ESL and Young Adult Reading List (updated 12/8/0808)
Title
The Hobbit
Author
Tolkien,
J.R.R.
Date
1978
Call
Review
Number
F
TOL
HOB
Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who
wanted to be left alone in quiet
comfort. But the wizard Gandalf came
along with a band of homeless dwarves.
Soon Bilbo was drawn into their quest,
facing evil orcs, savage wolves, giant
spiders, and worse, unknown dangers.
Finally, it was Bilbo -- alone and
unaided -- who had to confront the
great dragon Smaug, the terror of an
entire countryside...THIS STIRRING
ADVENTURE FANTASY BEGINS
THE TALE OF THE HOBBITS
THAT WAS CONTINUED BY J.R.R.
TOLKIEN IN HIS BESTSELLING
EPIC THE LORD OF THE RINGS.
Cover
The
Fellowship
of the Ring
The Two
Towers
Tolkien, J.
R. R.
Tolkien, J.
R. R.
2001
2001
F
TOL
FEL
A New York Times Bestseller Part
One of The Lord of the Rings In a
sleepy village in the Shire, young
Frodo Baggins is faced with an
immense task as his elderly cousin
Bilbo entrusts the One Ring of Sauron
to his care. Frodo must make a perilous
journey across Middle-earth to the
Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the
all-powerful Ring and foil the Dark
Lord in his evil purpose.
F
TOL
TWO
For over fifty years, J.R.R. Tolkien's
peerless fantasy has accumulated
worldwide acclaim as the greatest
adventure tale ever written. No other
writer has created a world as distinct as
Middle-earth, complete with its own
geography, history, languages, and
legends. And no one has created
characters as endearing as Tolkien's
large-hearted, hairy-footed hobbits.
Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
continues to seize the imaginations of
readers of all ages, and this new threevolume paperback edition is designed
to appeal to the youngest of them. In
ancient times, the Rings of Power were
crafted by the Elvensmiths, and
Sauron, the Dark Lord, forged the One
Ring, filling it with his own power so
that he could rule all others. But the
One Ring was taken from him, and
though he sought it throughout
Middle-earth, still it remained lost to
him . . .
The Return
of the King
Tolkien, J.
R. R.
2001
F
TOL
RET
For over fifty years, J.R.R. Tolkien's
peerless fantasy has accumulated
worldwide acclaim as the greatest
adventure tale ever written. No other
writer has created a world as distinct as
Middle-earth, complete with its own
geography, history, languages, and
legends. And no one has created
characters as endearing as Tolkien's
large-hearted, hairy-footed hobbits.
Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
continues to seize the imaginations of
readers of all ages, and this new threevolume paperback edition is designed
to appeal to the youngest of them. In
ancient times, the Rings of Power were
crafted by the Elvensmiths, and
Sauron, the Dark Lord, forged the One
Ring, filling it with his own power so
that he could rule all others. But the
One Ring was taken from him, and
though he sought it throughout
Middle-earth, still it remained lost to
him . . .
The
Chronicles
of Narnia:
The Lion,
The Witch,
and the
Wardrobe
The Joy
Luck Club
Narnia ... the land beyond the
wardrobe, the secret country known
only to Peter, Susan, Edmund, and
Lucy ... the place where the adventure
begins.
Lewis, C. S.
Tan, Amy
2005
1989
F
LEW
F
TAN
JOY
Lucy is the first to find the secret of the
wardrobe in the professor's mysterious
old house. At first, no one believes her
when she tells of her adventures in the
land of Narnia. But soon Edmund and
then Peter and Susan discover the
Magic and meet Aslan, the Great Lion,
for themselves. In the blink of an eye,
their lives are changed forever.
A New York Times Bestseller In 1949
four Chinese women - drawn together
by the shadow of their past - begin
meeting in San Francisco to play mah
jong, invest in stocks, eat dim sum, and
"say" stories. They call their gathering
the Joy Luck Club. Nearly forty years
later, one of the members has died.
When her daughter comes to take her
place, she learns of her mother's
lifelong wish, and the tragic way in
which it has come true.
The
Invisible
Man
Wells, H.
G.
1976
F
WEL
INV
"With his face swaddled in bandages,
his eyes hidden behind dark glasses and
his hands covered even indoors, Griffin
- the new guest at the Coach and
Horses - is at first assumed to be a shy
accident victim. But the true reason for
his disguise is far more chilling: he has
developed a process that has made him
invisible, and is locked in a struggle to
discover the antidote. Forced from the
village and driven to murder, he seeks
the aid of his old friend Kemp. The
horror of his fate has affected his mind,
however - and when Kemp refuses to
help, he resolves to wreak his revenge."
The four Tillerman children finally
have a home at their grandmother's
rundown farm on the Maryland shore.
It's what Dicey has dreamed of for her
three younger siblings, but after
watching over the others for so long,
it's hard to let go. Who is Dicey, if she's
no longer the caretaker for her family?
Dicey’s
Song
Voigt,
Cynthia
1982
F
VOI
Dicey finds herself in new friends, in a
growing relationship with her
grandmother, and in the satisfaction of
refinishing the old boat she found in
the barn. Then, as Dicey experiences
the trials and pleasures of making a
new life, the past comes back with
devastating force, and Dicey learns just
how necessary -- and painful -- letting
go can be.
Justin and
the Best
Biscuits in
the World
Montana
1948
Walter,
Mildred
Pitts
Watson,
Larry
1986
1993
F
WAL
Justin's sisters and his mama are
always fussing at him. No wonder he's
glad to go visit Grandpa's ranch. While
he's there he will ride his favorite
horse, Black Lightning, see the
cowboys at the rodeo, and forget all
about "women's work." Mildred Pitts
Walter writes with the sure touch of
experience. She tells about a very
special grandfather and about a boy's
struggle to make it in a "man's world" even though he is surrounded by
women.
F
WAT
"From the summer of my twelfth year I
carry a series of images more vivid and
lasting than any others of my boyhood
and indelible beyond all attempts the
years make to erase or fade them...” So
begins David Hayden's story of what
happened in Montana in 1948. The
events of that cataclysmic summer
permanently alter twelve-year-old
David's understanding of his family: his
father, a small-town sheriff; his
remarkably strong mother; the
Hayden's Sioux housekeeper, Marie
Little Soldier, whose revelations are at
the heart of the story; David's uncle, a
war hero and respected doctor. As their
story unravels around David, he learns
that truth is not what you believe it to
be, that power is abused, and that
sometimes you have to choose between
family loyalty and justice. In a voice as
brilliantly clear as the eastern Montana
sky, Larry Watson has created a
completely new American classic. With
nearly perfect pitch, Watson evokes a
time, a place, and more: a story whose
pages will not stop, turning, because its
characters will not let them.
The Time
Machine
Stuart Little
Wells, H.
G.
White, E.
B.
1995
1973
F
WEL
TIM
When the Time Traveler courageously
stepped out of his machine for the first
time, he found himself in the year
802,700--and everything had changed.
H.G. Wells' famous novel of one man's
astonishing journey beyond the
conventional limits of the imagination
is regarded as one of the great
masterpieces in the literature of science
fiction.
F
WHI
How terribly surprised the Little
family must have been when their
second child turned out to be a small
mouse. At times, doesn't everyone feel
like the sole mouse in a family--and a
world--of extremely tall people?
The
Trumpet of
the Swan
Angel on
the Square
Marcellino,
Ed
Whelan,
Gloria
1970
2001
F
MAR
F
WHE
Like the rest of his family, Louis is a
trumpeter swan. But unlike his four
brothers and sisters, Louis can't
trumpet joyfully. In fact, he can't even
make a sound. And since he can't
trumpet his love, the beautiful swan
Serena pays absolutely no attention to
him.
Louis tries everything he can think of
to win Serena's affection--he even goes
to school to learn to read and write.
But nothing seems to work. Then his
father steals him a real brass trumpet.
Is a musical instrument the key to
winning Louis his love?
A Life of Luxury In the fall of 1914,
safe behind palace walls, Katya Ivanova
sees St. Petersburg as a magical place.
The daughter of a lady-in-waiting to
the Empress, Katya spends all her time
with the Grand Duchesses; the royal
family feels like her own. But outside
the palace, a terrible war is sweeping
through Europe, and Russia is
beginning to crumble under the weight
of a growing revolution. Now, as
Katya's once-certain future begins to
dissolve, she must seek to understand
what is happening to her beloved
country and, for the first time in her
life, take charge of her own destiny.
Swallowing
the Sun
Cruise
Control
Trueman,
Terry
Trueman,
Terry
2003
2004
F
TRU
SWA
F
TRU
CRU
“There’s never been anything like this
rain before. I hear the monster
growling, low and mean. Its voice is
the wind roaring all around us. This
isn’t like rain at all – there aren’t
raindrops, but sheets of solid water,
like a waterfall crashing down from the
sky…”
Yesterday, Jose thought about music,
girls, sport, his favorite ice cream; he
watched wild parrots fly across his
home; he dreamed of travelling the
world. But when the hurricane hits his
little town, it seems to swallow the sun.
The world shrinks to life or death
against that monstrous power, and Jose
must find the strength to help his
fellow survivors live on…
Unflinchingly candid, this arresting
companion to Trueman's Printz Honor
book "Stuck in Neutral" is a compelling
exploration of love and family as it tells
the story of a young man who is
dangerously consumed by his own rage
and guilt.
Gulliver’s
Travels
Swift,
Jonathan
F
SWI
This book was supposedly written by
Lemuel Gulliver, a ship's captain from
Nottinghamshire, England. He
voyaged to some very queer countries,
indeed. First, he was shipwrecked on
the coast of Lilliput, a country of
people only six inches tall. They called
him a Man-mountain. After amazing
adventures among these little people,
he sailed to Brobdingnag, land of
giants, where he became the toy of the
king and queen.
Zach Wahhsted is used to hearing
these brutal words. But today he isn't
the only one in danger of dying.
Inside Out
Trueman,
Terry
2003
F
TRU
INS
A busy coffee shop -- a robbery gone
wrong. Two gunmen, nine hostages,
flashing lights, itchy trigger fingers.
And Zach, a seemingly ordinary
teenager, is caught in the middle of the
mayhem.
But nobody realizes that Zach -- who
has no gun and no knife -- has a mind
more dangerous than any weapon.
Never what he seems and always on
the edge, Zach is an unforgettable
character in a new book by Terry
Trueman that is filled with the same
shocking power and heartbreaking
compassion as his Printz Honor Book,
stuck in neutral.
Brave New
World
Huxley,
Aldous
1932
F
HUX
Originally published in 1932, Huxley's
terrifying vision of a controlled and
emotionless future "Utopian" society is
truly startling in its prediction of
modern scientific and cultural
phenomena, including test-tube babies
and rampant drug abuse.
Kira-Kira
Kadohata,
Cynthia
2004
F
KAD
Glittering: That’s how Katie
Takeshima’s sister, Lynn, makes
everything seem. The sky is kira-kira
because its color is deep but seethrough at the same time. The sea is
kira-kira for the same reason. And so
are people’s eyes. When Katie and her
family move from a Japanese
community in Iowa to the Deep South
of Georgia, Lynn explains to her why
people stop them on the street to stare.
And it’s Lynn who, with her special
way of viewing the world, teaches
Katie to look beyond tomorrow. But
when Lynn becomes desperately ill,
and the whole family begins to fall
apart, it is up to Katie to find a way to
remind them all that there is always
something glittering-- kira-kira-- in
the future. Luminous in its persistence
of love and hope, Kira-Kira is Cynthia
Kadohata’s stunning debut in middlegrade fiction.
Boston Jane:
Holm,
An
Jennifer L.
Adventure
Mrs. ‘Arris
Goes to
Moscow
Gallico,
Paul
2001
1974
F
HOL
F
GAL
Fresh from the Young Ladies'
Academy, 16-year-old Jane Peck has
come to the wilds of the Northwest to
be wed. But her upbringing in
straitlaced Philadelphia is hardly
preparation for the crude life that
awaits her in the Washington
Territory.
Ada Harris is off on another escapade.
The world’s favorite and most
redoubtable charlady was cleaning
Geoffrey Lockwood’s flat when she
noticed a photograph of a beautiful girl
in a fur hat standing in front of some
strange and forbidding battlements.
She was still examining the photo
when Lockwood walked in, in an
agitated state. While Mrs. Harris
didn’t want to snoop, her natural
curiosity and sympathetic ear got the
story out of him.
The girl was Lisabeta, a Russian
Intourist guide with whom he had
fallen in love while he was in the Soviet
Union doing research for a book.
Unfortunately, after he had interviewed
a dissident writer, Lockwood had been
abruptly expelled from Russia without
No
Cover
Image
Available
being able to tell Lisabeta what had
happened to him, and he couldn’t write
to her for fear of getting her into
trouble. The situation seemed hopeless.
But hopeless was a word Mrs. Harris
rarely used.
Shakespeare
Stories
Garfield,
Leon
1985
F
GAR
Here are twelve of Shakespeare's most
memorable plays, presented in a fresh
narrative form to delight both those
who know the plays well and those
who are new to them. Dramatic color
illustrations and varied black-andwhite drawings perfectly capture the
mood of each story.
Julie of the
Wolves
George,
Jean
Craighead
1972
F
GEO
Faced with the prospect of a
disagreeable arranged marriage or a
journey across the barren Alaskan
tundra, 13-year-old Miyax chooses the
tundra. She finds herself caught
between the traditional Eskimo ways
and the modern ways of the whites.
Miyax or Julie as her pen pal Amy calls
her, sets out alone to visit Amy in San
Francisco, a world far away from
Eskimo culture and the frozen land of
Alaska. During her long and arduous
journey, Miyax comes to appreciate the
value of her Eskimo heritage, learns
about herself, and wins the friendship
of a pack of wolves. After learning the
language of the wolves and slowly
earning their trust, Julie becomes a
member of the pack. Since its first
publication, Julie of the Wolves, winner
of the 1973 Newbery Medal, has found
its way into the hearts of millions of
readers.
‘“I shall be a good witch,” said Selina to
her older sister.
“There’s no such thing,” said Muffet.
“There will be when I am one,” said
Selina.’
Mr.
McFadden’s
Hallowe’en
Looking for
Alaska
Godden,
Rumer
Green,
John
1975
2005
F
GOD
F
GRE
So begins an extraordinary and
evocative tale of life on the Scottish
Border. Filled with no-nonsense
sentiment, Mr. McFadden’s Hallowe’en
concerns an inheritance, a small pony
called Haggis, a cantankerous but
kindly old man, and an abandoned boy.
Rumer Godden writes of a Hallowe’en
that will be remembered as vividly by
Selina and Muffet as by young readers
everywhere.
In a stunning debut novel, Miles
"Pudge" Halter befriends some fellow
boarding school students whose lives
are everything but boring. Pudge falls
in love with Alaska, the razor-sharp
and self-destructive nucleus. But when
tragedy strikes, Pudge discovers the
value of loving unconditionally.
The Wind
in the
Willows
Grahame,
Kenneth
1908
F
GRA
For generations, readers have enjoyed
classic literature. They have delighted
in the romance of Jane Austen, thrilled
at the adventures of Jules Verne, and
pondered the lessons of Aesop.
Introduce young readers to these
familiar volumes with Great Illustrated
Classics. In this series, literary
masterworks have been adapted for
young scholars. Large, easy-to-read
type and charming pen-and-ink
drawings enhance the text. Students
are sure to enjoy becoming acquainted
with traditional literature through
these well-loved classics.
Bert,
Breen’s
Barn
Edmonds,
Walter D.
1975
F
EDM
A young man attempts to claim
ownership to an old barn rumored to
contain a hidden treasure.
Hitty: Her
First
Hundred
Years
Fire in the
Hole!
Field,
Rachel
Farrell,
Mary
Cronk
1929
2004
F
FIE
A favorite since it was first published in
1929; this Newbery Medal winner is a
timeless classic about a very special
doll of great charm and character.
F
FAR
Fourteen-year-old Mick doesn’t want
to end up like his father, a roughneck
union miner working for low wages in
the Coeur d’Alene silver-mining
district of Idaho. He detests the
vigilante attitude of his father’s union
and would rather do his fighting with
words like his mentor, Mr. Delaney,
who runs the town newspaper. But
when the radicals of his father’s union
blow up the mining company’s oreconcentrating mill, Mick’s dreams blow
up with it. Federal soldiers put the
town under martial law and arrest
every man in it, including Mick and his
father. Mick realizes that he’s his
family’s only chance for survival. He
must escape and do the one thing he
swore he’d never do-join the scabs
working in the mines. First-time
author Mary Cronk Farrell has crafted
a gripping historical novel based on a
true event that occurred at the turn of
the last century. Lessons from this
overlooked part of U.S. history will
still resonate with readers today.
Author’s note.
Johnny
Tremain
Forbes,
Esther
1943
F
FOR
A story filled with danger and
excitement, Johnny Tremain tells of
the turbulent passionate times in
Boston just after the Revolutionary
War. Johnny, a young apprentice
silversmith, is caught up in a dramatic
involvement with James Otis, John
Hancock, and John and Samuel Adams
in the Boston Tea Party and the Battle
of Lexington; and finally, a touching
resolution of Johnny's personal life.
Breathing
Underwater
Flinn, Alex
2001
F
FLI
Nick has never spoken of his father's
violent temper, but when Nick meets
Caitlin, everything changes. This
critically acclaimed first novel offers an
honest and fresh look into the mind of
the abused--and abuser.
A Room
Made of
Windows
Cameron,
Eleanor
1971
F
CAM
ROO
A young girl with ambitions to be a
writer observes the people around her.
The Court
of the Stone
Children
After the
Goat Man
Cameron,
Eleanor
Byars,
Betsy
1973
1974
F
CAM
COU
F
BYA
Who was Dominique? The day that
Nina, lonely and adrift in San
Francisco, played her imaginary game
in the museum with the court of the
stone children, she first saw her. And
soon the question became, what was
this strange, beautiful girl?
The answer, Nina gradually
discovered, lay in the past – when the
museum was still a chateau in France;
when Napoleon ruled; and when
Dominique was a young girl!
An overweight, sensitive boy gains the
insight and strength to overcome his
problems through his search for and
discovery of a friend's grandfather,
known as the Goat Man.
Fahrenheit
451
Caddie
Woodlawn
Bradbury,
Ray
Brink,
Carol Ryrie
1978
1963
F
BRA
First published in 1953, Fahrenheit
451 is a classic novel set in the future
when books forbidden by a totalitarian
regime are burned. The hero, a book
burner, suddenly discovers that books
are flesh and blood ideas that cry out
silently when put to the torch.
F
BRI
"This Newbery Award winning book . .
. has been reprinted with a charming
reminiscence by the author about her
grandmother Caddie . . . Told with
style and grace and teamed with . . .
fresh new illustrations, the story of
Wisconsin frontier life in the 1860s
will continue to attract readers today."-"School Library Journal, " starred
review.
Before We
Were Free
Alvarez,
Julia
2002
F
ALV
Anita de la Torre never questioned her
freedom living in the Dominican
Republic. But by her 12th birthday in
1960, most of her relatives have
emigrated to the United States, her Tio
Toni has disappeared without a trace,
and the government's secret police
terrorize her remaining family because
of their suspected opposition of el
Trujillo's dictatorship. Using the
strength and courage of her family,
Anita must overcome her fears and fly
to freedom, leaving all that she once
knew behind. From renowned author
Julia Alvarez comes an unforgettable
story about adolescence, perseverance,
and one girl's struggle to be free.
Copper Sun
Draper,
Sharon M.
2006
F
DRA
Amari’s life was once perfect. Engaged
to the handsomest man in her tribe,
adored by her family, and living in a
beautiful village, she could not have
imagined everything could be taken
away from her in an instant. But when
slave traders invade her village and
brutally murder her entire family,
Amari finds herself dragged away to a
slave ship headed to the Carolinas,
where she is bought by a plantation
owner and given to his son as a
birthday present.
Survival seems all that Amari can hope
for. But then an act of unimaginable
cruelty provides her with the
opportunity to escape, and with an
indentured servant named Polly, she
flees to Fort Mose, Florida, in search of
sanctuary at the Spanish colony. Can
the illusive dream of freedom sustain
Amari and Polly on their arduous
journey, fraught with hardship and
danger?
Told in a series of vignettes stunning
for their eloquence, The House on
Mango Street is Sandra Cisneros’
greatly admired novel of a young girl
growing up in the Latino section of
Chicago.
The House
on Mango
Street
Cisneros,
Sandra
1984
F
CIS
Sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes
deeply joyous, The House on Mango
Street tells the story of Esperanza
Cordero, whose neighborhood is one of
harsh realities and harsh beauty.
Esperanza doesn’t want to belong – not
to her rundown neighborhood, and not
to the low expectations the world has
for her. Esperanza’s story is that of a
young girl coming into her power, and
inventing for herself what she will
become.
Mount
Vernon
Love Story
Clark,
Mary
Higgins
1968
F
CLA
Charming, insightful, and immensely
entertaining in its unique presentation
of one of America's legendary figures,
this first novel by Mary Higgins Clark-originally published as "Aspire to the
Heavens"--shows the reader the man
behind the legend, a man of flesh,
blood, and passion.
Ramona the
Brave
Cleary,
Beverly
1975
F
CLE
Six-year-old Ramona tries to cope with
an unsympathetic first-grade teacher.
Monsters of
Morley
Manor
Colville,
Bruce
1996
F
COL
What do you get when you mix
together-- werewolves, vampires, mad
scientists, wizards, aliens, alternate
dimensions, tiny people, Transylvania,
ancient curses, giant frogs, evil clones,
ghosts, lawyers, shape-changers, fallen
angels, journeys through hell, zombie
warriors, body snatchers, and two
clever kids in whose hands rests the
fate of Earth? --The craziest
adventure-comedy-fantasy-mystery
from bestselling novelist Bruce
Colville, that's what.
Prairie
Songs
Conrad,
Pam
1985
F
CON
PRA
Louisa's life in a loving pioneer family
on the Nebraska prairie is altered by
the arrival of a new doctor and his
beautiful, tragically frail wife.
The Dark is
Rising
Cooper,
Susan
1973
F
COO
On the Midwinter Day that is his
eleventh birthday, Will Stanton
discovers a special gift: he is the last of
the Old Ones, immortals dedicated
throughout the ages to keeping the
world from domination by the forces of
evil, the Dark. He is plunged at once
into a quest for the six magical Signs
that will one day aid the Old Ones in
the final battle between the Dark and
the Light. Thereafter, for the twelve
days of Christmas while the Dark is
rising, life for will – although
outwardly normal – is strangely
wonderful as he is drawn through
terror and delight.
Staying Fat
for Sarah
Byrnes
Elijah of
Buxton
Crutcher,
Chris
1993
Curtis,
Christopher 2007
Paul
F
CRU
Eric and Sarah have been friends since
junior high, when his weight and her
scars made them outcasts. In high
school, Eric has slimmed and Sarah
doesn't let being an outsider hurt her.
Now she sits silent in a hospital. Can
Eric uncover her secret before it puts
them both in danger?
F
CUR
Its 1860, and 11-year-old Elijah is a
first-generation freeborn child. His
Canadian town of Buxton serves as a
haven for runaway slaves. When the
town’s corrupt preacher steals money
from a citizen who’s been saving to buy
his family’s freedom, Elijah sets off for
America in pursuit, in this powerful
new novel by a Newbery Medalist.
The BFG
Dahl, Roald 1982
F
DAH
BFG
The BFG-the Big Friendly Giantkidnaps Sophie from her bed in the
orphanage and takes her back to
Giantland with him lest she tell
everyone that she has seen a giant.
There she meets nine other Giants,
Fleshlumpeater, Bonecrusher,
Gizzardgulper, Bloodbottler-a whole
beastly crew-all much bigger than the
BFG, and much, much meaner. Every
night the BFG catches dreams in a
long-handled net and blows the good
ones into little children's minds as they
sleep, while the other Giants are busy
racing off to various parts of the world
to eat "human beans." How the BFG
and Sophie conspire to put an end to
the loathsome activities of the other
Giants is a marvelously original and
funny story, told by one of the bestknown, best-loved writers for children,
Roald Dahl. Quentin Blake's delightful
black-and-white line drawings depict
all the humor and action of Dahl's
wonderful tale.
Danny, The
Champion
of the
World
James and
the Giant
Peach
Dahl, Roald 1975
Dahl, Roald 1961
F
DAH
DAN
Anny’s dad had a secret, but now the
secrets out and its going to lead Danny
on the adventure of a lifetime.
F
DAH
JAM
When James Henry Trotter
accidentally drops some magic crystals
by the old peach tree, strange things
start to happen. The peach at the top of
the tree begins to grow, and before
long it's as big as a house. Then James
discovers a secret entranceway into the
fruit, and when he crawls inside, he
meets a bunch of marvelous oversized
friends -- Old-Green-Grasshopper,
Centipede, Ladybug, Miss Spider, and
more.
After years of feeling like an outsider in
the house of his despicable Aunt
Sponge and Aunt Spiker, James has
finally found a place where he belongs.
With a snip of the stem, the peach
starts rolling away, and the exciting
adventure begins!
Life is both sweet and cruel to strongwilled young Shabanu, whose home is
the wind-swept Cholistan Desert of
Pakistan. The second daughter in a
family with no sons, she’s been allowed
freedoms forbidden to most Muslim
girls. Yet her parents soon grow
justifiably concerned that her
independence and disinterest in
“women’s work” will lead to trouble.
Shabanu:
Daughter of
the Wind
Staples,
Suzanne
Fisher
1989
F
STA
As tradition dictates, Shabanu’s father
has arranged for her to be married in
the coming year. Though this will
mean an end to her liberty, Shabanu
accepts it as her duty to the family.
Then a tragic encounter with a wealthy
and powerful landowner ruins the
marriage plans of her older sister, and
it is Shabanu who is called upon to
sacrifice everything she’s dreamed of.
Should she do what is necessary to
uphold her family’s honor – or should
she listen to the stirrings of her own
heart?
Loser
Spinelli,
Jerry
2002
F
SPI
LOS
No matter what the game, Zinkoff
never wins. Newbery Medal-winning
author Spinelli uses wit and emotion to
create the unique story of a boy as he
travels from first through sixth grade.
Maniac
Magee
Spinelli,
Jerry
1990
F
SPI
MAN
He wasn't born with the name Maniac
Magee. He came into this world named
Jeffrey Lionel Magee, but when his
parents died and his life changed, so did
his name. And Maniac Magee became a
legend. Even today kids talk about how
fast he could run; about how he hit an
inside-the-park "frog" homer; how no
knot, no matter how snarled, would
stay that way once he began to untie it.
But the thing Maniac Magee is best
known for is what he did for the kids
from the East Side and those from the
West Side.
Miracles on
Maple Hill
Sorensen,
Virginia
1956
F
SOR
Marly and her family share many
adventures when they move from the
city to a farmhouse on Maple Hill.
Esperanza
Rising
Franny and
Zooey
Ryan, Pam
Munoz
Salinger, J.
D.
2000
1957
F
RYA
Esperanza Ortega lives in a beautiful
home filled with servants and the
promise of one day presiding over all of
Rancho de las Rosas. But tragedy
shatters that dream, forcing Esperanza
and Mama to flee from Mexico to
California and settle in a farm labor
camp.
F
SAL
The author writes: “Franny” came out
in The New Yorker in 1955 and was
swiftly followed (in 1957) by “Zooey”.
Both stories are early, critical entries in
a narrative series I’m doing about a
family of settlers in twentieth-century
New York, the Glasses. It is a longterm project, patently an ambitious
one, and there is a real-enough danger,
I suppose, that sooner or later I’ll bog
down, perhaps disappear entirely, in
my own methods, locutions, and
mannerisms. On the whole, though, I’m
very hopeful. I love working on these
Glass stories, I’ve been waiting for
them most of my life, and I think I have
fairly decent, monomaniacal plans to
finish them with due care and all
available skill.
In the
Forest and
On the
Marsh
This Way
to
Christmas
Skrebitski,
G. A.
Sawyer,
Ruth
1966
1952
F
SKR
No Review Available
F
SAW
David was a lonely little boy and it
seemed for a while that Christmas was
going to be an empty one that year.
For there he was, far away from his
mother and father, up in the snowcovered hill country with only his
nurse, Johanna, and her husband. But
one evening, he met another lonely
creature: a locked-out fairy that
introduced David to his still-lonelier
neighbors, who came from all over the
world. The stories they told him, the
Christmas they shared, and the happy
surprise for David at the end make this
ageless book one that will live forever
in the hearts of its readers.
No
Cover
Image
Available
Harry
Potter and
the
Sorcerer’s
Stone
Rowling, J.
K.
1997
F
ROW
In a rousing first novel, already an
award-winner in England, Harry is just
a baby when his magical parents are
done in by Voldemort, a wizard so
dastardly other wizards are scared to
mention his name. So Harry is brought
up by his mean Uncle Vernon and Aunt
Petunia Dursley, and picked on by his
horrid cousin Dudley. He knows
nothing about his magical birthright
until ten years later, when he learns
he's to attend Hogwarts School of
Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hogwarts is
a lot like English boarding school,
except that instead of classes in math
and grammar, the curriculum features
courses in Transfiguration, Herbology,
and Defense Against the Dark Arts.
Harry becomes the star player of
Quidditch, a sort of mid-air ball game.
With the help of his new friends Ron
and Hermione, Harry solves a mystery
involving a sorcerer's stone that
ultimately takes him to the evil
Voldemort. This hugely enjoyable
fantasy is filled with imaginative
details, from oddly flavored jellybeans
to dragons' eggs hatched on the hearth.
It's slanted toward action-oriented
readers, who will find that Briticisms
meld with all the other wonders of
magic school.
The
Invention of
Hugo
Cabret
Criss Cross
Selznick,
Brian
Perkins,
Lynne Rae
2007
2005
F
SEL
Orphan, clock keeper, thief--Hugo lives
in the walls of a busy Paris train
station, where his survival depends on
secrets and anonymity. Combining
elements of picture book, graphic
novel, and film, Caldecott Honor artist
Selznick breaks open the novel form to
create an entirely new reading
experience in this intricate, tender, and
spellbinding mystery.
F
PER
This winner of the 2006 Newbery
Medal is a poignant coming-of-age
story about a young girl and her
friends whose paths cross--and stories
criss cross--over one summer.
Scribbler of
Dreams
Hatchet
Pearson,
Mary E.
Paulsen,
Gary
2001
1987
F
PEA
Kaitlin Malone hates the Crutchfields.
Her family has feuded with them for
generations, and now her dad is in jail
for killing one of them. This legacy of
hatred has never been questioned-until Kaitlin falls for a Crutchfield boy.
As if that's not bad enough, that boy is
the son of the man her father
murdered.
F
PAU
HAT
On a trip to visit his father, 13-year-old
Brian is the sole survivor of a plane
crash in the Canadian wilderness. With
only the clothes on his back and a
hatchet he received as parting gift from
his mother, Brian begins to shape a life
for himself in the wild.
The
Cookcamp
The Higher
Power of
Lucky
Paulsen,
Gary
Patron,
Susan
1991
2006
F
PAU
COO
During World War II, a little boy is
sent to live with his grandmother, a
cook in a camp for workers building a
road through the wilderness.
F
PAT
HIG
Lucky, age ten, can't wait another day.
The meanness gland in her heart and
the crevices full of questions in her
brain make running away from Hard
Pan, California (population 43), the
rock-bottom only choice she has. It's all
Brigitte's fault-for wanting to go back
to France. Guardians are supposed to
stay put and look after girls in their
care! Instead Lucky is sure that she'll
be abandoned to some orphanage in
Los Angeles where her beloved dog,
HMS Beagle, won't be allowed. She'll
have to lose her friends Miles, who
lives on cookies, and Lincoln, future
U.S. president (maybe) and member of
the International Guild of Knot Tyers.
Just as bad, she'll have to give up
eavesdropping on twelve-step
anonymous programs where the
interesting talk is all about Higher
Powers. Lucky needs her own-and
quick. But she hadn't planned on a dust
storm. Or needing to lug the world's
heaviest survival-kit backpack into the
desert.
Bridge to
Terabithia
Paterson,
Katherine
1977
F
PAT
BRI
In this classic novel, the friendship
between young Jess and Leslie grows
as they meet in Terabithia--their secret
hiding place--and only ends with the
tragic death of one of them.
The Ginger
Tree
The
Medicine
Man
Wynd,
Oswald
Gonzalez,
Francisco
Rojas
1977
2000
F
OSW
In 1903, a young Scotswoman named
Mary Mackenzie sets sail for China to
marry her betrothed, a military attaché
in Peking. But soon after her arrival,
Mary falls into an adulterous affair
with a young Japanese nobleman,
scandalizing the British community.
Casting her out of the European
community, her compatriots tear her
away from her small daughter. A
woman abandoned and alone, Mary
learns to survive over forty tumultuous
years in Asia, including two world
wars and the cataclysmic Tokyo
earthquake of 1923.
F
GON
Rojas takes advantage of his extensive
anthropological field work among
different indigenous peoples of Mexico,
to write concise and short stories
which acutely portrait these ethnic
groups, what their culture is like, and
what kind of lives they lead. Each one
of the twelve stories is about a specific
ethnical group, so the reader gets a
sense of the variety and differences
among these groups. The stories go
from the extraordinary to the everyday
aspects of life. Rojas was a good
anthropologist, and that is reflected in
the fact that his stories are not told
from an "afar" Western point of view,
which tends to emphasize the "exotic",
but instead try to penetrate into the
vision and collective soul of these
groups. The general tone is
melancholic, fatalist, magical, and full
of references to the rites and beliefs of
Mexican Indians.
Now that the Zapatista uprising has
brought up the issue of indigenous
peoples, it should be healthy that
people interested take a look at the
wide variety of cultures and visions of
these peoples, a first-hand account by
one man who really got to live among
them. Many prejudices and
commonplaces will be changed after
reading this. But, most of all, it is good
literature, and that should suffice.
Eight
Million
Gods and
Demons
Sherwin,
Hiroko
2001
F
SHE
Eight million gods and demons, the
number of deities in the Japanese
pantheon, reflect the chaos in Japan
between the Meiji Era and the end of
World War II. Beginning with the
child bride, Emi, who marries the
politician, Taku, despite her tender age
and ailing health, and concluding with
the stoic tribulations of their family
through the wreckage of World War
II, Sherwin takes the reader into her
historical love story with ease. Taku
recognizes Emi's golden personality as
worthy of his devotion despite her
weak physical constitution and inability
to produce healthy children, but Taku
cannot help being attracted to a local
geisha named Hana, who is beautiful,
strong, and regal as a peacock. Hana's
demeanor is haughty, but her heart is
wrapped in stone; Taku takes her for
his mistress, but the pain he has caused
sweet Emi and the greed of his
The
Hundred
Secret
Senses
Tan, Amy
1995
F
TAN
HUN
newfound lover are the bitter facts he
must endure. This is a captivating first
novel spanning four generations of
love, loss, and irony.
Olivia, the main character and narrator
of this tale, begins by telling about the
arrival of her half sister Kwan, from
China. Kwan is nearly 18 when she
comes to the US. She is unable to
communicate in English and knows
nothing of the American lifestyle.
Olivia, her only companion, albeit
unwillingly, is soon filled with Chinese
folklore, the Chinese language, and
ghosts. Yes, Kwan has Yin eyes, or in
other words, the ability to see the
deceased that have traveled to the Yin
World. Even though the whole ghost
thing may be a recurring theme, Tan
has an interesting way of adding her
own twist.
The plot switches back and forth from
Olivia, Simon (Olivia's husband), and
Kwan, to Kwans growing experiences
in her past life, which she can
remember. Each time the section ends
at a high point, causing you to want to
read on, but unlike some novels which
use this strategy to pull you through
boring parts, this book is always
exiting, thus letting you enjoy every
bit of the book.
No-No Boy
Okada,
John
1977
F
OKA
It is sad that John Okada wrote only
one novel in his life, but it gives me
great joy just to mention this book to
anyone. _No-No Boy_ is a novel that
deals with the high emotions of those
felt by Japanese Americans during the
tumultuous times of the second world
war. It is a time when American
citizens are incarcerated into
"relocation centers" without any wrong
doing except that their last names were
Okada, Sone, and Ikeda. However, as
John Okada traces the story of Kenji, a
Nisei who refused to answer yes to the
loyalty questionnaire, we do not feel
any strong bitterness about the whole
situation that could be all too common
in such a text. This touching novel is
ultimately about one's search for a
home, for loyalty, and for acceptance
into society. These themes, while
prevalent in many Japanese American
texts written about this time period,
are universal and can be shared by
anyone who has ever felt the pangs of
loneliness associated with being an
outcast.
A Personal
Matter
Oe,
Kenzaburo
American
Born
Chinese
No
Yang, Gene
F
Data
Luen
YAN
Available
1969
F
OE
In A Personal Matter, Oe has chosen a
difficult, complex though universal
subject: how does one face and react to
the birth of an abnormal child? Bird,
the protagonist, is a young man of 27
with antisocial tendencies who more
than once in his life, when confronted
with a critical problem, has “cast
himself adrift on a sea of whisky like a
besotted Robinson Crusoe.” But he has
never faced a crisis as personal or grave
as the prospect of life imprisonment in
the cage of his newborn infantmonster. Should he keep it? Dare he
kill it? Before he makes his final
decision, Bird’s entire past seems to
rise up before him, revealing itself to be
a nightmare of self-deceit.
Indie graphic novelist Gene Yang's
intelligent and emotionally challenging
American Born Chinese is made up of
three individual plotlines: the
determined efforts of the Chinese folk
hero Monkey King to shed his humble
roots and be revered as a god; the
struggles faced by Jin Wang, a lonely
Asian American middle school student
who would do anything to fit in with
his white classmates; and the sitcom
plight of Danny, an All-American teen
so shamed by his Chinese cousin ChinKee (a purposefully painful ethnic
stereotype) that he is forced to change
schools. Each story works well on its
own, but Yang engineers a clever
convergence of these parallel tales into
a powerful climax that destroys the
hateful stereotype of Chin-Kee, while
leaving both Jin Wang and the
Monkey King satisfied and happy to be
who they are.
The
Adventures
of Tom
Sawyer
Twain,
Mark
1993
F
TWA
ADV
1993
Mark Twain's story of a boy's life in a
small town on the Mississippi River is
worth reading for many reasons. First
of all, it is just plain fun. Tom has many
amusing adventures, such as the
famous white-washing incident. The
imaginations of the children are fully
engaged; in a world without even
picture shows, radio, or recorded
music, much less TV or video games,
the boys and girls of St. Petersburg do
not lack activities to keep themselves
entertained. There is also a dark side to
this world, as exemplified by the
murderer Injun Joe (here some of the
unfortunate racism of the period sneaks
into the narrative) and the many
superstitions of the children.
The
Tsukiyama,
Language of
Gail
Threads
1999
F
TSU
LAN
The unique bond forged between
Chinese women who were abandoned
by their families and forced into the
silk industry at a young age is
beautifully explored in Tsukiyama's
(Night of Many Dreams) precisely
crafted novel. During the Japanese
invasion of Canton in 1938, Pei, a shy
27-year-old whose quiet strength
marks her as a survivor, flees the silk
factory where she has lived and worked
since she was eight years old. She takes
with her Ji Shen, an adolescent
orphaned when the Japanese took
Nanking, whom Pei has pledged to
raise. Arriving in Hong Kong, Pei
relies on her ties with the silk
sisterhood to find housing and a place
to work, and also to learn the rules and
customs which she must adopt in this
new environment. In spare, evocative
prose, Tsukiyama paints contrasting
pictures of the bustling wealth of Hong
Kong and its massive poverty. First
assigned to a wealthy Chinese
household where she is embroiled in
servants' quarrels, Pei finally finds
unexpected peace working for "a white
devil," a widowed Englishwoman who
comes to treat Pei like a daughter.
Flashbacks to Pei's early life in the silk
factory punctuate the narrative, which
skillfully traces 35 years through the
Japanese invasion of Hong Kong and
its aftermath up until 1973Ain Pei's
nimbly stalwart existence. Women
provide for each other in myriad ways
in this world, and the relationships
forged between them glow at the heart
of Tsukiyama's story. Sisters are
reunited, mothers and adopted
daughters remain steadfastly loyal,
childbirth breeds grief, but affirmation,
too, and great friends even return from
the dead to console their loved ones in
this quiet but powerful effort from a
writer who proves once again that she
is an unusually gifted storyteller.
Coming
Through
Slaughter
Ondaatje,
Michael
1976
F
OND
The story is one of Buddy Bolden, a
real jazz musician in New Orleans in
the early 20th century. None of his
music survives, but he is said to be one
of the founders of jazz. And so
Ondaatje explores the small pieces of
Bolden's historical truth, creating a
character and an entire book that
revolves around his life, his love affair
with music, his love affair with a
woman, and the audience's love affair
with him. Other historical characters
emerge from the text, like E.J. Bellocq,
a man who photographed prostitutes
from the Storyville area of New
Orleans.
Animal
Farm
The
Terrible
Twos
Orwell,
George
Reed,
Ishmael
1982
1999
F
ORW
ANI
George Orwell’s classic satire of the
Russian Revolution has become an
intimate part of contemporary culture.
It is an account of the transformation
of Manor Farm into Animal Farm, of
the brave struggle on the part of the
animals to create a wholly democratic
society built on the credo that All
Animals Are Created Equal. Of course,
as with its many counterparts in
modern society, this brave struggle
results in a new totalitarian regime and
a new maxim: But Some Animals Are
More Equal Than Others.
F
REE
This novel depicts a zany, bizarre, and
all-too-believable future where
mankind’s fate depends upon St.
Nicholas and a Risto-rasta dwarf
named Black Peter, who together
wreak mischievous havoc on Wall
Street and in the Oval Office. This
offbeat, on-target social critique makes
marvelous fun of everything that is
American, from commercialism to
Congress, Santa Claus to religious
cults.
Women of
the Silk
Tsukiyama,
Gail
1991
F
TSU
TER
Women of the Silk captures the
realities, struggles, and infrequent joys
of working women in early 20th
century China. Gail Tsukiyama's
elegant portrayal of Pei, a girl sold to a
silk factory by her destitute parents is
riveting. Pei's life, though riddled with
hardship, is enriched by her
relationships with other women who
share her fate. The factory women
enjoy a sisterhood, which bolsters their
self-confidence and sense of self worth.
This bond, coupled with the autonomy
afforded them by living on their own
without husbands, enables the silk
factory women to enjoy a measure of
freedom and self-confidence that was
unobtainable to married Chinese
women of the era. Instilled with a sense
of belonging and confidence, the
"sisters" gather the collective strength
to stand up to the brutal factory chiefs
and fight for their rights.
1984
Orwell,
George
1961
F
ORW
1984
There are many different types of
books out there: fiction, non-fiction,
science fiction, fantasy, horror, history,
and biography. But only a few of them
have the same impact that George
Orwell achieves in his book 1984. It
seems part paranoid fantasy, part
tribute to the malleability of the human
psyche, and part historical allegory.
The issues, even presented in the
outdated means that they are, still ring
true for our modern society. The line
between patriotism and nationalism is a
thin one, and one that Americans look
at each day. But in Orwell's world that
line was crossed, and the result was a
totalitarian government beyond
anything most of us can imagine. With
the government controlling all jobs,
information, deeds, and actions, even to
the smallest thought of their peoples,
his world is stark and horrible to those
of us used to a freedom. But the steps
into that world are not that far away
from our modern media control. In his
world of 1984 the media serves the
purpose of brainwashing the populace
at large, and an ongoing war keeps the
pressure on. And while some may claim
that the media in our own country has
the same control over us, in his world,
the media is the government, and has
no other agenda than that which the
government sets forth.
The
Adventures
Twain,
of
Mark
Huckleberry
Finn
Purity of
Blood
PerezReverte,
Arturo
2000
1997
F
TWA
ADV
2000
Mark Twain's classic novel, The
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, tells the
story of a teenaged misfit who finds
himself floating on a raft down the
Mississippi River with an escaping
slave, Jim. In the course of their
perilous journey, Huck and Jim meet
adventure, danger, and a cast of
characters who are sometimes
menacing and often hilarious.
F
ART
PUR
Those looking for seriously
entertaining thrills will welcome
Pérez-Reverte's second 17th-century
Spanish swashbuckler featuring the
exploits of stoic, honorable Capt. Diego
Alatriste (after 2005's Captain Alatriste).
A father and two brothers accompany
Alatriste on a mission to rescue their
sister from the convent in which she
has been imprisoned. Things go wrong
when an old enemy of the captain
ensures that Alatriste's ward, 13-yearold Inigo Balboa, falls into the hands of
the Inquisition. With the aid of the
great Spanish poet Francisco de
Quevedo, all is made right. Rich in
historical detail and sardonic
observations, the narrative begins
leisurely. The pace picks up, but the
action is never so breathless as to
sweep the reader along, as with Captain
Alatriste. Still, this will matter little to
fans, who are sure to look forward to
further installments in the series.
George Orwell's picture of the British
Indian Empire is a world of real and
mental violence, pure racism,
provocations by and manipulations of
indigenous rebellions, corruption,
bribing and blackmail.
He unveils `the lie that we're here to
uplift our poor black brothers. ... The
Indian Empire is despotism with theft
as its final object. Its real backbone is
the Army.'
Burmese
Days
Orwell,
George
1962
F
ORW
BUR
The White Man lives like a parasite on
the indigenous population, because `the
real work of administration is done
mainly by native subordinates.' `He
becomes a creature of the despotism
tied tighter than a monk or a savage by
an unbreakable system of taboos.'
A colony `is a world in which every
word and every thought is censored.
Even friendships can hardly exist when
every white man is a cog in the wheels
of despotism. Free speech is
unthinkable. You are free to be a
drunkard, a fornicator; but you are not
free to think for yourself. Your whole
life is a life of lies.'
The
Absolutely
Alexie,
True Story
Sherman
of a PartTime Indian
1966
F
ALE
Arnold Spirit, a goofy-looking
dork with a decent jumpshot, spends
his time lamenting life on the "poorass" Spokane Indian reservation,
drawing cartoons (which accompany,
and often provide more insight
than, the narrative), and, along with
his aptly named pal Rowdy, laughing
those laughs over anything and
nothing that affix best friends so
intricately together. When a teacher
pleads with Arnold to want more, to
escape the hopelessness of the rez,
Arnold switches to a rich white school
and immediately becomes as much
an outcast in his own community as he
is a curiosity in his new one. He
weathers the typical teenage
indignations and triumphs like a champ
but soon faces far more trying ordeals
as his home life begins to crumble and
decay amidst the suffocating mire of
alcoholism on the reservation.
Suri & Co.
Amirshahi,
Mahshid
1995
F
AMI
Eat
Everything
Before You
Die
Chan,
Jeffery Paul
2004
F
CHA
Told by a high-spirited, intelligent,
willful (if sometimes insecure) teenage
girl, they recount incidents in her daily
life in Iran in the 1970s before the
Revolution. Without any ideological
"message," they present human interest
and social comment. Their central
characteristic is humor, from slapstick
to subtlety, which can be easily
appreciated across cultural boundaries.
As we meet Suri's immediate family,
distant relatives, and friends, we are
discreetly introduced to upper-middleclass society in an Iran undergoing
headlong westernization. The
contradictions between this process
and traditional Iranian mores are
particularly well depicted. Much
writing in recent years has been
concerned with the 1979 Iranian
Revolution and the rise of Islamic
fundamentalism. This volume reminds
us that there is always an ongoing
human dimension largely unaffected by
political and religious changes.
Another feature is the homogeneity of
this collection, created by one author
and interpreted by the translator.
A professor of Asian-American studies
weaves a knotty, dynamic tale of
Christopher Columbus Wong, a grown
orphan, and his quest to uncover his
origins and process his life experiences:
growing up in San Francisco's
Chinatown in the 1950s, going to
university during the Vietnam War,
eloping with a Chinese immigrant
seeking a green card and then taking
No
Image
Available
up with a passionate hippie. Colorful
characters float in a whirlwind of
American counterculture. There's
dying Uncle Lincoln, who might be
Wong's father; Peter, his gay older
brother with "a quick mouth ready to
deal in two languages"; the inimitable
Auntie Mary, known to kill pigeons
from her balcony with "slingshot
frozen peas"; and Wong's father-figure,
Reverend Candlewick, who was
defrocked for pedophilia. Wong
describes Wick as a "messiah... who
could alchemize race, culture, politics,
sex, and rock 'n' roll"—a feat that is
quite possibly the ambition of this very
ambitious novel. But the non-linear and
muddled narrative obfuscates the plot,
even as it makes sense coming from a
narrator so lost. Chan writes with
sumptuous eloquence about food, and
the moments in which boundaries
between sibling, lover, mother and
father shift and break down are deeply
moving.
Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness was
first published in 1899 in serial form in
London’s Blackwood’s Magazine.
Heart of
Darkness
Conrad,
Joseph
2002
F
CON
HEA
Loosely based on Conrad’s firsthand
experience of rescuing a company
agent from a remote station in the
heart of the Congo, the novel is
considered a literary bridge between
the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
With its modern literary approach to
questions such as the ambiguous nature
of good and evil, the novel foreshadows
many of the themes and techniques
that define modern literature.
Balzac and
the Little
Chinese
Seamstress
Sijie, Dai
2001
F
DAI
The Cultural Revolution of Chairman
Mao Zedong altered Chinese history in
the 1960s and '70s, forcibly sending
hundreds of thousands of Chinese
intellectuals to peasant villages for "reeducation." This moving, often
wrenching short novel by a writer who
was himself re-educated in the '70s tells
how two young men weather years of
banishment, emphasizing the power of
literature to free the mind. Sijie's
unnamed 17-year-old protagonist and
his best friend, Luo, are bourgeois
doctors' sons, and so condemned to
serve four years in a remote mountain
village, carrying pails of excrement
daily up a hill. Only their ingenuity
helps them to survive. The two friends
are good at storytelling, and the village
headman commands them to put on
"oral cinema shows" for the villagers,
reciting the plots and dialogue of
movies. When another city boy leaves
the mountains, the friends steal a
suitcase full of forbidden books he has
been hiding, knowing he will be afraid
to call the authorities. Enchanted by
the prose of a host of European writers,
they dare to tell the story of The Count
of Monte Cristo to the village tailor
and to read Balzac to his shy and
beautiful young daughter. Luo, who
adores the Little Seamstress, dreams of
transforming her from a simple
country girl into a sophisticated lover
with his foreign tales. He succeeds
beyond his expectations, but the result
is not what he might have hoped for,
Like Water
for
Chocolate
Esquivel,
Laura
1995
F
ESQ
and leads to an unexpected, droll and
poignant conclusion.
Each chapter of screenwriter Esquivel's
utterly charming interpretation of life
in turn-of-the-century Mexico begins
with a recipe--not surprisingly, since so
much of the action of this exquisite first
novel (a bestseller in Mexico) centers
around the kitchen, the heart and soul
of a traditional Mexican family. The
youngest daughter of a well-born
rancher, Tita has always known her
destiny: to remain single and care for
her aging mother. When she falls in
love, her mother quickly scotches the
liaison and tyrannically dictates that
Tita's sister Rosaura must marry the
luckless suitor, Pedro, in her place. But
Tita has one weapon left--her cooking.
Esquivel mischievously appropriates
the techniques of magical realism to
make Tita's contact with food sensual,
instinctual and often explosive. Forced
to make the cake for her sister's
wedding, Tita pours her emotions into
the task; each guest who samples a
piece bursts into tears. Esquivel does a
splendid job of describing the
frustration, love and hope expressed
through the most domestic and
feminine of arts, family cooking,
suggesting by implication the limited
options available to Mexican women of
this period. Tita's unrequited love for
Pedro survives the Mexican Revolution
the births of Rosaura and Pedro's
children, even a proposal of marriage
from an eligible doctor. In a poignant
conclusion, Tita manages to break the
bonds of tradition, if not for herself,
then for future generations.
The Green
Mile, Part
One: The
Two Dead
Girls
King,
Stephen
1996
F
KIN
GRE
PT1
The first part of one of Stephen King’s
most famous novels in serial book form.
The Green
Mile, Part
Two: The
Mouse on
the Mile
King,
The Green
Mile, Part
Three:
Coffey’s
Hands
King,
Stephen
1996
F
KIN
GRE
PT2
The second part of one of Stephen
King’s most famous novels in serial
book form.
1996
F
KIN
GRE
PT3
The third part of one of Stephen King’s
most famous novels in serial book form.
Animal
Dreams
The Bean
Trees
Kingsolver,
Barbara
Kingsolver,
Barbara
1991
1988
F
KIN
ANI
From the acclaimed author of The
Bean Trees and Homeland, comes a
powerful story of love and courage in
an exotic southwestern landscape.
Blending flashbacks, dreams, and
Native American myths, thesis a
suspenseful love story and a moving
exploration of life's greatest
commitments.
F
KNI
BEA
Feisty Marietta Greer changes her
name to "Taylor" when her car runs
out of gas in Taylorville, Ill. By the
time she reaches Oklahoma, this
strong-willed young Kentucky native
with a quick tongue and an open mind
is catapulted into a surprising new life.
Taylor leaves home in a beat-up '55
Volkswagen bug, on her way to
nowhere in particular, savoring her
freedom. But when a forlorn Cherokee
woman drops a baby in Taylor's
passenger seat and asks her to take it,
she does. A first novel, The Bean Trees
is an overwhelming delight, as random
and unexpected as real life. The
unmistakable voice of its irresistible
heroine is whimsical, yet deeply
insightful. Taylor playfully names her
little foundling "Turtle," because she
clings with an unrelenting, reptilian
grip; at the same time, Taylor aches at
the thought of the silent, staring child's
past suffering. With Turtle in tow,
Taylor lands in Tucson, Ariz., with
Gifts
Le Guin,
Ursula K.
2004
F
GUI
GIF
two flat tires and decides to stay. The
desert climate, landscape and
vegetation are completely foreign to
Taylor, and in learning to love
Arizona, she also comes face to face
with its rattlesnakes and tarantulas.
Similarly, Taylor finds that
motherhood, responsibility and
independence are thorny, if welcome,
gifts. This funny, inspiring book is a
marvelous affirmation of risk-taking,
commitment and everyday miracles.
The back-story is pretty simple-families living in the Uplands have
hereditary magical abilities or "gifts"
(one type to a family) that can and
usually are employed to harm: gifts of
"unmaking" (killing/destroying), of
"calling" (calling animals--used to call
them to be killed), of "twisting"
(maiming things and people), of
"wasting" (cursing with a slowly fatal
illness). The clans feud back and forth
over land, cattle, etc., yet must also
stay on terms to keep interbreeding as
the gifts are strongest when bred true
through the family. The description of
the clans reminded me of old Celtic
tales of cattle-thieving etc. Fans of
Irish/Scottish old tales of Lloyd
Alexander's Prydain series might see
some similarities).
A Wizard of Le Guin,
Earthsea
Ursula K.
1968
F
GUI
WIZ
Often compared to Tolkien's Middleearth or Lewis's Narnia, Ursula K. Le
Guin's Earthsea is a stunning fantasy
world that grabs quickly at our hearts,
pulling us deeply into its imaginary
realms. Four books (A Wizard of
Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, The
Farthest Shore, and Tehanu) tell the
whole Earthsea cycle--a tale about a
reckless, awkward boy named
Sparrowhawk who becomes a wizard's
apprentice after the wizard reveals
Sparrowhawk's true name. The boy
comes to realize that his fate may be far
more important than he ever dreamed
possible. Le Guin challenges her
readers to think about the power of
language, how in the act of naming the
world around us we actually create that
world. Teens, especially, will be
inspired by the way Le Guin allows her
characters to evolve and grow into
their own powers.
In this first book, A Wizard of Earthsea
readers will witness Sparrowhawk's
moving rite of passage--when he
discovers his true name and becomes a
young man. Great challenges await
Sparrowhawk, including an almost
deadly battle with a sinister creature, a
monster that may be his own shadow.
Driving
Lessons
McBain, Ed 1999
F
MCB
The
Kalahari
Typing
School for
Men
Smith,
Alexander
McCall
F
SMI
KAL
2002
The opening scene is gripping.
Sixteen-year-old Rebecca Patton runs
down a pedestrian while taking her
driving lesson. The woman she hits is
tossed into a pile of burning leaves and
lies seriously injured. The police arrive
before the ambulance leaves. Rebecca is
confused and upset. Worst of all, her
driving instructor cannot even say his
own name. How could this happen?
Before long, she's in the police station
being interrogated.
The fourth appearance of Precious
Ramotswe, protagonist of The No. 1
Ladies' Detective Agency and two
sequels, is once again a charming
account of the everyday challenges
facing a female private detective in
Botswana. In his usual unassuming
style, McCall Smith takes up
Ramotswe's story soon after the events
described in Tears of the Giraffe.
Precious and her fiancé, Mr. J.L.B.
Matekoni, still have not set a wedding
date, but they continue to nurture the
sibling orphans in their care, as well as
the entrepreneurial ambitions of
Precious's assistant, Mma Makutsi,
who sets out to open a typing school
for men. Along the way, Ramotswe
handles a few cases and negotiates the
arrival of a rival detective in Gaborone.
The competition, a sexist detective who
boasts of New York City street smarts,
proves a delicious foil to his distaff
counterpart. A moral component enters
the story in the person of a successful
engineer who wishes to atone for his
past sins. He enlists Ramotswe to help
him find the woman he has wronged,
and this case comes to a satisfying yet
hardly sentimental conclusion. But the
real appeal of this slender novel is
Ramotswe's solid common sense, a
proficient blend of folk wisdom,
experience and simple intelligence. She
is a bit of a throwback to the days of
courtesy and manners, and casts
disapproving glances at the apprentices
in her fiancé’s auto shop who obsess
about girls instead of garage protocol.
A dose of easy humor laces the pages,
as McCall Smith throws in wry
observations, effortlessly commenting
on the vagaries his protagonist
encounters as she negotiates Botswana
bureaucracy. This is another graceful
entry in a pleasingly modest and wise
series.
The Full
Cupboard of
Life
Smith,
Alexander
McCall
2003
F
SMI
FUL
Precious Ramotswe is on the case again
in this delightful fifth installment in the
bestselling No. 1 Ladies' Detective
Agency series, this time assisting the
self-made founder of a chain of
hairdressing salons who wants to
unearth the real intentions of her four
suitors, each possibly more interested
in her money than her heart. As fans
know, though, sleuthing takes second
place to folksy storytelling in McCall
Smith's wry novels. This time around,
Mma Ramotswe is distracted by her
long-prolonged engagement to Mr.
J.L.B. Matekoni, Gaborone's best
mechanic; it seems she will never be
married, despite her fiancé's honorable
intentions. He installs an extra large
seatbelt in her car to keep her safe (she
is quite comfortable with her
"traditional build," despite the new,
slender fashion of modern woman), but
an altercation with another mechanic
and the prospect of a charity parachute
jump keep his mind off matrimony. A
drive for decency motivates Mma
Ramotswe and her friends-among them
Mma Potokwani, the imperious matron
of the local orphan farm, and Mma
Makutsi, assistant at the Ladies'
Detective Agency and founder of the
Kalahari Typing School for Men-and
Smith's talent is in portraying this
moral code in a manner that is always
engaging. As readers will appreciate,
Mma Ramotswe solves her cases-more
questions of character, really, than of
criminal behavior-in good time.
The No. 1
Ladies’
Detective
Agency
Smith,
Alexander
McCall
1998
F
SMI
Traditionally built ladies living in the
African heat don't tend to hurry, and,
at the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency,
there's always time for another cup of
tea.
A series of vignettes linked to the
establishment and growth of Mma
Ramotswe's "No. 1 Ladies Detective
Agency" serve not only to entertain
but to explore conditions in Botswana
in a way that is both penetrating and
light thanks to Smith's deft touch.
Mma Ramotswe's cases come slowly
and hesitantly at first: women who
suspect their husbands are cheating on
them; a father worried that his
daughter is sneaking off to see a boy; a
missing child who may have been killed
by witchdoctors to make medicine; a
doctor who sometimes seems highly
competent and sometimes seems to
know almost nothing about medicine.
The desultory pace is fine, since she has
only a detective manual, the frequently
cited example of Agatha Christie and
her instincts to guide her. Mma
Ramotswe's love of Africa, her wisdom
and humor, shine through these pages
as she shines her own light on the
problems that vex her clients. Images
of this large woman driving her tiny
white van or sharing a cup of bush tea
with a friend or client while working a
case linger pleasantly.
The Heart
is a Lonely
Hunter
McCullers,
Carson
1968
F
MCC
With its profound sense of moral
isolation and its compassionate
glimpses into its characters' inner lives,
the novel is considered McCullers'
finest work, an enduring masterpiece
first published by Houghton Mifflin in
1940. At its center is the deaf-mute
John Singer, who becomes the
confidant for all various types of misfits
in a Georgia mill town during the
1930s. Each one yearns for escape from
small town life. When Singer's mute
companion goes insane, Singer moves
into the Kelly house, where Mick Kelly,
the book's heroine (and loosely based
on McCullers), finds solace in her
music. Wonderfully attune to the
spiritual isolation that underlies the
human condition, and with a deft sense
for racial tensions in the South,
McCullers spins a haunting,
unforgettable story that gives voice to
the rejected, the forgotten, and the
mistreated -- and, through Mick Kelly,
gives voice to the quiet, intensely
personal search for beauty.
Shame
Wild Cat
Falling
Nasrin,
Taslima
Narogin,
Mudrooroo
1997
1992
F
NAS
The Duttas – Sudhamay, a respected
physician; his wife, Kiranmayee; and
their two children, Suranjan and Maya
– have lived in Muslim Bangladesh all
their lives. Despite being part of the
country’s Hindu minority, which has
been terrorized at every opportunity by
Muslim fundamentalists, they refuse to
leave, as most of their friends and
family have done. Sudhamay, an
atheist, believes with a naïve mixture of
optimism and idealism that the forces
of reason will prevail. Then, on
December 6, 1992, their world
suddenly begins to fall apart.
F
NAR
Wild Cat Falling is the story of an
Aboriginal youth who grows up on the
ragged outskirts of a country town,
falls into petty crime, serves time in
gaol, and then returns to do battle with
the society that put him there. White
society has no place for this young
man, no place but behind bars, and in
Wild Cat Falling there is an inexorable
momentum pushing him back to the
gaol from which he was only recently
released. But when he meets the
strange old black rabbiter, he is offered
both kindness and acceptance and a
connection to his heritage that gives
him a touchstone for his questions
about identity. But it is too late; the
police are already on his trail for the
accidental shooting of a police officer.
The Paper
Door
Naoya,
Shiga
1987
F
SHI
Sometimes as delicate as haiku, at
others samurai-like in their robustness,
these stories cry out for a translator
with a sensitive ear and a taste for
words. But here the plodding prose, the
use and reuse of throwaway phrases,
the clumsy dialogue contrive to turn
each shyly articulated episode into a
banal account and obscure the
distinctiveness of the voice and setting.
In "The Little Girl and the Rapeseed
Flower," when a dying blossom pleads
with a child to save its life, or in "Han's
Crime," in which a performing knifethrower, his vision blurred, perhaps
accidentally, perhaps willfully, kills the
wife with whom he had quarreled, each
e incident serves as a frame for selfdiscovery. More complex, "The Paper
Door" delineates two vacationing
families, and the maidservant of one
falls in love with the young master of
the other, mistakenly believing that he
too is infatuated. The longest of the
stories, "Kuniko," again involving a
man indirectly responsible for the
death of his wife, invites the reader into
a Japanese household to observe its
customs and wonder at its duplicities.
Turbulence lies beneath these smiling
surfaces, but inept prose makes the
richness hard to find.
The Ancient Momaday,
Child
N. Scott
Mutant
Message
Down
Under
Morgan,
Marlo
1989
1994
F
MOM
A man is torn between two worlds,
tormented by nightmares, and finds
himself drawn to the desert. He finds
his destiny, and it too is disintegration.
But whereas the disintegration in
"House Made of Dawn" is a violent,
tragic event, in "The Ancient Child" it
comes across as a process of spiritual
resolution and healing, rather than
destruction.
F
MAR
MUT
An American woman is summoned by a
remote tribe of nomadic Aboriginals
who call themselves the “Real People”
to accompany them on a four-monthlong walk-about through the Outback.
While traveling barefoot with them
through 1,400 miles of rugged desert
terrain, she learns a new way of life,
including their methods of healing,
based on the wisdom of their 50,000year-old culture. Ultimately, she
experiences a dramatic personal
transformation.
Red
Sorghum
Yan, Mo
Escape from Miller,
Cabriz
Linda Lael
1993
1990
F
YAN
The Japanese Invasion of China in
1937 is a dark period in history. The
Japanese committed many horrible
crimes and atrocities on the Chinese
population. Red Sorghum in very
graphic detail describes some of these
atrocities and their impact on the
Chinese civilian population.
F
MIL
One naive American woman, (Kristin)
one adventure-seeking person, (Zach)
one embarrassed Prince, (Jascha of
Cabriz) and one over protective father.
Too many people in this equation when
you consider the country Kristin is in is
in turmoil. I like the fact that both
Kristin and Zach were able to escape
from the Palace twice, the second time
by helicopter. I have to applaud
Kristin's character for finally standing
up to her over protective father after he
dug into Zach's background and
moving out of the house to write a
book on her experiences in Cabriz.
Zach finally learned to open up and
Kristin's father finally learned that his
daughter had a life and to accept Zach
as is.