Richford Jr-Sr High School
Recommended Summer Reading List
Dear Students, Parents, and Guardians,
Summer is a wonderful time to enjoy leisure reading. Numerous studies
have shown that students who consistently read in their spare time are more
proficient in core subjects, become better critical thinkers and effective
communicators, and do better on achievement tests such as the SAT.
The RHS Library and English Department have created recommended
summer reading lists for each grade level, which include fiction and nonfiction books ranging from moderately easy to extremely challenging. In
addition, we have tried to include books, which we hope will appeal to the
wide variety of interests of our student body.
Although there is no required reading assignment, we strongly suggest that
each student read at least 2 books before the end of the summer. Extra credit
may be earned towards next school year’s courses. Please see your
respective teacher at the beginning of your English course. You may use the
accompanying Reading Journal to keep track of the titles you read.
Copies of these titles will be available at the Arvin A. Brown Library in
Richford (848-3313). Library hours are: Mondays and Fridays: 10 - 5, Wed:
10 -8, and Sat: 9 - 1. All RJSHS students, including those from Montgomery
and Berkshire, may apply for a library card and borrowing privileges from
this library. Montgomery residents may also find many of these titles at the
Montgomery Town Library (326-3113).
All the recommended reading lists by grade level may be accessed by going
to the RJSHS web site: http://rhs.richford.k12.vt.us/
Have a great summer and Happy Reading!
Richford Jr-Sr High School Library and English Department
RJSHS Recommended
Summer Reading List
Entering Grade Seven
The Call of the Wild – Jack London
Island of the Blue Dolphin – Scott O’Dell
Crash – Jerry Spinelli
Soldier’s Heart: A Novel of the Civil War – Gary Paulsen
Kira-Kira – Cynthia Kadohata
The Thieves of Ostia - Caroline Lawrence
Mary, Bloody Mary – Carolyn Meyer
Bud, Not Buddy – Christopher Paul Curtis
Al Capone Does My Shirts – Gennifer Choldenko
The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett
Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
Julie of the Wolves – Jean Craighead George
The Old Willis Place – Mary Downing Hahn
Walk Two Moons – Sharon Creech
The Revealers – Doug Wilhelm
The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be – Farley Mowat
The Face on the Milk Carton – Caroline Cooney
Travel Team – Mike Lupica
Heat – Mike Lupica
Brian’s Hunt – Gary Paulsen
The Bones on Black Spruce Mountain – David Budbill
My Side of the Mountain – Jean Craighead George
Flush – Carl Hiaasen
Tuck Everlasting – Natalie Babbitt
Peter and the Starcatchers – Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson
Harry Potter Series – J.K. Rowling
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
Bridge to Terabithia – Katherine Paterson
Rascal – Sterling North
Kit’s Wilderness – David Almond
Surviving the Applewhites – Stephanie S. Tolan
The Music of Dolphins – Karen Hesse
RJSHS Recommended
Summer Reading List
Entering Grade Eight
Jacob Have I Loved – Katherine Paterson
The Same Stuff as Stars – Katherine Patterson
Witness – Karen Hesse
Out of the Dust – Karen Hesse
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry – Mildred Taylor
Doomed Queen Anne – Carolyn Meyer
Lyddie – Katherine Patterson
Zazoo – Richard Mosher
A Tour of Evil – Suzi Wizowaty
The Executioner’s Daughter – Laura E. Williams
Olive’s Ocean – Kevin Henkes
As Long as There Are Mountains – Natalie Kinsey-Warnock
A Step from Heaven – An Na
Skater Stuntboys – Pam Withers
Slot Machine – Chris Lynch
Stargirl – Jerry Spinelli
Criss Cross – Lynne Rae Perkins
The Schwa Was Here – Neal Shusterman
Counting on Grace – Elizabeth Winthrop
Night Flying – Rita Murphy
The Lightning Thief – Rick Riordan
One-handed Catch – Mary Jane Auch
Trickster’s Choice – Tamora Pierce
Never Cry Wolf – Farley Mowat
The Sea of Trolls – Nancy Farmer
Hattie Big Sky – Kirby Larson
Tom Sawyer – Mark Twain
Fat Boy Saves the World – Ian Bone
My Darling, My Hamburger – Paul Zindel
The Pigman – Paul Zindel
Summer of My German Soldier – Bette Greene
RHS Recommended
Summer Reading List
Entering Grade Nine
Speak – Laurie Halse Anderson
The Red Badge of Courage – Stephen Crane
Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte
Code Talker: A Novel of the Navajo Marines of World War Two – Joseph
Bruchac
The River Between Us – Richard Peck
A Single Shard – Linda Sue Park
Mrs. Mike – Benedict Freedman
A Day No Pigs Would Die – Robert Newton Peck
The Outsiders – S.E. Hinton
Downriver – Will Hobbs
A Time for Dancing – Davida Wills Hurwin
Slam – Walter Dean Myers
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants – Ann Brashares
Sleeping Freshmen Never Lie – David Lubar
The Chocolate War – Robert Cormier
Dragon Flight – Anne McCaffrey
The Golden Compass – Philip Pullman
The Will of the Empress – Tamora Pierce
Artemis Fowl – Eoin Colfer
Eragon – Christopher Paolini
The Thief Lord – Cornelia Funke
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens – Sean Covey
Reviving Ophelia – Mary Pipher
Dropping in with Andy Mac: Life of a Pro Skateboarder – Andy MacDonald
Death Be Not Proud – John Gunther
Crooked – Laura and Tom McNeal
Frankenstein – Mary Shelley
Battle Dress – Amy Efaw
RHS Recommended
Summer Reading List
Entering Grade Ten
Cut – Patricia McCormick
Alia Waking – Laura Williams McCaffrey
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents – Julia Alvarez
Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich – Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Watership Down – Richard Adams
Nothing But the Truth - Avi
Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
The Plain Janes – Cecil Castellucci
The Car – Gary Paulsen
The Seeing Stone – Kevin Crossley-Holland
The First Part Last – Angela Johnson
Twelfth Night – Shakespeare
In These Girls, Hope is a Muscle – Madeleine Blais
NBA’s Greatest – John Harea
The Wee Free Men – Terry Pratchett
I Am the Messenger – Markus Zusak
Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
Pendragon: the Merchant of Death – D.J. MacHale
Far from the Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn – Betty Smith
Flowers for Algernon – Daniel Keyes
The Color Purple – Alice Walker
A Northern Light – Jennifer Donnelly
In the Heart of the Sea – Nathaniel Philbrick
David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
RHS Recommended
Summer Reading List
Entering Grade Eleven or Twelve
Cider House Rules – John Irving
My Sister’s Keeper – Jodi Picoult
The Secret Life of Bees – Sue Monk Kidd
Les Miserables – Victor Hugo
Clan of the Cave Bear – Jean Auel
Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
Don Quixote – Cervantes
Seabiscuit – Laura Hillenbrand
The Good Earth – Pearl S. Buck
Girl in Hyacinth Blue – Susan Vreeland
Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
Animal Dreams – Barbara Kingsolver
The Bean Trees – Barbara Kingsolver
First They Killed My Father – Loung Ung
Lucas – Kevin Brooks
Angela’s Ashes – Frank McCourt
Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima – James Bradley and Ron Powers
The Stranger – Albert Camus
Ten Thousand Days of Thunder: A History of the Vietnam War – Philip Caputo
Tuesdays with Morrie – Mitch Albom
It’s Not about the Bike: My Journey Back to Life – Lance Armstrong
Uncle Tom’s Cabin – Harriet Beecher Stowe
Native Son – Richard Wright
On the Road – Jack Kerouac
A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini
The Maltese Falcon – Dashiell Hammett
Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
Joy Luck Club – Amy Tan
The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
My Antonia – Willa Cather
Snow Falling on Cedars – David Guterson
The Perfect Storm – Sebastian Junger
Into thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster – Jon Krakauer
Prom – Laurie Anderson
…Continued on back….
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan – Lisa See
Uglies – Scott Westerfield
The Hunter’s Moon – O.R. Melling
The Glass Menagerie – Tennessee Williams
The Last of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper
Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
The Color of Water – James McBride
Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
The Testament – John Grisham
I Heard the Owl Call my Name – Margaret Craven
Between a Rock and a Hard Place – Aaron Ralston
The Namesake – Jhumpa Lahiri
The Book Thief – Markus Zusak
Looking for Alaska – John Green
Suite Francaise – Irene Nemirovsky
The Usual Rules – Joyce Maynard
In the Time of the Butterflies – Julia Alvarez
Jurassic Park – Michael Crichton
Waiting for Teddy Williams – Howard Frank Mosher
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden – Joanne Greenberg
The Glass Castle – Jeannette Walls
Miracle in the Andes – Nando Parrado
Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury
No Pretty Pictures – Anita Lobel
The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing – M. T. Anderson
Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman
Ahab’s Wife – Sena Jeter Naslund
Summer Reading Journal
Name:
Grade:
Title of Book:
Author:
Summary:
My Response: