Grade 10 HONORS English Summer Reading List

Students are to choose one book from the list to read. All students will be tested on their choice at the start of the school year in their English classes. Books may be borrowed from the state library system or purchased from the local bookstores. New and used paperback books may be purchased online. Two such sites are http://www.campusi.com and Amazon.com

Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury. [Amazon]
It is a crime in this society to own or read books. Books are searched out and burned. Trivial information in this society is good, and knowledge is evil. The society is controlled by television and drugs.

Cold Sassy Tree, Olive Ann Burns. [Amazon]
A romantic and adventurous story set in Georgia in 1906, introduces Will Tweedy, a fourteen-year-old boy and the trouble he gets into. Things change when a woman from Maryland moves to town and marries the proprietor of the town’s general store, barely a three week widower.

The Plague, Albert Camus. [Amazon]
Locked into an Algerian City because of an epidemic of bubonic plague, a doctor narrates this existential story of forced relationships and survival.

Sula, Toni Morrison. [Amazon]
A novel about the lifelong friendship of two vastly different women who become estranged when one causes the other’s husband to abandon her. “Its humor is earthy and delightful, and its dialogue is especially sharp.” (Jonathan Yardley)

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain [Amazon]
An adventure novel that tells the story of a young boy who travels down the Mississippi River on a raft with his friend, a runaway slave named Jim.

Night, Elie Wiesel. [Amazon]
Elie Wiesel writes from personal experience about the horrors of the Holocaust and its lifelong impact on its survivors. Wiesel’s chilling account includes a protagonist who probes philosophical questions about this unforgettable episode in human history.