Fall 2007 incoming Seniors Reading list
Chopin, Kate The Awakening - The Awakening tells the story of Edna
Pontellier and the changes that occur in her thinking and lifestyle as the result of a summer romance.
Crane, Stephen The Red Badge of Courage- The Red Badge of Courage is the story of Henry Fleming, a teenager who enlists with the Union
Army in the hopes of fulfilling his dreams of glory.
Gibson, William Virtual Light- Berry Riddell is a former armed-response rentacop now working for a bounty hunter. Chevette Washington is a bicycle messenger turned pickpocket who impulsively snatches a pair of innocent-looking sunglasses. But these are no ordinary shades. What you can see through these high-tech specs can make you rich--or get you killed.
Hailey, Alex
Heller, Joseph Catch 22- satire on the murderous insanity of war. Yossarian, the wise-ass bombardier who was too smart to die but not smart enough to find a way out of his predicament
Hemingway, Ernest A Farewell to Arms- is the unforgettable story of an American ambulance driver on the Italian front and his passion for a beautiful
English nurse.
Butler, Octavia Kindred -utilizes the devices of science fiction in order to answer the question "how could anybody be a slave?" A woman from the twentieth century, Dana is repeatedly brought back in time by her slave-owning ancestor Rufus when his life is endangered.
Morrison, Toni
The Autobiography of Malcolm X- recounts his transformation from a bitter, self-destructive petty criminal into an articulate political activist.
Song of Solomon -Song of Solomon explores the quest for cultural identity through an African American folktale about enslaved
Africans who escape slavery by fleeing back to Africa.
Silko, Leslie Ceremony -A young Native American fights to defeat the demons that have followed him since his return from WWII.

Wharton, Edith The Age of Innocence -story of the upper classes of Old New
York, and Newland Archer's impossible love for the disgraced
Countess Olenska, is a perfectly wrought book about an era when upper-class culture in this country was still a mixture of American and European extracts,
Summer -it is set in the Berkshires, but the season is summer and the story is that of Charity Royall, a New Englander of humble origins -- passionate, forthright, and proud -- and her torrid affair with Lucius Harney, an artistically inclined young man from the city.
Austen, Jane
Martel, Yann
Pride and Prejudice -the story of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet (minor gentry), their five daughters, and the various romantic adventures at their Hertfordshire residence of Longbourn.
Life of PiAfter a harrowing shipwreck, Pi finds himself adrift in the Pacific Ocean, trapped on a 26-foot lifeboat with a wounded zebra, a spotted hyena, a seasick orangutan, and a 450-pound
Bengal tiger named Richard Parker
Maguire, Gregory Wicked -Elphaba, better known as the Wicked Witch of the West, is not wicked; nor is she a formally schooled witch. Instead, she's an insecure, unfortunately green Munchkinlander who's willing to take radical steps to unseat the tyrannical Wizard of Oz. Using an appropriately brusque voice for the always-blunt Elphaba,
McDonough relates her tumultuous childhood
Bradbury, Ray Something Wicked This Way Comes- A carnival like no other roll into town. Two boys-- best friends Will Halloway and Jim
Nightshade-- are about to learn the secret of its smoke, mazes, and mirrors as they confront a nightmarish evil that will change their lives forever.
Krakauer, John Into the Wild - In April 1992, a young man from a well to do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness morth of Mt. McKinley. How he came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild.
Remnick, David King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an
American Hero.
- With telling detail, Remnick captures the drama, danger, beauty, and ugliness of a generation’s worth of big heavyweight fights.

Steinbeck, John
McCullers, Carson The Member of the Wedding A young Southern girl is determined to be the third party on a honeymoon, despite all the advice against it from friends and family.
Francis, Dick
The Log from the Sea of Cortez In 1940, Steinbeck ventured into the Gulf of California to search for marine invertebrates along the beaches. This is the day-by-day account of his trip.
10 lb. Penalty Ben Juliard wanted to become a jockey, but found himself playing a role in his father’s campaign for President. Ben discovers that politics can be the most dangerous race of all.
Vonnegut, Kurt Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut's absurdist classic
Slaughterhouse-Five introduces us to Billy Pilgrim, a man who becomes unstuck in time after he is abducted by aliens from the planet Tralfamadore. In a plot-scrambling display of virtuosity, we follow Pilgrim simultaneously through all phases of his life, concentrating on his (and Vonnegut's) shattering experience as an
American prisoner of war who witnesses the firebombing of
Dresden.
Garcia Marquez, Gabriel One Hundred Years of Solitude -It is typical of Gabriel
García Márquez that it will be many pages before his narrative circles back to the ice, and many chapters before the hero of One
Hundred Years of Solitude
, Buendía, stands before the firing squad. In between, he recounts such wonders as an entire town struck with insomnia, a woman who ascends to heaven while hanging laundry, and a suicide that defies the laws of physics
Yolen, Jane Dragon’s BloodDragons are trained to fight to the death, and two determined teens help free them in this spellbinding saga.
Training a dragon to be a fighting champion is the only way to freedom for fifteen-year-old Jakkin.
Atwood, Margret
Handmaid’s Tale-
In the Republic of Gilead, formerly the United
States, far-right Schlafly/Falwell-type ideals have been carried to extremes in the monotheocratic government. The resulting society is a feminist's nightmare: women are strictly controlled, unable to have jobs or money and assigned to various classes:
Irving, John A Prayer for Owen MeanyOwen Meany is a dwarfish boy with a strange voice who accidentally kills his best friend's mom with a baseball and believes--accurately--that he is an instrument of God, to be redeemed by martyrdom.

Maguire Gregory Confessions of an Ugly StepsisterGregory Maguire's chilling, wonderful retelling of Cinderella is a study in contrasts. Love and hate, beauty and ugliness, cruelty and charity--each idea is stripped of its ethical trappings, smashed up against its opposite number, and laid bare for our examination
Alvarez, Julia How the Garcia Girls Lost Their AccentsFifteen tales vividly chronicle a Dominican family's exile in the Bronx, focusing on the four Garcia daughters' rebellion against their immigrant elders.
Cook, Karen What Girls Learn- Depicts the inner lives of girls on the verge of adolescence with tremendous insight, and in Tilden, she has found a narrator both eloquent and observant. What Girls Learn explores notions of family and femininity and the transcendence of love, even in the face of loss.
Chobosky, Stephen The Perks of Being a Wallflower- Charlie encounters the same struggles that many kids face in high school--how to make friends, the intensity of a crush, family tensions, a first relationship, exploring sexuality, experimenting with drugs--but he must also deal with his best friend's recent suicide.
Dickerson, Matthew Following Gandalf: Epic Battles and Moral Victory in The
Lord of Rings- Investigates the importance of free will and moral choices in Tolkien's Middle Earth, where moral victory, rather than military success, is the ''real'' story. He explores Christian themes throughout, including salvation, grace, and judgment.

Complete the following and bring to your English class on the first day of school.
Title ____________________________________ Author _____________________
Main characters/Key participants and brief description of each
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Setting (time and place) ____________________________________________________
Conflict ________________________________________________________________
Important events (i.e. brief summary) _________________________________________
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How is the conflict resolved? ________________________________________________
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Were you satisfied with the ending? Why/why not? _____________________________
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Theme (lesson/moral/purpose) _______________________________________________
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Did you enjoy this book? Why/why not? ______________________________________
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