family relationships.
          Montgomery, Lucy
            Anne Of Green Gables
            A story of an imaginative orphan and her life on a farm with an
            old-fashioned woman and her brother.
    6                                                                                                                                                     7
7–8                                                                                                                                                    7–8
          Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de 		                                             historical fiction
             The Little Prince
general      The beautiful and philosophical story of a pilot stranded in the      Buck, Pearl S.
fiction      Sahara desert and the young Prince he meets there.                       The Good Earth
                                                                                      The moving story of a poor peasant-farmer, Wang Lung and
          Smith, Betty
                                                                                      his selfless wife, O-Lan who live during the reign of the last       historical
             A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
                                                                                      emperor. Through hard work and sacrifice, Wang manages to            fiction
             A heartwarming story of the struggles and adjustments of a               acquire property and prosperity only to find that his sons don’t
             poor Irish-American family, told by a particularly loving and            share his veneration for the land.
             astute daughter, Francie Nolan.
                                                                                   Cooper, Susan
          Smith, Dodie         			                                                   King of Shadows
             I Capture the Castle                                                    Nat Field is a twelve-year-old orphaned actor who travels with
             A teenage girl who lives in a castle finds refuge from her              his theater group to England’s new Globe Theatre. Little does
             peculiar life by writing faithfully in her diary. Reminiscent of        he know that he will wake one morning in Elizabethan En-
             Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.                                      gland and work as William Shakespeare’s apprentice.
          Spinelli, Jerry     			                                                  Crane, Stephen
             Stargirl                                                                 The Red Badge of Courage
             Leo Borlock follows the unspoken rule at his high school:                The cost of war is uppermost in this psychological story of a
             don’t stand out. New student Stargirl does not follow this               sensitive boy who slowly moves from timidity to great courage
             rule. Somewhere between her arrival and when she starts to be            through the course of the American Civil War.
             shunned for her individuality, Leo realizes he is in love with her.
                                                                                   Elliot, Laura
          Spyri, Johanna 			                                                           Under a War-Torn Sky
             Heidi                                                                     When Hank, a fifteen-year-old American pilot, is shot down
             Orphaned Heidi lives with her grandfather in the Swiss Alps,              behind enemy lines in France during World War II, he seeks
             where she brings wealthy invalid Klara.                                   the help of the French Resistance.
          Stevenson, Noelle 			                                                    Kelly, Jacqueline
             Nimona                                                                   The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate
             As sidekick and supervillain, Nimona and Lord Blackheart are             Calpurnia Tate is a young girl from Texas at the turn of the
             about to wreak some serious havoc. Their mission: prove to               20th century who is facing adulthood reluctantly. Soon she
             the kingdom that Sir Ambrosius Goldenloin and his buddies                discovers an interest in natural sciences which is nurtured by
             at the Institution of Law Enforcement and Heroics aren’t the             her intimidating grandfather while being encouraged to be
             heroes everyone thinks they are. Nemeses! Dragons! Science!              lady-like by her mother.
             Symbolism!
                                                                                   Pratchett, Terry
          Stevenson, Robert L. 			                                                    Dodger
             Treasure Island                                                          Although he is now seventeen, Dodger is still a street urchin
             A classic pirate tale with gore, rum and treasure enough for             who lives in nineteenth-century London where he meets mad
             everyone. Come aboard!                                                   barber Sweeney Todd, famous writer Charles Dickens, and even
          Taylor, Mildred D. 		                                                       the calculating politician Benjamin Disraeli. Pratchett blends
             Let the Circle Be Unbroken                                               history and fantasy with adventure and mystery.
             Four black children growing up in rural Mississippi during            Schmidt, Gary D.
             the Depression experience racial antagonisms and hard times,             The Wednesday Wars
             but learn from their parents the pride and self-respect they need        The story of a boy growing up in 1967 who is led into maturity
             to survive.                                                              by his strict teacher, Ms. Baker, and his overbearing father.
          Traven, B.          			                                                  Selznick, Brian
             Treasure of the Sierra Madre                                             The Invention of Hugo Cabret
             Three misfits search for gold in the wilds of Mexico as they face        The story of a Parisian orphan, clock keeper and thief, who
             the horrors of their own greed.                                          lives within the walls of a busy Paris train station. His world
                                                                                      interlocks with an eccentric, bookish girl, and a bitter old man.

    8                                                                                                                                                      9
7–8                                                                                                                                                 7–8
             Sepetys, Ruta       			                                                Dahl, Roald
                Between Shades of Gray                                                 Boy: Tales of Childhood
                Lina Vilkas, along with her family, is abducted from her home          The famous author of children’s stories writes of his own
                in Lithuania by Soviet Officers. She must struggle to stay alive       childhood, including tales of the prankster at an English
                and protect her family through her perilous journey through            boarding school and then as a taster in a chocolate factory.
historical      concentration camps.
   fiction
                                                                                    Hickam, Homer
             Trease, Geoffrey 		                                                       October Sky
                Cue for Treason                                                        Hickam’s memoir retells the story of an unlikely group of boys
      non                                                                                                                                                  non
                When Peter Brownrigg accidentally joins a troupe of actors led         who prove that the sky really is the limit. Originally published    fiction
   fiction
                by William Shakespeare, he is plunged into a world of mystery          as Rocket Boys.
                and suspense as he attempts to discover the truth about a plot
                to kill the Queen of England.                                       Herriot, James 			                                                     p l ay s   +
                                                                                       All Creatures Great and Small                                       p o e t ry

             Weil, Silvie        			                                                   The enchanting memoir of a Scottish veterinarian and his
               My Guardian Angel                                                       work in the Yorkshire countryside, where his encounters with
               Elvina, granddaughter of the great rabbi Rashi, must decide if          humans are just as fascinating as his encounters with animals.
               she will save the life of a young, wounded Crusader.
                                                                                    Lord, Walter
             Wein, Elizabeth 			                                                       A Night to Remember
               Code Name Verity                                                        A fabulous historical account of the glamorous Titanic, doomed
               After a spy plane crashes in Nazi Germany, one of the teen              to sink on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.
               spies survives and has to choose between putting her mission in         (There’s a sequel: The Night Lives On.)
               jeopardy and being brutally killed.
                                                                                    Maxwell, Gavin
             Wouk, Herman 			                                                         A Ring of Bright Water
               The Caine Mutiny                                                       This delightful and enlightening book discovers the wild
               Conflict aboard the destroyer-minesweeper U.S.S. Caine                 animals that roam the coast of Scotland, centering on the otters
               during World War II reaches its climax during a typhoon as             who live there.
               Captain Queeg apparently goes mad.
                                                                                    Red Shirt, Delphine
             Yolen, Jane 				                                                          Bead on an Anthill
                The Devil’s Arithmetic                                                 Growing up without books on the Pine Ridge Reservation in
                While celebrating a Passover seder in 1988, twelve-year-old            Nebraska, Delphine Red Shirt depends on the teaching of her
                Hannah finds herself transported to Poland in 1942. A haunting         friends and family.
                story of the Holocaust, this book forces the reader to confront
                the atrocities of genocide.                                         Small, David
                                                                                      Stitches
             Zusak, Markus 			                                                        When he was fourteen years old, David Small underwent what
                The Book Thief                                                        should have been a minor operation. Instead, Small woke up
                Death narrates this unforgetable story of Liesel Meminger,            to discover a vocal cord had been removed and he was virtually
                a foster girl living outside of Munich during World War II            mute, but he was not told he had cancer. Alongside the story
                in Germany. On her way to her foster family, she steals her first     of his dysfunctional and oppresive family, Small illustrates his
                book, The Gravedigger’s Handbook, even though she cannot yet          horrific experiences and hopeful triumph.
                read. With the help of her foster father, Liesel learns to read
                and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing       Thompson, Craig
                raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement.           Blankets
                                                                                       Set amidst the beautiful, isolated depiction of a wintery
                                                                                       midwestern landscape, Thompson’s graphic memoir explores
             nonfiction                                                                love and growing up in a fundamentalist Christian community.

                                                                                    Yousafzai, Malala
             Bitton-Jackson, Livia                                                     I Am Malala
                 I Have Lived a Thousand Years:                                        When the Taliban took control of the Swat Valley, one girl
                 Growing Up in the Holocaust                                           spoke out. Malala Yousafzai refused to be silenced and fought
                 Thirteen-year-old Elli Friedmann’s memoir recalls her struggle        for her right to an education. On Tuesday October 9, 2012,
                 to survive in Nazi-occupied Hungary.                                  she almost paid the ultimate price.

     10                                                                                                                                                    11
7–8                                                                                                                                                       7–8
               p l ay s   +    poetry                                                  mystery

               Alexander, Kwame			                                                     Bradley, Alan
                  The Crossover                                                           The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie
                  This story-in-verse follows two Black twin brothers who share           (Flavia de Luce Series)
                  a love for basketball but find themselves drifting apart as they        Flavia de Luce is a typical 11-year-old except for the fact that
                  head into their junior high school year.                                she is an amateur chemist who specializes in poison. In this
                                                                                          novel she uses her knowledge of crime to single-handedly solve
               Eliot, T.S.
                                                                                          murders. This is the first book of the series.
                   Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats
                   Light verse about a variety of felines from perhaps the twentieth   Christie, Agatha
                   century’s greatest poet. This is the book upon which Cats the          Murder on the Orient Express
p l ay s   +
                   musical is based.                                                      Trapped on the train with the murderer in a blizzard, Hercule
 p o e t ry
                                                                                          Poirot tries to solve the murder of Mr. Ratchett en route to
               Gibson, William
                                                                                          England on the Orient Express.
                  The Miracle Worker                                                                                                                            m y s t e ry

                  An inspiring story of the young teacher Annie Sullivan, who          Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan
                  brings the power of language to a deaf and mute child named            The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
                  Helen Keller.                                                          These stories feature the master plotting of England’s prize
                                                                                         mystery solver and his faithful sidekick, Watson.
               Kaufman, George & Moss Hart
                  You Can’t Take It with You                                           Hammet, Dashiell
                  Blissfully untainted by work, competition, or greed, a wonder-         The Thin Man
                  ful, wacky family proves that life can be measured by enthusias-       Nick Charles, one of fiction’s funniest detectives, makes his
                  tic endeavor rather than productivity.                                 debut in this novel. (He is not, by the way, the thin man.)
               Nash, Ogden 				                                                        Keene, Carolyn
                  Candy is Dandy: The Best of Ogden Nash                                  Nancy Drew
                  One of America’s funniest poets: his nonsensical rhymes and             Sixty-four books in all, this classic series transports readers to
                  puns make him enjoyable and interesting. A light, entertaining          1940s America, where eighteen-year-old Nancy Drew makes a
                  read.                                                                   name for herself as a brilliant detective, challenging the gender
                                                                                          roles of the time. The series is just as empowering as the myster-
               Nelson, Marilyn
                                                                                          ies are fascinating.
                  Carver: A Life in Poems
                  Nelson’s collection of poems offers readers a compelling, lyrical    Milford, Kate
                  account of the life of the revered African-American botanist            Greenglass House
                  and inventor.                                                           Greenglass house, a smuggler’s inn, is experiencing the arrival
                                                                                          of unexpected guests—each with a connection to the house.
               Williams, Tennessee          		                                            Objects go missing. The inkeeper’s son Milo and the cook’s
                  The Glass Menagerie                                                     daughter Meddy investigate.
                  A classic of modern drama about three confused family
                  members living in their own world of illusions.                      Raskin, Ellen
                                                                                          The Westing Game
               Woodson, Jacqueline 			                                                    A wily “whodunnit” that features a motley cast of characters,
                 Brown Girl Dreaming                                                      all united by Samuel Westing’s puzzle prowess. A gripping read.
                 A story in verse, Woodson recounts her childhood experience
                 growing up in South Carolina and New York during the Civil            Zusak, Markus
                 Rights Movement.                                                         I am the Messenger
                                                                                          When underage taxi driver Ed Kennedy becomes the recipient
                                                                                          of mysterious playing cards, he is thrust into missions,
                                                                                          sometimes quirky, other times deadly, but always revealing.
                                                                                          The question remains: who is sending the cards?

     12                                                                                                                                                         13
7–8                                                                                                                                                     7–8
              science fiction                 +   fa n ta s y                       Bray, Libba
                                                                                       A Great and Terrible Beauty
              Adams, Douglas 		                                                        When her mother dies mysteriously, Gemma Doyle is forced to
                The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy                                   move to England to attend boarding school. While there, she
                These are the very funny voyages of Arthur Dent as he travels in       discovers a portal into a secret world and the covert society of
                search of Zaphod Beeblebrox, ex-head honcho of the universe            sorceresses that control it.
                and the only person, it seems, who can save it from destruction.
                                                                                    Card, Orson Scott
              Adams, Richard 			                                                       Ender’s Game Series
                Watership Down                                                         A fast-moving and exciting work from one of the great names
                A magical and suspenseful story of adventure, heroism, and             in science fiction about a boy in training to lead Earth in an
                friendship. A group of rabbits abandon their dying community           electronic war against an alien threat.
                and set off to establish a new life.
                                                                                    Carroll, Lewis
              Alexander, Lloyd               		                                        Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass
                 The Chronicles of Prydain Series                                      Two delightful tales about Alice’s adventures in the mad,
                 This series begins with the story of Taran, the Assistant Pig         magical worlds, down the rabbit hole and through the looking
                 Keeper; Princess Eilonwy, the 370-year-old Dalben; and Lord           glass, where words don’t mean what they say and things aren’t
sci-fi   +       Gwydion as they battle the dreaded Lord of Annuvin and his            what they seem.                                                        sci-fi   +
fa n ta s y      host of undead.                                                                                                                              fa n ta s y
                                                                                    Charbonneau, Joelle
              al-Shaykh, Hanan 			                                                     The Testing
                  One Thousand and One Nights                                          In this dystopian novel, gifted teenagers are put through
                  A collection of Western and South Asian stories and folktales        dangerous trials and tests to see if they are fit to become leaders
                  about ruler Shahryar and his wife, Scheherazade, all with            of society.
                  different frames. These include the well-known “Aladdin’s
                                                                                    Clare, Cassandra
                  Wonderful Lamp,” “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves,” and
                                                                                       City of Bones
                  “The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor.”
                                                                                       Clary Fray, a fifteen-year-old girl, is dragged into the world of
              Bacigalupi, Paolo			                                                     the supernatural after witnessing a murder in a local night club.
                 Ship Breaker
                                                                                    Colfer, Eoin
                 A post-apocalyptic story set on the Gulf Coast and at a
                                                                                       Artemis Fowl
                 fictional place called Orleans that divided the land into water-
                                                                                       A troubled adolescent genius abducts a fairy, leading to a
                 ways and different levels of destruction caused by greed
                                                                                       confrontation between multiple magical races.
                 and mismanagement.
                                                                                    Cooper, Susan
              Barron, T.A.
                                                                                      The Dark is Rising
                 The Lost Years of Merlin
                                                                                      Will Stanton lives a normal life, until he discovers that he is the
                 T.A. Barron writes the story of Merlin’s childhood. A new look
                                                                                      Sign-Seeker. Last hope of the Old Ones, he is destined to guard
                 at a side of Merlin rarely seen.
                                                                                      the Signs of Light and battle the evil forces of the Dark.
              Bracken, Alexandra
                                                                                    Croggon, Alison
                 The Darkest Minds
                                                                                       The Naming (The Pellinor Series)
                 After a plague inexplicably wipes out the child population of
                                                                                       Maerad, a slave in a harsh world, has a secret power that gives
                 America, only 2% are left—with strange mutations. They are
                                                                                       her the ability to destroy or save the world. She embarks on a
                 placed in concentration camps. To survive, Ruby must carve a
                                                                                       journey to combat an otherworldly power.
                 space for herself in a crumbling dystopian America.
                                                                                    Divakaruni, Chitra B.
              Bradbury, Ray
                                                                                       The Conch Bearer
                 The Martian Chronicles
                                                                                       This is the story of two children who are entrusted with a magic
                 This loose collection of quirky stories discussing the human
                                                                                       conch shell and must embark on a mystical and dangerous
                 discovery of Martian civilization provides complex and satiric
                                                                                       journey to deliver the conch back to its rightful home.
                 social criticism in the form of science fiction.
                                                                                    DuPrau, Jeanne
                                                                                      The City of Ember
                                                                                      Two teens must race to find a way to save their community, an
                                                                                      underground city slowly decaying and running out of supplies
                                                                                      and electricity.
    14                                                                                                                                                        15
7–8                                                                                                                                                      7–8
              Flanagan, John 			                                                    Lowry, Lois
                 Ranger’s Apprentice                                                   The Giver
                 Flanagan’s series traces the growth of a ranger in a world that       Lowry reels readers into a fictional society that, at first, appears
                 roughly parallels Eurasia and Africa. The set of friends and          utopic. The series, four books in all, tells the captivating tale of
                 mentors stretch across many classes and bring to light the value      interconnected and intriguing characters who, like most of the
                 of deep friendships and humor.                                        quartet’s readers, are coming of age and questioning the world
                                                                                       around them.
              Funke, Cornelia
                 The Thief Lord                                                     Maas, Sarah J.
                 In the magical underworld of Venice, Italy, runaway orphans          Throne of Glass
                 Prosper and Bo fall under the protection of a mysterious             Celaena Sardothien, Adarlan’s assassin, has been kept slave in
                 thirteen-year-old who calls himself the Thief Lord, who leads a      the mines for a year, until she is released to serve as the Crown
                 group of criminal street children.                                   Prince’s champion in the competition that will decide her
                                                                                      freedom. The first in an eight book series.
              Gaiman, Neil
                 Neverwhere                                                         McMann, Lisa
                 Richard Mayhew, through one act of kindness, is exiled from          The Unwanteds (Series)
                 London Above and must navigate the dark and dangerous                In Quill, creativity is forbidden, and the artistic teenagers are
sci-fi   +       London Below.                                                        sentenced to death. However, on the day of their executions,             sci-fi   +
fa n ta s y                                                                           the “Unwanted” teenagers discover a whole new world of                   fa n ta s y
              Goldman, William 		                                                     magic...
                 The Princess Bride
                 The beautiful Buttercup and the dashing farm boy Wesley            Meloy, Colin
                 face pirates, swordfights, giants and temporary resurrection.        Wildwood
                 A comedic, action-packed fairy-tale.                                 Prue McKeel’s life is ordinary. At least until her brother is
                                                                                      abducted by a murder of crows and taken to the Impassable
              Jacques, Brian 		                                                       Wilderness. So begins an adventure that will take Prue and her
                 Redwall                                                              friend, Curtis, deep into an impenetrable world. There, they
                 Redwall Abbey, tranquil home to a community of peace-loving          uncover a secret world in the midst of violent upheaval, and
                 mice, is threatened by Cluny the Scourge, a savage bilge rat         find themselves entwined in a struggle for the very freedom of
                 warlord, and his battle-hardened horde. But the Redwall mice         this wilderness. A wilderness the locals call Wildwood.
                 and their loyal woodland friends won’t give up, combining their
                 courage and strength to try and drive off the horde.               Messenger, Shannon
                                                                                      Keeper of the Lost Cities
              Jones, Diana Wynne              		                                      Sophie Foster is not exactly a normal girl. She’s a twelve year
                 Howl’s Moving Castle                                                 old high school senior, has a photographic memory, and, oh
                 Sophie, a girl turned into an old lady by a jealous witch, must      yeah, she’s a telepath. When she finds out she’s an elf, she
                 leave home in search of a cure. Eventually, Sophie enters the        moves to the Lost Cities where many peculiar things occur after
                 moving castle of the Wizard Howl, where she finds a way to           her arrival. The first in a nine book series.
                 break her curse, if she can just help Howl first.
                                                                                    Meyer, Marissa
              LeGuin, Ursula K.               		                                      The Lunar Chronicles
                 A Wizard of Earthsea                                                 Set in a future where humanity inhabits both the earth and
                 A boy’s rise from a fishing village on a remote island to the        the moon, this series follows the journey of cyborg mechanic
                 Wizards’ School of Roke and his concurrent flight from an evil       Cinder and the many shocking secrets she uncovers about her
                 shadow he has accidentally loosed upon the world.                    past, and connection to the Lunar people.

              Lewis, C.S. 				                                                      Moers, Walter
                 The Chronicles of Narnia Series                                      The 13½ Lives of Captain Bluebear
                 In the introductory volume of The Chronicles of Narnia,              Bluebear explores the world of Zamonia, encountering all
                 entitled The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, four children        sorts of extraordinary creatures, from the Minipirates to giant
                 find a magical doorway into the land of Narnia, where the evil       Bollogs. This witty epic will keep you giggling throughout.
                 White Witch fights the noble lion Aslan.
                                                                                    Pearson, Mary E.
                                                                                       The Adoration of Jenna Fox
                                                                                       Jenna Fox wakes up from a coma remembering nothing. She
                                                                                       is told she was in a car accident and has recently recovered,
                                                                                       but nothing is as appears in this exploration of bioethics and
                                                                                       coming of age.
    16                                                                                                                                                         17
7–8                                                                                                                                                     9–12
              Pfeffer, Susan Beth              		                                     List for Grades Nine through Twelve
                 Life as We Knew It
                 After an asteroid moves the moon’s orbit significantly, tsunamis
                 and other natural disasters run rampant. The narrator provides       general fiction
                 insight into private lives as schools are shut down, food supplies
                 are depleted, and society crumbles.                                  Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi
                                                                                         Americanah
              Pierce, Tamora
                                                                                         Adichie explores race and immigration in America through
                 Alanna: The First Adventure
                                                                                         the eyes of Ifemelu, a young Nigerian immigrant in the
                 The daughter of a noble lord, Alanna of Trebond, disguises
                                                                                         21st century. The book features locations in and around
                 herself as her twin brother and travels to the Palace to become
                                                                                         Connecticut.
                 a knight, befriending both the Crown Prince and the King of
                 Thieves while keeping her true identity a secret.                    Adiga, Aravind
                                                                                         The White Tiger
              Pratchett, Terry
                                                                                         In this inventive, epistolary novel, Balram Halwai tells his life
                 Nation
                                                                                         story as a servant, philosopher, murderer, and entrepreneur,
                 Nation is the adventure of all adventures—like the television
                                                                                         taking the reader deep into the hidden underbelly of India.
                 show Lost, except set several hundred years earlier. The setting
sci-fi   +       resembles a South Pacific island that has suffered a tsunami;        Alam, Rumaan
fa n ta s y      Mau is on his solo-initiation trip at sea when the wave strikes.        Leave the World Behind
              Pratchett, Terry and Neil Gaiman                                           A privileged, white family escapes the oppressive summer heat
                                                                                         of New York City, booking an idyllic, rural rental home on
                 Good Omens                                                                                                                                   general
                                                                                         Long Island. Their reprieve is interrupted when a panicked           fiction
                 This finely-tuned parody, loosely based on the Book of
                                                                                         black couple arrives in the middle of the night, claiming to be
                 Revelation, follows the eleven-year-old Antichrist and a cast of
                                                                                         the home’s owners and that a cataclysm is befalling the world
                 various other worldly and otherworldly beings through the last
                                                                                         outside. What follows is a slow, unfurling dread as the two fam-
                 days of humankind.
                                                                                         ilies warily circle each other, confronting race, class, and how
              Pullman, Phillip 			                                                       crisis can further exacerbate humanity’s tenuous bonds.
                  His Dark Materials Trilogy
                                                                                      Alderman, Naomi
                  In his controversial, Milton-inspired trilogy, Philip Pullman
                                                                                         Disobedience
                  weaves a thrilling and intricate tale that examines the true
                                                                                         A young woman who has broken away from her Orthodox
                  nature of religion and fate.
                                                                                         Jewish community in London returns when her father dies.
                                                                                         She has created a new life for herself in New York, and now she
                                                                                         must resolve a number of old issues.

                                                                                      Atwood, Margaret
                                                                                         The Handmaid’s Tale
                                                                                         A trenchant dystopian novel set in what used to be New
                                                                                         England, this novel follows the story of Offred, a handmaiden
                                                                                         who must navigate life in a totalitarian state where women are
                                                                                         considered property.

                                                                                      Austen, Jane
                                                                                         Sense and Sensibility
                                                                                         Austen explores nineteenth-century English culture through her
                                                                                         brilliantly crafted protagonists, the Dashwood sisters, as they
                                                                                         face their new, unfortunate circumstances after moving from
                                                                                         their luxurious home to a country cottage.

                                                                                      Baldwin, James
                                                                                         Go Tell it on the Mountain
                                                                                         With heavy allusions to the Bible, this semi-autobiographical
                                                                                         classic tells the story of a young boy in a predominantly black
                                                                                         church in Harlem in 1935.

    18                                                                                                                                                        19
9–12                                                                                                                                                  9–12
          Barbery, Muriel 			                                                     Danielewski, Mark
             The Elegance of the Hedgehog                                            House of Leaves
             Renee is short, fat, and works as a concierge; she’s also a secret      A young family moves into a house that is larger inside than
             autodidact. Paloma is a twelve-year-old suicidal genius whose           out. Soon enough the two little children wander off and their
             wit is unappreciated by her drug-addicted mother and sister.            voices begin to tell a terrifying story in this brilliant novel,
             The two misunderstood outcasts search for truth in their                distinguished by its multiplicity of voices and narratives.
             lonely lives.
                                                                                  DeLillo, Don
          Barolini, Helen 			                                                        End Zone
             Umbertina                                                               The language of end zones—the terminology of football and
             Departing from typical migration tales that focus on men,               nuclear war become interchangeable—and later distorted as
             Umbertina’s determination, ingenuity, and business sense                one collegiate year concludes. With humor and concern, Don
             propel the family into financial success and security as she            DeLillo links football and war in this original and thought-
             strives for the American Dream. Umbertina has a gritty agency           provoking novel.
             that she then passes on to her daughters and granddaughters,
             as this novel crosses the ocean multiple times on a voyage that      di Donato, Pietro
             reckons with identity and place.                                         Christ in Concrete
                                                                                      With its impressionistic style and lyric proletarianism,
          Block, Francesca Lia 			                                                    Christ in Concrete (1939) is a seminal work of Italian American
             Echo                                                                     literature. It focuses on the harsh economic realities and
             This novella follows the struggles and life of Echo, a young             tenement living that one family experiences through the eyes
             artist who must overcome her inner demons and the unseen                 of a twelve-year-old boy who must support his family after his
general                                                                                                                                                  general
fiction
             evils of Los Angeles to find herself and love, but has trouble           father’s untimely death.                                           fiction
             distinguishing between fantasy and reality.
                                                                                  Diaz, Junot
          Bronte, Charlotte               		                                         The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
             Jane Eyre                                                               Oscar is a sweet ghetto nerd who dreams of becoming the
             A romance, dark thriller, and portrait of an independent,               Dominican J.R.R. Tolkien and, most of all, finding love. But a
             strong woman as relevant today as it was when published in              curse that has haunted Oscar’s family for generations, following
             1847, Jane Eyre is often regarded as a “must-read” for every            them on their epic journey from Santo Domingo to the USA,
             Hopkins student.                                                        may make it impossible for him to ever get what he wants.

          Calvino, Italo      			                                                 Donoghue, Emma
             If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler                                      Room
             A complex and convoluted search for the conclusion of a story,         The entire world of a 5-year-old boy is the 11-by-11-foot room in
             resulting only in the beginnings of more than ten narratives,          which his mother is being held against her will.
             each with its own style, characters, and tone.
                                                                                  Doxiadis, Apostolos
          Camus, Albert (t. Matthew Ward)                                           Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture
            The Stranger                                                            A young boy, intrigued by his uncle’s studies in mathematics,
            Through the story of an ordinary man unwittingly drawn into             discovers his uncle’s obsession with the mathematical
            a senseless murder on an Algerian beach, Camus explores what            hypothesis, Goldbach’s Conjecture.
            he termed “the nakedness of man faced with the absurd.”
                                                                                  Dreiser, Theodore
          Céline, Louis-Ferdinand 		                                                 An American Tragedy
             Journey to the End of the Night                                         A portrait of America’s corrupt value system and its effects on
             A darkly hilarious jaunt from the battlefields of the Great War         the ambitious and romantic Clyde Griffiths.
             to French West Africa and to America and then back to France,
             following the epic misadventures of the casually nihilistic          DuMaurier, Daphne
             antihero Bardamu.                                                      Rebecca
                                                                                    A young bride uncovers the secrets of her husband’s first wife,
          Conrad, Joseph 			                                                        Rebecca, and his mansion, Manderley. A thrilling tale of
             The Secret Agent                                                       romance and suspense.
             Set in London, the novel is the story of an attack, and its
             consequences, on the Greenwich Observatory, masterminded
             by a Russian spy.

   20                                                                                                                                                    21
9–12                                                                                                                                                    9–12
          Egan, Jennifer 			                                                      Fitzgerald, F. Scott
             A Visit from the Goon Squad                                              This Side of Paradise
             A careful arrangement of dovetailing stories that feature                A classic of the Lost Generation, this novel explores the lives
             appearances and reappearances of interconnecting characters.             of young people growing up in the shadow of WWI. It follows
             Music pulses on every page as Egan’s characters determine if             the life of Armory Blaine, a lackadaisical Princeton professor,
             “time’s a goon.”                                                         and speaks to the avarice and striving of post-war America.

          Eliot, George				                                                       Forster, E.M.
              Middlemarch                                                            A Passage to India
              In the town of Middlemarch, a brilliant and naive woman                One of the very best portrayals of what happens when cultures
              marries a man old enough to be her father, an ambitious doctor         clash. In this case, tensions and discoveries occur in British
              arrives, and an old miser lies on his deathbed. George Eliot           India in the 1920s.
              (Mary Ann Evans’ pen name) studies all the foibles and
              revelations of human life.                                          Gaiman, Neil
                                                                                     American Gods
          Ellison, Ralph        			                                                  Just released from prison and lost in society, Shadow is
              Invisible Man                                                          employed in a battle of Gods for the soul of America, a battle
              This novel explores race, ideology, and the intermixing                of the New and the Old.
              of both in the early twentieth century. The narrator, feeling
              marginalized by society, tells the reader the story of the          Gardner, John
              injustices he has faced being a black man in the South.                Grendel
                                                                                     The epic Beowulf is turned upside down in this version,
general   Englander, Nathan              		                                          narrated by the villainous (or perhaps misunderstood) monster         general
fiction
             The Ministry of Special Cases                                           of the original.                                                      fiction

             The long-awaited first novel by Englander tells the story of
             Kaddish, a Jew in junta-led Argentina whose son is one of the        Godden, Rumer
             ‘disappeared.’ A moving, dramatic, Kafkaesque story with rich          Black Narcissus
             characters and a chilling ending.                                      Five nuns, engaged in missionary work high in the Himalayas,
                                                                                    succumb to the sensuality and mystery of their surroundings.
          Erdrich, Louise
             Plague of Doves                                                      Greenwell, Garth
             The white town of Pluto, North Dakota and the nearby Ojibwe             What Belongs to You
             reservation share a troubled history that is gradually revealed         In Sofia, a teacher from the American South meets Mitko,
             through generational narration.                                         a beautiful young man. Mitko is a sex worker, and he and
                                                                                     the teacher begin a complicated, messy, and heartbreaking
          Eugenides, Jeffrey             		                                          relationship. This lyrical, erotic novel grapples with love, queer
             The Marriage Plot                                                       identities, and desire.
             Madeleine Hanna is an English major with plenty of choices
             to make. The pressing matter at hand? Her love life.                 Harkaway, Nick
             There’s Mitchell, the friend who thinks she is his soulmate,            Tigerman
             and Leonard, the brilliant but brooding man she loves.                  Sergeant Lester Ferris of the British Army is hoping to retire
                                                                                     but is drawn into the world of shady business on the island of
          Farah, Nuruddin 			                                                        Mancreau and befriends a young street kid in the process.
             Links
             Links tells the challenging and gripping story of Jeebleh, a man     Hemingway, Ernest
             returning to his hometown of Mogadiscio, Somalia, for the              For Whom the Bell Tolls
             first time in twenty years. Diverted from his pilgrimage to visit      Set during the Spanish Civil War, a story of danger, love,
             his mother’s grave, he is asked to investigate the abduction of a      and the quest for meaning, told through the eyes of an
             young girl and beomes entangled in the violent politics of a city      American volunteer.
             decimated by American intervention.
                                                                                  Hesse, Hermann
          Faulkner, William              		                                          Siddhartha
             As I Lay Dying                                                          The story of a young Indian boy named Siddhartha whose
             The matriarch of a penniless family lies dying in her bed at            spiritual quest occurs during the time of Buddha.
             home, prompting the homecoming of family from across the
                                                                                  Hugo, Victor
             nation. This leads to fascinating conflicts, culminating in a long
                                                                                    The Hunchback of Notre Dame
             journey to bury her body in a town far away.
                                                                                    The doomed love story of Quasimodo, the hunchback of
                                                                                    Notre Dame, and the gypsy Esmeralda.
   22                                                                                                                                                      23
9–12                                                                                                                                                  9–12
          Iweala, Uzodinma             		                                        Kushner, Rachel
             Beasts of No Nation                                                    The Mars Room
             The superb debut novel by an American-Nigerian novelist                Romy Hall is serving two life sentences in a woman’s prison
             concerns a young boy who endures the horrors of war in an              for a crime she committed while working at The Mars Room,
             unnamed West African nation.                                           a San Francisco strip club. Part crime odyssey, part sociological
                                                                                    study of life behind bars.
          James, Henry
             Portrait of a Lady                                                  Lagerkvist, Par
             The story of an intelligent, attractive American young woman           Barabbas
             who, in rejecting the men, both good and evil, who pursue her,         A powerful novel by a Nobel Prize winner about “the
             finds there are “other things a girl can do besides marry.”            acquitted,” Barabbas, whose life was exchanged for Jesus’s.

          Johnson, Adam 			                                                      Lederer, William J. and E. Burdick
             The Orphan Master’s Son                                                The Ugly American
             An orphan in North Korea works with a state-run service to             A forceful indictment of the United States’ tactless and
             kidnap Japanese citizens. This Pulitzer prize-winning novel            ineffectual conduct of foreign policy in Southeast Asia.
             masterfully explores humanity and corruption.
                                                                                 Lee, Min Jin
          Jones, Stephen Graham 			                                                 Free Food for Millionaires
             The Only Good Indians                                                  As Casey navigates Manhattan, we see her life and the lives of
             Part revenge tale, part exploration of cultural identity, and          those around her: her sheltered mother and scarred father who
             completely horrifying, Jones’ tale explores the Amerian Indian         are first generation Korean immigrants, her friend Ella who’s
general      experience through four friends hellbent on escaping their             always been the good Korean girl, Ella’s ambitious Korean            general
fiction                                                                                                                                                  fiction
             shared sin against tradition and heritage.                             husband and his Caucasian mistress, Casey’s white fiancé, and
                                                                                    then her Korean boyfriend, all culminating in a portrait of New
          Kazantzakis, Nikos                                                        York City and its world of haves and have-nots.
             Zorba the Greek
             With clean, beautiful prose and trenchant characterization,         Lindsay, Joan
             Kazantzakis tells the story of a young would-be intellectual           Picnic at Hanging Rock
             and an older, all-embracing wanderer who fall into an unlikely         At a boarding school for girls everything seems well-mannered,
             companionship.                                                         until that image is shattered by the disappearance of four
                                                                                    students from a school picnic, a mystery that winds through
          Kesey, Ken            		                                                  the lives of many and questions privilege.
             One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
             Alternating between dark humor and psychological torment,           Luiselli, Valeria
             this novel is set in an Oregon psychiatric hospital, where              The Story of my Teeth
             the narrator, “Chief ” Bromden, observes the increasingly erratic       While auctioning off old teeth that he claims belong to Plato,
             exploits of Randall Patrick Murphy, a patient who lied his              Virginia Woolf, Borges, and others, Gustavo (Highway) Sán-
             way into the hospital, and the sadistic Nurse Ratched.                  chez Sánchez’s life turns upside down as he falls into a magical
                                                                                     whirlwind of personal and global history.
          Koestler, Arthur
             Thieves in the Night                                                McBride, Laura
             A powerful book detailing the struggles of a group of ambitious       We Are Called to Rise
             Jews as they attempt to establish a commune in the Palestine of       Seemingly unrelated stories about a family of immigrants,
             the 1940s. Based on Koestler’s own experiences.                       a failing marriage, and a social worker are connected in an
                                                                                   unexpected way.
          Kostova, Elizabeth
             The Historian                                                       McCann, Colum
             A truly terrifying novel, The Historian focuses on one woman’s        Apeirogon
             dire struggle to understand the mysteries of Vlad the Impaler.        A provocative and deeply empathic story about two remarkable
                                                                                   (and actual) people caught up in the Israeli/Palestinian
          Kundera, Milan 			                                                       conflict. It’s fiction, but, then again, it feels like journalism.
             The Unbearable Lightness of Being                                     McCann inhabits these people’s hearts and minds with
             In the midst of the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia,           imaginative brilliance.
             a young physician is torn between two women: his wife and a
             free-spirited sensualist.

   24                                                                                                                                                    25
9–12                                                                                                                                                  9–12
          McCullers, Carson 		                                                   Murakami, Haruki
            A Member of the Wedding                                                The Wild Sheep Chase
            A sensitive portrayal of adolescent Frankie Adams who is bored         A young advertising executive receives a postcard from a friend,
            by her little cousin, rejected by the “in-crowd,” neglected by         and casually appropriates the image for an insurance company’s
            her father, and yearns to belong to her newlywed brother and           advertisement. What he doesn’t realize is that included in
            his wife.                                                              the pastoral scene is a mutant sheep, which has captured the
                                                                                   attention of a man in black who offers a menacing ultimatum:
          Malamud, Bernard               		                                        find the sheep or face dire consequences. Thus begins a surreal
             The Fixer                                                             and elaborate quest: a truly wild sheep chase.
             This story of the pain and suffering of innocent Yakov Bok, a
             Jew in Russia, follows him as he is falsely accused of murdering    Ng, Celeste
             a Christian boy. Based on a true case, this story is very moving.      Little Fires Everywhere
                                                                                    Beginning at the end, Isabelle Richardson burns down her
          Mann, Thomas 			                                                          family home. Ng invites readers to enter the town of Shaker
            Death in Venice                                                         Heights, a planned community where everything was always
            This short novel follows the fatal obsession of the aging writer        designed to happen as expected. That is, until Mia Warren and
            Gustav von Aschenbach with a young Polish boy, Tadzio,                  her daughter Pearl enter the lives of the Richardsons.
            whom Aschenbach encounters on vacation in Venice.
                                                                                 Nomen, Non
          Márquez, Gabriel García                                                  The Unwords
            One Hundred Years of Solitude                                          A nameless but brutally honest narrator takes us on a
            The history of the Buendia family over five generations,               thought-provoking and philosophical journey through the
general     through civil wars, tragic deaths, and 1,789 consecutive days          fallacies of our language and social and moral decay using
                                                                                                                                                         general
fiction                                                                                                                                                  fiction
            of rain. Magical realism at its best.                                  pictures and verse.
          Mistry, Rohinton 				                                                  Obreht, Tea
             A Fine Balance                                                        The Tiger’s Wife
             The story of five individuals living in India who must follow its     Natalia, a doctor in the Balkans, has been shaped by two
             repressive caste system and navigate the corrupt government.          things: war and her grandfather. But when her grandfather dies
          Mitchell, David 			                                                      after lying about his destination, Natalia realizes that he had
                                                                                   been hiding secrets from everyone.
             Cloud Atlas
             Six nested stories through time tell the tale of what appears to    Orwell, George
             be a single soul. Each story contains crucial elements of the         1984
             previous story, leaving the reader convinced that each main           In a dystopian society where Big Brother watches everything
             character is the reincarnated version of the previous.                and the population behaves like mindless robots, Winston and
          Momaday, N. Scott 		                                                     Julia attempt to break away from their controlling world.
            House Made of Dawn                                                   Otsuka, Julie
            A Pulitzer Prize winner, this novel tells the story of a young          The Buddha in the Attic
            Native American caught between the lands of his childhood               Depicting the extraordinary lives of Japanese “picture brides”
            and the cities of industrial America.                                   who come to the US at the turn of the century, this novel
          Moore, Christopher 			                                                    tells of the collective experience of a group of idealistic young
                                                                                    women and touches on the themes of assimilation, racism and
            Lamb: The Gospel of Christ According to Biff
                                                                                    the American Dream.
            Jesus’s pal Biff works to fill in the blanks of Jesus’s life left
            by the Bible. A comedic look into what was left out.                 Palahniuk, Chuck
                                                                                    Invisible Monsters
          Morrison, Toni
                                                                                    After successful, young model Shannon McFarland is disfigured
            Beloved
                                                                                    in a mysterious accident on the highway, she embarks on a
            Inspired by true events, this lyrical novel follows Sethe—
                                                                                    cross-country journey with the charismatic Brandy Alexander,
            a woman who has escaped slavery—as she and her family
                                                                                    who urges her to change her life.
            grapple with the terrible, haunting choice she was forced to
            make years earlier.

   26                                                                                                                                                    27
9–12                                                                                                                                                    9–12
          Pasternak, Boris 		                                                     Russel, Karen
             Dr. Zhivago                                                             Swamplandia!
             Set against the Russian Revolution and its aftermath: the               Set in the Florida everglades, this novel tells the story of
             ruthless Kamarovsky, the beautiful Lara, the faithful Tonia,            Ava Bigtree, an alligator wrestler who goes on an adventure
             and a gifted young doctor and poet named Zhivago struggle               to reunite her family after the death of her mother.
             to survive.
                                                                                  Russo, Richard
          Pessl, Marisha 				                                                        Empire Falls
             Special Topics in Calamity Physics                                      2002 Pulitzer Prize Winner for fiction. A subtle drama about
             Widely acclaimed, this dazzling novel chronicles the                    the plight of a working class father and daughter in a decaying
             adventures, at turns rollicking and deadly, of the brilliant and        Northeast mill town.
             beautiful sixteen-year-old Blue Van Meer.
                                                                                  Salinger, J.D.
          Potok, Chaim 				                                                           Catcher in the Rye
             My Name Is Asher Lev                                                     The classic tale of teen angst, true love and phonies, Salinger’s
             Born into an Orthodox Jewish family, Asher Lev is confronted             novel introduces us to one of the most irritating and endearing
             by his intense feelings for the creative arts and the disapproving       voices in literature: Holden Caulfield.
             elders who try to discourage his interest.
                                                                                  Shchlink, Bernhard
          Powers, Kevin 			                                                          The Reader
            The Yellow Birds                                                         Michael Berg was fifteen when he had a passionate but brief
            The novel opens in 2004 as two young soldiers prepare for war            affair with a beautiful older woman, Hanna Schmitz. Years
general     in Iraq—a freshly imagined bildungsroman about a soldier’s               later, Michael meets Hanna again—when she is on trial for her         general
fiction                                                                                                                                                    fiction
            coming of age. Twenty-one-year-old Bartle promises one                   crimes at Auschwitz.
            frightened mother that he will look after her eighteen-year-old
                                                                                  Shamsie, Kamila
            son. An Iraq War veteran, Powers tells a “true war story” with
                                                                                     Home Fire
            the spare, precise language of a poet.
                                                                                     Sophocles’s “Antigone” is retold through the love, resentment,
          Pynchon, Thomas                		                                          fear, and loyalty of three British Muslim siblings. Orphaned
             The Crying of Lot 49                                                    adults left to grapple with the legacy of their jihadist father,
             Funny, ironic, erotic, and bizarre, this short but dense novel is       sisters Isma and Aneeka react differently and powerfully to their
             the best introduction to Pynchon’s work.                                brother’s decision to join ISIS.

          Robinson, Marilynne            		                                       Sinclair, Upton
             Housekeeping                                                            The Jungle
             Sent to live with their grandmother, sisters Ruthie and Lucille         A muckraking novel which exposed the deplorable conditions
             find themselves set up in a more stable environment than                of Chicago’s stockyards at the turn of the century. This exposé
             they are used to. The narrator, Ruthie, observes her constantly         led to government regulations in the industry that still stand
             changing world with an unclouded and keen eye.                          today.

          Roth, Philip 				                                                       Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr
             American Pastoral                                                       In The First Circle
             A tour de force that takes on the Vietnam War, the Jewish-              Gulag inmates staff a Soviet technical institute, and these
             American experience, glove-making, baseball, and domestic               scientists are favored over the other prisoners. One inmate
             terrorism. American Pastoral follows the life of Seymour                reports this injustice, and the narrative follows the hunt for
             “Swede” Levov, whose promising and beautiful life eventually            the exposer.
             crumbles into a nightmare.
                                                                                  Stegner, Wallace
          Rushdie, Salman			                                                         Angle of Repose
             Midnight’s Children                                                     Stegner wrote this Pulitizer Prize-winning novel weaving
             Saleem Sinai is born at the stroke of midnight on August 15,            together the stories of several generations of a family who
             1947, the very moment of India’s independence. Greeted by               experienced the grandeur, challenges and joys of settling in
             fireworks displays, cheering crowds, and Prime Minister Nehru           the American West where the geography itself played a role in
             himself, Saleem grows up to learn the ominous consequences              shaping its people.
             of this coincidence. Perhaps most remarkable are the telepathic
             powers linking him with India’s 1,000 other “midnight’s
             children,” all born in that initial hour and endowed with
             magical gifts.

   28                                                                                                                                                      29
You can also read