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EIGHTH GRADE READS

August 25, 2011

This is the young adult book list I give to students at the start of the year; the following books aren’t included because they are my summer reading books or books we read during the school year.  You’ll see that my list takes into account the summer reading choices my students make, the hope being that they can jump from one book they found interesting to another.

It goes without saying, of course, that To Kill a Mockingbird and Fahrenheit 451 are classics that anyone, regardless of age, can fall in love with.  But I think you may also be surprised to find that these young adult books are often as compelling for grownups as they are for their target audience. (PS–There’s an option to print the list at the very bottom!)

 

summer reading choices:

classics–

Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)

And Then There Were None (Agatha Christie)

The Once and Future King (T.H. White)

Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)

Jacob Have I Loved (Katherine Paterson)

 

contemporary–

The House of the Scorpion (Nancy Farmer)

The Adoration of Jenna Fox (Mary E. Pearson)

The Book Thief (Marcus Zusak)

Uglies (Scott Westerfeld)

Peak (Roland Smith)

 

class books:

first semester–

Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury)

To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee)

 

second semester– (please note, both of these books are graphic novels/comics)

American Born Chinese (Gene Luen Yang)

Persepolis (Marjane Satrapi)

 

If you liked Ender’s Game (adventure, fantasy), you might like…

Airman (Eoin Colfer)
In the late nineteenth century on a remote island off the coast of Ireland, Conor Broekhart discovers a plot to overthrow the king.  He is accused of beinga traitor, thrown into prison, and forced to work under brutal conditions while he plans a daring escape using a flying machine that he must design and build.

Maximum Ride, the Angel Experiment (James Patterson)
The “birdkids” were bred in a laboratory to be 98% human and 2% bird.  In this first book of the series, the youngest member of their “flock” is abducted by the the evil Erasers (part-human, part-wolf), the group finds itself engaged in battle with its creators.

Nightrise (Anthony Horowitz)
Twins Jamie and Scott have the closest possible connection; they can read each other’s thoughts.  After being attacked by the evil Nightrise Corporation, one is imprisoned and the other is left to fight against the Old Ones in order to save his brother and prevent the end of human kind.

If you liked And Then There Were None (mystery, suspense), you might like…

A Pocket Full of Rye (Agatha Christie)
The wealthy Rex Fortescue falls dead at teatime and the only clue is a “pocket full of rye” (a kind of wheat) found in his pants pocket.  The ingenious crime-solver Miss Marple uses the old nursery rhyme “Sing a Song of Sixpence” to help solve the murder.

The Westing Game (Ellen Raskin)
A group of people with seemingly no connection but the apartment tower they have all just moved into are forced to play The Westing Game, tracking down clues to solve the murder of Sam Westing, who has promised a fortune to whichever team uncovers the mystery first!

Monster (Walter Dean Myers)
Sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon is being called a “Monster.”  He is accused of participating in the fatal shooting of a convenience-store clerk, but was he just in the wrong place at the wrong time?

 

If you liked The Once and Future King (myths & legends, epic battles between good & evil), you might like…

Game of Thrones—The Song of Ice & Fire (George Martin)
In medieval times, two families, the Starks and the Lannisters, fight for control over the Iron Throne.  Far off toward the northern border, a huge wall keeps back barbarians, vampires, and direwovles who attempt to push south all winter.  Meanwhile, a dragon princess plots revenge.  [series]

The Dark is Rising (Susan Cooper)
On his eleventh birthday, Will Stanton discovers that he is not just an ordinary boy; he is an Old One, the last in a line of immortal keepers of the Light.  His task is to track down the six Signs of the Light and to join them in order to overcome the Dark.  He is guided on this perilous journey by the first of the Old Ones, a mysterious figure named Merriman. [series]

The Golden Compass (Philip Pullman)
In a world where every human is born with an animal companion, or daemon, young Lyra, who is stubborn and inquisitive, gets swept up into a great mystery with her daemon Pan.  When Lyra’s best friend disappears, she and Pan go on a journey that takes her as far as the North Pole and involves dangerous politics, armored bears, hot-air balloons, and a mysterious substance known as Dust.  [series]

If you liked Rebecca (psychological thriller, romance), you might like…

Beastly (Alex Flinn)
Kyle Kingsbury is stuck-up and spoiled, a good-looking high school kid who gets everything he wants and is quick to judge others based on appearance.  He makes the mistake of humiliating a girl who happens to be a witch and winds up looking like a Beast, the victim of a spell.  Abandoned by his father and his friends, he learns that the only way to restore his appearance is to find true love.

Thirteen Reasons Why (Jay Asher)
One day, Clay Jenson receives a mysterious package on his doorstep.  It contains several cassette tapes and he’s completely confused until he starts listening to them and hears the voice of his dead classmate Hannah Baker.  On the tapes, Hannah details the circumstances that led to her suicide.  Clay is one of 13 people Hannah wanted to hear the tapes, and he spends the day trying to unravel the mystery of why.

Wicked Lovely (Melissa Marr)
Aislinn can see faeries, something most humans cannot do.  In this world, though, faeries are not kindly beings, but rather very unpredictably, selfish creatures.  Though Aislinn’s grandmother warned her not to let the faeries know she could see them, the king of the faeries discovers her “sight” and becomes convinced that she is the faeries’ rightful queen. [series]

If you liked Jacob Have I Loved (coming of age, finding your place,) you might like…

A Wrinkle in Time (Madeline L’Engle)
The story revolves around a young girl named Meg.  Her father, a government scientist, goes missing after working on a mysterious project called a tesseract. Meg sets off on a journey to find him, and along the way, she discovers that the Universe is not quite what it seems.  [series]

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac (Gabrielle Zevin)
After hitting her head on the steps of her high school, Naomi loses her memories of everything that has happened since the sixth grade.  As she attempts to rebuild her life and rediscover herself, she finds some things about herself that she doesn’t like very much.  With two guys vying for her attention, her parents in the middle of a nasty divorce, and college on the horizon, will Naomi be able to change her past and reinvent her future?

My Sister’s Keeper (Jodi Picoult)
In the book on which the movie was based, thirteen-year-old Anna decides to sue her parents.  Why?  Since she was born, she has been expected to do whatever it takes to help keep her older sister, who is dying of leukemia, alive.  Because Anna is the only perfect match for Kate, she has given everything from blood to bone marrow to help her sister.  Now, her parents expect her to give up a kidney, and though she loves her sister, she is unwilling.

 

If you liked The House of the Scorpion (adventure, science fiction), you might like…

The Hunger Games (Suzanne Collins)
In a not-too-distant future, the United States of America has collapsed, and has been replaced by Panem, a country divided into the Capitol and 12 districts. Each year, two young representatives from each district are selected to participate in The Hunger Games. Part entertainment, part bloody intimidation, the televised games are broadcasted throughout Panem as the participants engage in a fight to the death. When 16-year-old Katniss’ young sister, Prim, is selected as the mining district’s female representative, Katniss volunteers to take her place. [series]

The Maze Runner (James Dashner)
Thomas wakes up in an elevator, remembering nothing but his own name. He emerges into a world of about 60 teen boys who have learned to survive in a completely enclosed environment, subsisting on their own agriculture and supplies from below. A new boy arrives every 30 days. The original group has been in “the glade” for two years, trying to find a way to escape through a maze that surrounds their living space. They have begun to give up hope when a girl appears for the first time.  [series]

The Life of Pi: A Novel (Yann Martel)
Sixteen-year-old Pi Patel, his family, and their zoo animals are traveling from India to North America aboard a cargo ship. When the ship sinks and all other passengers are lost, Pi finds himself sharing a lifeboat with a 450-pound Bengal tiger.  He must use his wits and instincts to survive.

 

If you liked The Adoration of Jenna Fox (overcoming a traumatic life event, discovering your identity), you might like…

The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
This story moves through life and death and into the afterlife.  Fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon is murdered by her neighbor, Mr. Harvey, one day after school.  After she dies, she watches her family struggle to accept her death and bring her killer to justice.

Speak (Laurie Halse Anderson)
A traumatic event near the end of the summer has a devastating effect on Melinda’s freshman year in high school.  She struggles through the year, unable to speak about what has happened to her, willing only to express herself with art.

Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister (Gregory Maguire)
Set in 17th-century Holland, this retelling of the Cinderella story is full of surprises.  The two Fisher sisters and their mother have fled to escape a hostile England. Plain but smart Iris and her sister, Ruth, a hulking simpleton, are dazed and terrified as their mother, Margarethe, secures the family a place in the home of an aspiring painter.

 

If you liked The Book Thief (historical fiction, bravery), you might like…

Milkweed (Jerry Spinelli)
This novel is about a boy in Warsaw, Poland in the years of World War II during the Holocaust. Over time, he learns that he is a Gypsy but he is taken in by a Jewish group of orphans, so he must avoid the German troops (or “Jackboots”) while living off the streets with other orphans. The story narrator is the boy in the future living in America recalling his past experiences.

The Three Musketeers (Alexandre Dumas)
Young d’Artagnan comes to Paris to join the Musketeers, young men who have sworn their loyalty to the king (almost like a 17th century version of the Secret Service, but with swords).   d’Artagnan and his new friends Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, serve King Louis XIV, fall in love with beautiful young women, and fight against the evil Cardinal Richelieu.

Soldier Boys (Dean Hughes)
Two boys, one American, the other German, both hurry to join the battle of World War II, but find that the fighting brings things they didn’t expect.  As the war rages on, their paths cross and they are both changed.

 

If you liked Uglies (futuristic/ imaginative adventures), you might like…

PEEPS (Scott Westerfield)
Cal is a carrier of a disease that turns most of its victims into zombie-like vampires.  Because he’s partially immune, Cal works for New York’s underground public health bureau, tracking other parasite positives, or “peeps,” while at the same time trying to figure out the strange disease and uncover the mystery behind the woman who infected him.

Graceling (Kristen Cashore)
Katsa is a warrior-girl in her late teens with one blue eye and one green eye, which marks her as a Graceling. Gracelings are beings with special talents—swimming, storytelling, dancing. Katsa’s Grace is her ability to fight (and kill, if she wanted to), unequaled in the seven kingdoms. Forced to support a manipulative king, Katsa acts out by forming a secret council that promotes justice over cruelty.

The Enemy (Charlie Higson)
In England, everyone over the age of sixteen has contracted a terrible disease that has turned them into zombies.  Now, London children are fighting for their lives against the adults who once cared for them!  As they struggle to feed themselves and stay safe, the adults travel in packs, picking the children off one by one.

 

If you liked Peak (kids outsmarting adults, adventure), you might like…

Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
Andrew “Ender” Wiggin, who spends his childhood at military school in outer space, believes he is playing computer simulated war games; in fact, he is commanding the last great fleet of Earth.

Blood on the River (Elisa Carbone)
Young orphan Samuel Collier boards a ship bound for the New World, where heencounters hardship, adventure and danger serving as Captain John Smith’s page.

Evil Genius (Catherine Jinks)  
Child prodigy Cadel Piggot, an antisocial computer hacker, discovers his true, shocking identity and his part in a global conspiracy when he enrolls as a first-year student at an advanced crime academy. [series]

 

::Books about Sports::

Cover-Up: Mystery at the Super Bowl (John Feinstein)
Steve Thomas and Carol Anderson are high school reporters with incredibly incriminating information; every player on the offensive line of a team headed for the Super Bowl has failed his drug test.  Fighting against the team owner’s cover up, Steve and Carol rush to find a way to prove what they know.

Pop (Gordan Korman)
Marcus moves to a new town before his junior year and spends all summer practicing football, hoping to be part of the school team.  As it turns out, the team has a perfect record and a star quarterback, Troy, who isn’t very welcoming.  Marcus and Troy become rivals, fighting for position on the team, attention from Troy’s father, and the affection of Troy’s ex-girlfriend, Alyssa.

The Blind Side (Michael Lewis)
This is the book on which the famous movie was based.  Left tackle prodigy Michael Oher was born into the Memphis ghetto and endured homelessness and neglect before being taken in by a rich, white family.  Conflicts between the world he left and the world he has entered are escalated when it’s discovered that Oher is an extremely talented player.

Gym Candy (Carl Deuker)
Freshman running back Mick Johnson wants to be a football star so badly that he’ll do anything–even use steroids, or “candy.”  They give him the edge to be bigger, faster, and stronger, but they also come with huge costs to his health, and his social life.

 

::Books with Female Protagonists::

How I Live Now (Meg Rosoff)
This is the story of Daisy, a fifteen year old who goes to England to live with her cousins in the not-too-distant future. Daisy falls in love with her cousin Edmond, but all their lives are changed as a war breaks out and England becomes an occupied state. At first the kids are self-sufficient and untouched by the horrors, but as the story develops, shades of World War II begin to overcome them as they face separation, deprivation, and ultimate loss.

Jellicoe Road (Melina Marchetta)
For years, three groups—Townies, Cadets (city kids doing a six-week outdoor education program), and Jellicoe School students—have engaged in teen war games in the Australian countryside, defending territorial borders, negotiating for assets, and even taking hostages. Taylor Markham, a 17-year-old who was abandoned years ago by her mother, takes on leadership of the boarding school’s six Houses. Plagued with doubts about being boss, she’s not sure she can handle her Cadet counterpart, Jonah Griggs, whom she met several years before while running away to find her mother.

Boys, Girls, & Other Hazardous Materials (Rosalind Wiseman)
Charlotte (who goes by Charlie) starts her high school career at a new school, hoping for a clean slate. Things look promising when she makes friends the first day and awkwardly reunites, after three years, with ex-best friend/boy-next-door-turned-crush Will. Unfortunately, people from Charlie’s past keep turning up, like Nidhi, who knows a secret that Charlie does not want to have revealed to her new community.

The House on Mango Street (Sandra Cisneros)
Told as a series of snippets or short scenes instead of a longer narrative, young Esperanza Cordero describes her coming-of-age in a poor, Hispanic neighborhood of Chicago.

The Summer I Turned Pretty (Jenny Han)
Isabel (who goes by “Belly”) lives for the summertime.  Every year, Isabel and her mom go to Cousins Beach and spend their days with Susannah (her mom’s friend) and Susannah’s kids, who are Belly’s best friends.  But the summer that Belly is fifteen, things are different than they’ve been, especially between her and Susannah’s sons, Conrad and Jeremiah.

 

:: Books with Male Protagonists::

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Sherman Alexie)
Arnold Spirit, a goofy-looking dork with a decent jump shot, lives on the Spokane Indian reservation but wishes he lived somewhere else.  He spends his time drawing cartoons, which are included in the book.  Encouraged by a teacher, Arnold transfers to a rich white school and immediately becomes unwelcome in both his old community and his new one.

Hero (Perry Moore)
Thom Creed is a seventeen-year-old basketball whiz with superpowers he hasn’t quite figured out, and a secret he isn’t quite sure he’s ready to reveal.  Thom’s father is a former superhero himself, but offers little help to his son as he tries to figure things out.  Tired of the way things are, Thom runs away, only to become entangled in a dramatic rescue operation.

Deadline (Cris Crutcher)
Ben is eighteen years old.  He has been diagnosed with an incurable blood disease.  Instead of spending the end of his life enduring medical treatments, he decides instead to keep his illness a secret from family and friends, and pack a lifetime’s worth of experiences into his final year of living.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky)
Charlie isn’t the biggest geek in his school, but he’s also far from the most popular guy around.  He’s a wallflower–shy and a little bit antisocial, smart but without a lot of social skills.  We learn about Charlie’s ups and downs of high school (struggles, successes, parties, crushes) because he writes letters to an anonymous recipient.

Funny How Things Change (Melissa Wyatt)
Remy has lived in a small, West Virginia mountain town for his whole life.  Things are quiet and simple and he’s always liked it that way.  Now that he’s eighteen, he agrees to accompany his girlfriend Lisa as she moves to Pennsylvania for college.  There, his identity switches to that of an outsider and he is confronted by the contrast of a brand-new life with one he knows well.

::Classics::

The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
Written by the author when she was sixteen years old herself, this book describes a world in which there are two distinct groups of kids–”greasers” and “socs,” (short for “socialists”).  Ponyboy, the main character, is a greaser and proud of it, always willing to fight against the stuck-up socs on behalf of his own gang.  But when Ponyboy’s friend murders a soc, everything falls apart.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain)
Huck is a teenaged misfit who winds up floating on a raft down the Mississippi River with an escaping slave named Jim.  The two develop a bond and barely escape several “close call” situations on their adventure.

The Hobbit (J. R. R. Tolkein)
The adventures of Bilbo Baggins & Gandalf are a preview to the epic battle between good and evil that takes place in The Lord of the Rings trilogy.  Even Gollum and the ring make an appearance in this classic book.

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (Jules Verne)
Professor Arronax joins the crew of a submarine in order to investigate a series of recent attacks by a mysterious sea creature.  The creature turns out to be a giant, complex submarine itself, captained by the strange Nemo.  Nemo takes Arronax and another sailor captive, bringing them along on his journey around the world.

Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
Orphaned at an early age, Jane has a lonely existence until she goes to work as a governess in the house of a mysterious man named Edward Rochester.  Jane and Edward develop a close relationship, despite the boundaries of their class and age, but Edward is supposed to marry another…

Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stevenson)
Pirates!  Buried treasure!  Canons!  A deserted island!  This book is the original pirate story about a young boy who gets caught up in the middle of a dangerous quest for treasure.

Emma (Jane Austen)
Emma is twenty-one years old and lives a very privileged, sheltered life.  Though she thinks she’s doing good when she befriends young Harriet Smith, who is less well off, Emma ends up making a mess of everything.  This is the novel on which the movie “Clueless” was loosely based.

The Pigman (Paul Zindel)
John and Lorraine are sophomores in high school when they meet “The Pigman,” a fat, balding old man with a strange enthusiasm for life.  As they become more and more caught up in the Pigman’s world, John and Lorraine are forced to decide what really matters to them and what they want to make of their lives.

Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
The March sisters, Meg, Jo, Beth, & Amy, are living with their mother while their father is off ministering to soldiers during the Civil War.  This book tells the stories of how they pass their days, what they dream of, who they fall in love with, why they fight, and how they survive as a family.

::Science Fiction/Dystopian Novels::

The Giver (Lois Lowry)
In a world where things are seemingly perfect and everyone is assigned a role or a task, twelve-year-old Jonah is chosen by the Elders to be the Receiver of Memories.  Under the instruction of the Giver, Jonah learns things about his community that he could never have imagined–and, in learning those things, has to choose whether or not he can do what’s being asked of him.

World War Z (Max Brooks)
This “future history” is told in the form of first-person narratives that recall the Great Zombie War.  Characters from around the world describe the outbreak of the zombie virus, the failed cover-up of Chinese politicians, and the devastating war that ensued.

War of the Worlds (H.G. Wells)
In the book that inspired the recent movie with Tom Cruise, Martians invade the Earth and launch a deadly attack on its inhabitants.  The book’s narrator is an unnamed man who walks through London, detailing the horror of the invasion.

Birthmarked (Caragh M. O’Brien)
In a future world where authoritarian rule forces most to live miserable lives, a select few babies each year are allowed into the Enclave, where a better life is available.  Young Gaia, who is learning to be a midwife, finds herself inside the Enclave for the first time when her parents are sentenced to be executed for reasons unknown to them all.  [series]

A Wizard of Earthsea (Ursula K. LeGuin)
A strange boy named Sparrowhawk unexpectedly becomes the apprentice to a great wizard in a land called Earthsea.  Soon, Sparrowhawk learns that he might be more important to the fate of mankind than he ever could have imagined, and that the challenges ahead of him are immense.  [series]

Feed (M.T. Anderson)
This book is set in a future world where television and computers are connected directly into people’s brains when they are babies. The result is a chillingly recognizable consumer society where empty-headed kids are driven by fashion and shopping and the avid pursuit of silly entertainment–even on trips to Mars and the moon–and by constant customized murmurs in their brains of encouragement to buy, buy, buy.

::Mystery/Suspense::

Shattering Glass (Gail Giles)
A group of cool high school boys transform Simon Glass, the school nerd, into one of the most popular boys in school.  But they weren’t expecting that Simon’s newfound popularity might backfire on them.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Mark Haddon)
Fifteen-year-old Christopher is autistic–gifted mathematically, but hopeless socially.  When he discovers his neighbor’s dog, murdered, Christopher is initially the one accused of the crime.  Innocent, he decides to solve the mystery of the true killer’s identity.  The book is a diary of his efforts.

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Alan Bradley)
Set in the English countryside in 1950, it features Flavia de Luce, an 11-year-old amateur sleuth who pulls herself away from her beloved chemistry lab in order to clear her father in a murder investigation. [series]

::Memoirs/Historical Fiction::

The Things They Carried (Tim O’Brien)
These stories from the Vietnam War are part fiction, but also based in the true reality of the author’s own experience in the war.  Each story examines both the literal things that soldiers carried with them, plus the burdens, scars, and memories of the lives they left behind to fight.

A Lesson Before Dying (Ernest J. Gaines)
In 1940s Louisiana, a young black man named Jefferson is sentenced to death for a murder he didn’t commit.  At the same time, a young white man named Grant has returned to his hometown from college.  As Jefferson faces the electric chair, the lives of the two men become inextricably entwined.

Warriors Don’t Cry (Melba Beals)
This book is the true story of what it was like to be a young, black woman in the very racist American South during the Civil Rights era.  Melba Beals was one of the Little Rock Nine, the first African-American children to attend previously white-only schools in Little Rock, Arkansas.  In this powerful memoir, Beals tells how she coped with the hatred and anger that were directed at her every day.