Magnet Schools Required Summer Reading
Haynes, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Taylor
2012-2013
Advanced Placement ENGLISH (CHOOSE ANY 3)
Students will choose three books: one fiction, one non-fiction and one play
Title
Author
Invisible Man
F
Catch 22
F
A Confederacy of Dunces
F
Heart of Darkness
F
Candide
F
Things Fall Apart
F
The Things They Carried
F
The Mapmaker's Wife: A True Tale of Love,
Murder, and Survival in the Amazon
F
A Streetcar Named Desire
Drama
Outliers : The Story of Success
NF
How to Read Literature Like a Professor NF
Ralph Ellison
Joseph Heller
John Kennedy Toole
Joseph Conrad
Voltaire
Chinua Achebe
Tim O'Brien
Robert Whitaker
Tennessee Williams
Malcolm Gladwell
Thomas C. Foster
Remember, all work must be submitted during the first week of school. If you do not have English
until the second semester, you are still responsible for submitting your work to your English
teacher within the first week of school. Students new to the school or JPPSS or those students who
have recently been added to an Honors class who do not come to school with their response forms
completed have until October 13th , if necessary, to read the books and submit their work.
For the books you choose from the list, you will:
1. Complete the response form for each book. You will receive bonus credit in points to be
added to classroom assessments (tests or projects).
2. Participate in class discussions concerning the books read throughout the year via one of
the following:
A. literature circle discussion
B. student-led panel discussion
C. teacher-led Wiki or other web-based project
*******************************************
AP ENGLISH SUMMER READING BOOK BLURBS
Magnet Schools
Invisible Man
(Fiction)
Ralph Ellison
A nameless narrator of the novel describes growing up in a black community in the South,
attending a Negro college from which he is expelled, moving to New York and becoming the
chief spokesman of the Harlem branch of "the Brotherhood", and retreating amid violence and
confusion to the basement lair of the Invisible Man he imagines himself to be.
Catch 22
(Fiction)
Joseph Heller
This twentieth century tragicomedy based on the author’s experiences during World War II
combines humor and horror while satirizing World War II and all other wars as the absurd
offspring of ego, profit, bureaucracy, and death.
A Confederacy of Dunces
(Fiction)
John Kennedy Toole
An overweight, under-worked, overeducated, and self-described genius wrecks a French Quarter
balcony, initiates a race riot, and gallantly sells Lucky Dogs before he escapes from New Orleans
in his search for true love.
Heart of Darkness
(Fiction)
Joseph Conrad
This novel focuses on a man’s journey up Africa’s Congo River in search of Kurtz, an idealistic
ivory merchant. Cut off from “civilized” society, Kurtz has gone mad. As Marlowe travels
deeper into Africa and closer to Kurtz, the action becomes increasingly violent, surreal, and even
nightmarish.
Candide
(Fiction)
Voltaire
This hilarious French satire written during the eighteenth century is the irreverent history of a
well-meaning young hero who wants only to marry the woman he loves. But before the hero can
achieve this goal, circumstances force him to travel the world, experiencing one horror after
another: Yet the reader cannot stop laughing—yes, laughing.
Things Fall Apart
(Fiction)
Chinua Achebe
Achebe's most famous novel brilliantly portrays the impact of colonialism on a traditional
Nigerian village at the turn of the century. Its hero, Obi Okonkwo, epitomizes both the nobility
and the rigidity of the traditional culture.
The Things They Carried
(Fiction)
Tim O'Brien
The men of Alpha Company survive their tour in Vietnam. They battle the enemy (or maybe
more the idea of the enemy) and occasionally each other. In their relationships we see their
isolation and loneliness, their rage and fear.
A Streetcar Named Desire
(Drama)
Tennessee Williams
Two sisters, who have been separated by time and place, come to grips with the harsh realities
of life amid the background of the steamy city of New Orleans. Lies, exaggeration, violence,
and love each unfold in this play.
The Mapmaker's Wife
(Nonfiction)
Robert Whitaker
In this true 1735 tale of love, murder, and survival in the Amazon, a beautiful Peruvian
noblewoman and a scientist on a quest to measure the earth’s circumference and reveal the
mysteries of South America. Victims of a tangled web of international politics, enduring a
twenty-year separation, the couple reunites, thus fulfilling their destinies.
The Outliers: The Story of Success
(Nonfiction)
Malcolm Gladwell
Malcolm Gladwell takes us on an intellectual journey through the world of "outliers"--the best and the
brightest, the most famous and the most successful. He asks the question: what makes high-achievers
different? His answer is that we pay too much attention to what successful people are like, and too little
attention to where they are from: that is, their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic
experiences of their upbringing.
How to Read Literature Like a Professor
(Nonfiction)
Thomas C. Foster
In this practical and amusing guide to literature, Thomas C. Foster shows how easy and
gratifying it is to unlock hidden truths in texts, and to discover a world where a road leads to a
quest; a shared meal may signify a communion; and rain, whether cleansing or destructive, is
never just rain.