SUMMER READING ASSIGNMENT
When you return to school in September, you will be held accountable in a variety of ways for the required reading. During the first weeks of class you will be tested on your knowledge of such elements as central conflict, plot, characters, setting, and the major motifs and central theme(s) of each of the books you have read. In addition, you may be asked to write about the books in essays that explore the thematic connections between books, or that compare and contrast the books in terms of their style, structure, or worldview. How you prepare for such quizzes, tests, and essays you will decide.
The traditional methods of annotation, lists, notes, outlines or summaries, and response journals can only support and probably improve your performance during the opening weeks of school, but none of the materials you may produce this summer will be collected and graded (but think of the great skills practice you have had).
Entering Seniors should note that one of the required books is a memoir, not a novel; therefore, the analytical categories you employ in seeking a full understanding of the book may need to be adjusted to reflect the way a non-fiction narrative differs from fiction.
REQUIRED:
Required Reading: The Princess Bride by William Goldman—“The Princess Bride" is a timeless tale that pits country against country, good against evil, love against hate. This incredible journey and artfully rendered story is peppered with strange beasties monstrous and gentle, memorable surprises both terrible and sublime, and unforgettable characters.” (Quoted from the back of the book.) Please begin with the section entitled, “The Princess Bride” and read up to, but not including the section entitled, “Buttercup’s Baby.” Read all the italicized sections.
Required Reading: Goddess of Yesterday by Caroline B. Cooney—Goddess of Yesterday is a tale of a young woman trapped within the confines of the Trojan War. Our curriculum this year relies on some basic understanding of these events, so this text helps prepare you for the entire year. Please be sure to study the maps and read the afterword.
SUPPLEMENTAL:
Supplemental Reading is NOT required, and not necessary, but the books on this list will broaden your horizons.
A Bad Boy Can be Good for a Girl by Tanya Lee Stone—Three girls use a secret method to relay information about a boy with bad intentions to the rest of the girls in their school.
Crunch Time by Mariah Fredericks (Nonfiction)— This book about testing (SATs) brings you some useful information and provides some perspective on these high stakes tests.
7 Days at the Hot Corner by Terry Trueman—“In Scott’s life, baseball is the most important thing, especially now that his high school team is competing for the state championship. But, Scott’s best friend, Travis, reveals he is gay, giving Scott a lot more than baseball to be concerned about. Trueman minimizes details about each of the playoff games, so one need not be a sports fan to appreciate this novel.” (Taken from English Journal)
Nailed by Patrick Jones—This novel explores the difficulties associated with bullying. Bret Hendricks operates on the premise that ‘the nail that sticks out farthest gets hammered hardest.’ He decides to try a different approach, which includes some help from his father.
Aftershock by Kelly Easton—The journey home from Oregon to Rhode Island is complicated for young Adam by the sudden car crash that kills both of his parents. The story provides a new perspective on the heroic journey archetype.
The Warrior Heir by Cinda Williams Chima—Set in contemporary Ohio, this fast paced fantasy tale gives us a tournament to the death between an ordinary guy and a magical creature.
Loving Will Shakespeare by Carolyn Meyer—(For excellent readers only) If you are a Shakespeare fan, and you want an excellent, well-researched insight into his early life, this is the book for you. We read a Shakespearean play every year at Wooster, so this is good background for you.
Students are expected to
read the required books.
REQUIRED:
Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddo
Entering Honors English Grade Ten
Students are expected to read the
required books.
REQUIRED:
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya
REQUIRED:
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Story of B by Daniel Quinn
Entering AP English Grade Eleven
ADDITIONAL REQUIRED READING:
All The Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
REQUIRED:
All entering twelfth graders must read the following books
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Lost in Place: Growing Up Absurd in Suburbia by Marc Salzman
Additionally, the students who are entering AP English 12, must read:
The Stranger by Albert Camus
The rest of the twelfth grade recommended list is purely voluntary, no reading required from the recommended list.
RECOMMENDED BOOKS (English 12 and AP English
12):
Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
Sister Carrie tells the story of a rudderless but pretty small-town
girl who comes to the big city filled with vague ambitions. She is used
by men and uses them in turn to become a successful Broadway actress.
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
The story of eleven-year-old Pecola Breedlove -- a black girl in an
America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all
others -- who prays for her eyes to turn blue: so that she will be beautiful,
so that people will look at her, so that her world will be different.
Crime and Punishment by Feodor Dostoyevski
Mired in poverty, the student Raskolnikov nevertheless thinks well
of himself. Of his pawnbroker he takes a different view, and in deciding
to do away with her he sets in motion his own tragic downfall.
Complete Short Stories by Flannery O'Connor
The publication of this extraordinary volume firmly established Flannery
O'Connor's monumental contribution to American fiction. There are thirty-one
stories here in all.
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
This now-classic novel tells the story of a young country doctor's
wife who seeks refuge from the boredom of her existence in love-affairs
and romantic yearnings, ultimately finding herself doomed to disillusionment.
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
The nameless narrator 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.
Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy
Hardy's timeless novel of two pairs of mismatched lovers.
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
The work is one of her most successful and accessible experiments in
the stream-of-consciousness style. The three sections of the book take
place between 1910 and 1920 and revolve around various members of the
Ramsay family during visits to their summer residence on the Isle of Skye
in Scotland.
The Awakening by Kate Chopin
The book begins at a crisis point in twenty-eight year-old Edna Pontellier's
life. Edna is a passionate and artistic woman who finds few acceptable
outlets for her desires in her role as wife and mother of two sons living
in conventional Creole society.
The Trial by Franz Kafka
A terrifying psychological trip into the life of one Joseph K., an
ordinary man who wakes up one day to find himself accused of a crime he
did not commit, a crime whose nature is never revealed to him.
The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
An aged woman discovers herself as she reflects upon her life, which
spans much of the 20th century.
Tracks by Louise Erdrich
This novel, set in North Dakota in the early 1900s, limns Fleur Pillager,
a Native American woman who is rumored to be a witch, and whose life mirrors
that of crumbling Indian culture and community.
Henderson the Rain King by Saul Bellow
Bellow's glorious, spirited story of an eccentric American millionaire
who finds a home of sorts in deepest Africa.
The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad
'An impenetrable mystery seems destined to hang for ever over this act of madness or despair.' Mr Verloc, the secret agent, keeps a shop in London's Soho where he lives with his wife Winnie, her infirm mother, and her idiot brother, Stevie. When Verloc is reluctantly involved in an anarchist plot to blow up the Greenwich Observatory things go disastrously wrong, and what appears to be 'A Simple Tale' proves to involve politicians, policemen, foreign diplomats and London's fashionable society in the darkest and most surprising interrelations.