Norwell High School Summer Reading
Get your summer reading at Buttonwood! You can find Norwell High School's assignments here.
9th grade CP students are required to read two books from the designated list. 9th grade H students are required to read FAHRENHEIT 451 and one additional book from the designated list.
10th grade CP students are required to read two books from the designated list. 10th grade H students are required to read THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE and one additional book from the designated list.
11th grade CP students are required to read two books from the designated list. 11th grade H students are required to read INTO THE WILD and one additional book from the designated list.
12th grade CP and H students are required to read THE LAST LECTURE. 12th grade CP students are required to read one additional book from the designated list. H students are required to read two additional books from the designated list.
*Please note that if a book is not listed, it is most likely that Buttonwood is unable to obtain a copy for you*
This is the required book for 9th grade H students.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
I am young, I am twenty years old; yet I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and fatuous superficiality cast over an abyss of sorrow. . . .
This is the testament of Paul Bäumer, who enlists with his classmates in the German army during World War I. They become soldiers with youthful enthusiasm. But the world of duty, culture, and progress they had been taught breaks in pieces under the first bombardment in the trenches. Through years of vivid horror, Paul holds fast to a single vow: to fight against the principle of hate that meaninglessly pits young men of the same generation but different uniforms against one another . . . if only he can come out of the war alive.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
In December of 1938, a chemist in a German laboratory made a shocking discovery: when placed next to radioactive material, a Uranium atom split in two. That simple discovery launched a scientific race that spanned three continents. In Great Britain and the United States, Soviet spies worked their way into the scientific community; in Norway, a commando force slipped behind enemy lines to attack German heavy-water manufacturing; and deep in the desert, one brilliant group of scientists was hidden away at Los Alamos. This is the story of the plotting, risk-taking, deceit, and genius that created the world's most formidable weapon. This is the story of the atomic bomb.
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This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Two dead bodies. One unforgettable hero. A teenage Sherlock solves his first murder mystery . . . and the legend begins. It is the summer of 1868, and Sherlock Holmes is fourteen. On break from boarding school, he is staying with eccentric strangers-his uncle and aunt-in their vast house in Hampshire. When two local people die from symptoms that resemble the plague, Holmes begins to investigate what really killed them, helped by his new tutor, an American named Amyus Crowe. So begins Sherlock's true education in detection, as he discovers the dastardly crimes of a brilliantly sinister villain of exquisitely malign intent.
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This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, "Dear Miss Sweetie." When her column becomes wildly popular, she uses the power of the pen to address some of society's ills, but she's not prepared for the backlash that follows when her column challenges fixed ideas about race and gender. While her opponents clamor to uncover the secret identity of Miss Sweetie, a mysterious letter sets Jo off on a search for her own past and the parents who abandoned her as a baby. But when her efforts put her in the crosshairs of Atlanta's most notorious criminal, Jo must decide whether she, a girl used to living in the shadows, is ready to step into the light. With prose that is witty, insightful, and at times heartbreaking, Stacey Lee masterfully crafts an extraordinary social drama set in the New South.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Once again, Earth is under attack. An alien species is poised for a final assault. The survival of humanity depends on a military genius who can defeat the aliens. But who? Ender Wiggin. Brilliant. Ruthless. Cunning. A tactical and strategic master. And a child. Recruited for military training by the world government, Ender's childhood ends the moment he enters his new home: Battle School. Among the elite recruits Ender proves himself to be a genius among geniuses. He excels in simulated war games. But is the pressure and loneliness taking its toll on Ender? Simulations are one thing. How will Ender perform in real combat conditions? After all, Battle School is just a game. Isn't it?
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Being the middle child has its ups and downs. But for Grace, an only child who was adopted at birth, discovering that she is a middle child is a different ride altogether. After putting her own baby up for adoption, she goes looking for her biological family, and finds a brother and sister that she never could have expected. Maya, her loudmouthed younger bio sister, has a lot to say about their newfound family ties. Having grown up the snarky brunette in a house full of chipper redheads, she’s quick to search for traces of herself among these not-quite-strangers. And when her adopted family’s long-buried problems begin to explode to the surface, Maya can’t help but wonder where exactly it is that she belongs. And Joaquin, their stoic older bio brother, has no interest in bonding over their shared biological mother. After seventeen years in the foster care system, he’s learned that there are no heroes, and secrets and fears are best kept close to the vest, where they can’t hurt anyone but him.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Tracy Chevalier transports readers to a bygone time and place in this richly-imagined portrait of the young woman who inspired one of Vermeer's most celebrated paintings. History and fiction merge seamlessly in this luminous novel about artistic vision and sensual awakening. Girl with a Pearl Earring tells the story of sixteen-year-old Griet, whose life is transformed by her brief encounter with genius . . . even as she herself is immortalized in canvas and oil.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
September 11, 2001, New York City: Brandon is visiting his dad at work, on the 107th floor of the World Trade Center. Out of nowhere, an airplane slams into the tower, creating a fiery nightmare of terror and confusion. And Brandon is in the middle of it all. Can he survive -- and escape?
September 11, 2019, Afghanistan: Reshmina has grown up in the shadow of war, but she dreams of peace and progress. When a battle erupts in her village, Reshmina stumbles upon a wounded American soldier named Taz. Should she help Taz -- and put herself and her family in mortal danger?
Two kids. One devastating day. Nothing will ever be the same.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.
Written for J.R.R. Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when it was first published in 1937. Now recognized as a timeless classic, this introduction to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, the wizard Gandalf, Gollum, and the spectacular world of Middle-earth recounts of the adventures of a reluctant hero, a powerful and dangerous ring, and the cruel dragon Smaug the Magnificent. The text in this 372-page paperback edition is based on that first published in Great Britain by Collins Modern Classics (1998), and includes a note on the text by Douglas A. Anderson (2001). Unforgettable!
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Set during one of the most conflicted and volatile times in American history, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet is an extraordinary story of commitment and enduring hope. In Henry and Keiko, Jamie Ford has created an unforgettable duo whose story teaches us of the power of forgiveness and the human heart.
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This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
When Lucy, Elena, and Michael receive their summer reading list, they are excited to see To Kill A Mockingbird included. But not everyone in their class shares the same enthusiasm. So they hatch a plot to get the entire town talking about the well-known Harper Lee classic. They plan controversial ways to get people to read the book, including re-shelving copies of the book in bookstores so that people think they are missing and starting a website committed to "destroying the mockingbird." Their efforts are successful when all of the hullabaloo starts to direct more people to the book. But soon, their exploits start to spin out of control and they unwittingly start a mini revolution in the name of books.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
In this New York Times best-seller, when a meteor knocks the moon closer to earth, Miranda, a high school sophomore, takes shelter with her family in this heart-stopping post-apocalyptic thriller that's "absorbing from first to last page."* (Publishers Weekly, starred review)
I guess I always felt even if the world came to an end, McDonald’s still would be open. Like one marble hitting another, when the moon slams closer to earth, the result is catastrophic. Worldwide tsunamis wipe out the coasts, earthquakes rock the continents, and volcanic ash blocks out the sun.
As August turns dark and wintery in northeastern Pennsylvania, Miranda, her two brothers, and their mother retreat to the unexpected safe haven of their sunroom, where they subsist on stockpiled food and limited water in the warmth of a wood-burning stove.
Told in a year’s worth of journal entries, Life as We Knew It chronicles the human struggle to hold on to the most important resource of all—hope—in an increasingly desperate and unfamiliar world.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Young, black, 16-year-old Steve Harmon, an amateur filmmaker, is on trial for the murder of a Harlem drugstore owner. Steve copes by writing a movie script based on his trial. But despite his efforts, reality is blurred until he can no longer tell who he is or what the truth is. Illustrations.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
In 12 dreams, Robert, a boy who hates math, encounters a sly, clever number devil who introduces him to the wonders of numbers: infinite numbers, prime numbers, Fibonacci numbers, and numbers that expand without end.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he toils willingly, trusting that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and lush wilds spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class. Inspired by a longing for justice, and driven by the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for the dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity’s overlords struggle for power. He will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society’s ruling class. There, he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies . . . even if it means he has to become one of them to do so.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Winter 1945. WWII. Four refugees. Four stories. Each one born of a different homeland; each one hunted, and haunted, by tragedy, lies, war. As thousands desperately flock to the coast in the midst of a Soviet advance, four paths converge, vying for passage aboard the Wilhelm Gustloff, a ship that promises safety and freedom. But not all promises can be kept . . .
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Soldier. Summoner. Saint. Orphaned and expendable, Alina Starkov is a soldier who knows she may not survive her first trek across the Shadow Fold—a swath of unnatural darkness crawling with monsters. But when her regiment is attacked, Alina unleashes dormant magic not even she knew she possessed. Now Alina will enter a lavish world of royalty and intrigue as she trains with the Grisha, her country’s magical military elite—and falls under the spell of their notorious leader, the Darkling. He believes Alina can summon a force capable of destroying the Shadow Fold and reuniting their war-ravaged country, but only if she can master her untamed gift. As the threat to the kingdom mounts and Alina unlocks the secrets of her past, she will make a dangerous discovery that could threaten all she loves and the very future of a nation. Welcome to Ravka . . . a world of science and superstition where nothing is what it seems.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
This beautiful, illuminating tale of hope and courage is based on interviews that were conducted with Holocaust survivor and Auschwitz-Birkenau tattooist Ludwig (Lale) Sokolov—an unforgettable love story in the midst of atrocity
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Mikaelsen's provocative portrait of an angry teen--who chooses banishment to a remote Alaskan island over detention as punishment for a brutal attack--has captivated reviewers and readers as it examines the alternative Native American Circle Justice.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Fifteen-year-old Drew "True" Robinson loves being the best point-guard prospect on his high-school basketball team, but learns the consequences of fame through a former player, as well as through the man who expects to be his manager when True reaches the NBA.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
Is it really possible to invent a machine that does the job of a writer? What is it about the landlady's house that makes it so hard for her guests to leave? Does Sir Basil Turton value most his wife or one of his priceless sculptures? These compelling tales are a perfect introduction to the adult writing of a storytelling genius.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
America's favorite sport and Native American history collide in this thrilling true story for middle-grade readers, about one of the nation's greatest football teams. When superstar athlete Jim Thorpe and football legend Pop Warner met in 1904 at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, they forged one of the winningest teams in American football history. Called “the team that invented football,” they took on the best opponents of their day, defeating much more privileged schools such as Harvard and the Army in a series of breathtakingly close calls, genius plays, and bone-crushing hard work. But this is not just an underdog story. It's an unflinching look at the persecution of Native Americans and its intersection with the beginning of one of the most beloved—and exploitative—pastimes in America, expertly told by nonfiction powerhouse Steve Sheinkin.
This is an option for 9th grade CP and H students.
In a society where unwanted teens are salvaged for their body parts, three runaways fight the system that would "unwind" them. In this work, "Boston Globe/Horn Book" Award-winner Shusterman challenges readers' ideas about life--not just where life begins and where it ends, but what it truly means to be alive.
This is the required book for 10th grade H students.
This is an option for one of the required books for 10th grade CP students.
Stevenson's famous exploration of humanity's basest capacity for evil
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Combining magic, mysticism, wisdom and wonder into an inspiring tale of self-discovery, The Alchemist has become a modern classic, selling millions of copies around the world and transforming the lives of countless readers across generations.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
In the pages of Alex and Eliza, #1 New York Times bestselling author Melissa de la Cruz brings to life the romance of young Alexander Hamilton and Elizabeth Schuyler.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Hazel Sinnett is a medical student in 19th century Scotland who, after being kicked out because of her gender, works with new attractive acquaintance Jack Currer to procure dead bodies to study, but they soon discover secrets buried in the heart of Edinburgh society.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Meet Enzo, the unforgettable canine narrator of this bittersweet and transformative story of family, love, loyalty, and hope. Enzo is a philosopher with a nearly human soul, and he's gained a wealth of knowledge from hours spent in front of the TV.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
The story of two fathers and two sons and the pressures on all of them to pursue the religion they share in the way that is best suited to each. And as the boys grow into young men, they discover in the other a lost spiritual brother, and a link to an unexplored world that neither had ever considered before. In effect, they exchange places, and find the peace that neither will ever retreat from again.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Follows Circe, the banished witch daughter of Helios, as she hones her powers and interacts with famous mythological beings before a conflict with one of the most vengeful Olympians forces her to choose between the worlds of the gods and mortals.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Christopher John Francis Boone knows all the countries of the world and their capitals and every prime number up to 7,057. He relates well to animals but has no understanding of human emotions. He cannot stand to be touched. And he detests the color yellow. This improbable story of Christopher's quest to investigate the suspicious death of a neighborhood dog makes for one of the most captivating, unusual, and widely heralded novels in recent years.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
In one of Tey's bestselling mystery novels ever, Scotland Yard Inspector Alan Grant is intrigued by a portrait of Richard III. Could such a sensitive face actually belong to one of history's most heinous villains--a king who killed his brother's children to secure his crown? Grant determines to find out once and for all what kind of man Richard was and who in fact killed the princes in the tower.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Only now is it becoming clear just how exceptional and unrepeatable Apollo was. At its height, it employed almost half a million people, many working seven days a week and each determined that "it will not fail because of me." Beginning with fighter pilots in World War II, Maurer traces the origins of the Apollo program to a few exceptional soldiers, a Nazi engineer, and a young eager man who would become president. Packed with adventure, new stories about familiar people, and undeniable danger, Destination Moon takes an unflinching look at a tumultuous time in American history, told expertly by nonfiction author Richard Maurer.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Sixteen-year-old Emilia, secretly a dedicated gamer, competes with her elite team in a major tournament at the same time she and her best friend are running for class president and vice president.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
A lengthy California drought escalates to catastrophic proportions, turning Alyssa's quiet suburban street into a warzone, and she is forced to make impossible choices if she and her brother are to survive.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
The phenomenal true story of the black female mathematicians at NASA whose calculations helped fuel some of America’s greatest achievements in space—the inspiration for the Oscar-nominated film
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Meet Ove. He’s a curmudgeon—the kind of man who points at people he dislikes as if they were burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has staunch principles, strict routines, and a short fuse. People call him “the bitter neighbor from hell.” But must Ove be bitter just because he doesn’t walk around with a smile plastered to his face all the time? Behind the cranky exterior there is a story and a sadness. So when one November morning a chatty young couple with two chatty young daughters move in next door and accidentally flatten Ove’s mailbox, it is the lead-in to a comical and heartwarming tale of unkempt cats, unexpected friendship, and the ancient art of backing up a U-Haul. All of which will change one cranky old man and a local residents’ association to their very foundations.
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This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Seven stories of passion and love separated by centuries but mysteriously intertwined—this is a tale of horror and beauty, tenderness and sacrifice.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
The Great Recession has shuffled Clay Jannon away from life as a San Francisco Web-design drone and into the aisles of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore. But after a few days on the job, Clay discovers that the store is more curious than either its name or its gnomic owner might suggest. The customers are few and never seem to buy anything; instead, they "check out" obscure volumes from strange corners of the store. Clay concludes the store must be a front for something larger and engineers a complex analysis of the clientele's behavior with the help of his variously talented friends. But when they bring their findings to Mr. Penumbra, they discover the bookstore's secrets extend far beyond its walls.
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This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Rebecca has been dead for several months, but her sinister influence is still very much alive at Manderley, as Maxim de Winter's second wife soon comes to realize.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Haunting and suspenseful, life-affirming and beautiful, "Sarah's Key" offers a compelling portrait of occupied Paris and reveals the taboos and silence that surround this little-known episode in French history.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Set in 19th-century China, See's national bestseller tells a story of two young women who find solace with each other, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their lifelong friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart. High school & older.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Thomas Hardy's classic novel. In the late 19th century, Tess Durbeyfield is sent off to visit a rich cousin, Alec D'Urberville, when her parents learn that they are distantly related. Tess takes a disliking to Alec and his attempts at seduction are rebuffed.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Achebe's first novel portrays the collision of African and European cultures in people's lives. Okonkwo, a great man in Igbo traditional society, cannot adapt to the profound changes brought about by British colonial rule. Yet, as in classic tragedy, Okonkwo's downfall results from his own character as well as from external forces.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
Aza Holmes never intended to pursue the disappearance of fugitive billionaire Russell Pickett, but there’s a hundred-thousand-dollar reward at stake and her Best and Most Fearless Friend, Daisy, is eager to investigate. So together, they navigate the short distance and broad divides that separate them from Pickett’s son Davis. Aza is trying. She is trying to be a good daughter, a good friend, a good student, and maybe even a good detective, while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts.
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This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
All Samantha wanted was to move back to New York and pursue her music, which was difficult enough being a Chinese girl in Missouri, 1849. Then her fate takes a turn for the worse after a tragic accident leaves her with nothing and she breaks the law in self-defense. With help from Annamae, a runaway slave she met at the scene of her crime, the two flee town for the unknown frontier.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
On the verge of completing a decade's worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. Just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. Kalanithi chronicles his transformation from a naive medical student into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.
This is an option for 10th grade CP and H students.
3:47 a.m. That’s when they come for Wren Clemmens. She’s hustled out of her house and into a waiting car, then a plane, and then taken on a forced march into the desert. This is what happens to kids who’ve gone so far off the rails, their parents don’t know what to do with them anymore. This is wilderness therapy camp. Eight weeks of survivalist camping in the desert. Eight weeks to turn your life around. Yeah, right. The Wren who arrives in the Utah desert is angry and bitter, and blaming everyone but herself. But angry can’t put up a tent. And bitter won’t start a fire. Wren’s going to have to admit she needs help if she’s going to survive.
This is the required book for 11th grade H students.
This is an option for 11th grade CP students.
Admitting an interest that borders on obsession, Krakauer searches for the clues to the drives and desires that propelled 24-year-old Chris McCandless to leave civilization behind and head into the remote Alaskan wilderness. Four months later, McCandless's emaciated corpse was found at his campsite by a hunter. Mesmerizing and heartbreaking, Krakauer's powerful and luminous storytelling blaze through every page.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Ten years after leaving Cooley Ridge, Nicolette Farrell returns to care for her ailing father. A decade ago, she, her brother Daniel, her boyfriend Tyler, and Corinne's boyfriend Jackson were suspects when Corinne--Nic's best friend-- disappeared without a trace. Within days of Nic's return, they are plunged into a shocking drama when Nic's neighbor Annaleise, who is dating Tyler and was the group's alibi ten years previously, goes missing. Told backwards from the time Annaleise disappears, the book follows Nic as she works to unravel the truth and, in the process, reveals shocking realities about her friends, her family, and what really happened to Corinne that night ten years ago.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
This is a beguiling fable that shines with the wonder of imagination, the beauty of romance, and the power of storytelling. Set during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the novel tells the story of two hapless city boys sent to a remote mountain village for reeducation.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
The Bean Trees is bestselling author Barbara Kingsolver s first novel, now widely regarded as a modern classic. It is the charming, engrossing tale of rural Kentucky native Taylor Greer, who only wants to get away from her roots and avoid getting pregnant. She succeeds, but inherits a 3-year-old native-American little girl named Turtle along the way, and together, from Oklahoma to Tucson, Arizona, half-Cherokee Taylor and her charge search for a new life in the West.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
WNYC's Note to Self host, Manoush Zomorodi, gives readers permission to unplug from their devices, get bored, and tap into a greater storehouse of creativity
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
An unforgettable novel about a young Jewish woman growing up in Boston in the early twentieth century, told “with humor and optimism…through the eyes of an irresistible heroine” (People)—from the acclaimed author of The Red Tent.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
This immensely engaging tale relates how an enterprising teenager in Malawi builds a windmill from scraps he finds around his village and brings electricity--and a future--to his family.
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America (Paperback)
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
The story of two men's obsessions with the Chicago World's Fair, one its architect, the other a murderer. "The Devil in the White City" draws the reader into a time of magic and majesty, made all the more appealing by a supporting cast of real-life characters, including Buffalo Bill, Theodore Dreiser, Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, and others.
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This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
As swarms of infected Flies roam the earth, a few survivors must navigate the woods of post-apocalyptic New England, and meet others along the way who are on their own quest to find life and love in a world that has gone dark
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
On the night of February 18, 1952, during one of the worst winter storms that New England has ever seen, two oil tankers just off the shore of Cape Cod were torn in half by the force of the storm. This middle-grade adaptation of an adult nonfiction book tells the story of a harrowing Coast Guard rescue when four men in a tiny lifeboat overcame insurmountable odds and saved more than 30 stranded sailors. This is a fast-paced, uplifting story that puts young readers in the middle of the action. It's a gripping story of heroism and survival with the same intensity as the bestselling book and movie The Perfect Storm
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
In the tradition of Mary Karr's "The Liars' Club" and Rick Bragg's "All Over But the Shouting," Walls has written a stunning and life-affirming memoir about surviving a willfully impoverished, eccentric, and severely misguided family.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Although it follows the movement of thousands of men and women and the transformation of an entire nation, "The Grapes of Wrath" is also the story of one Oklahoma farm family, the Joads, who are driven off their homestead and forced to travel west to the promised land of California.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Angie Thomas’s #1 New York Times bestselling, award-winning debut inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, about a teen girl who is the only witness to her friend’s fatal shooting by a police officer, is now available in paperback and includes a foreword and an antiracism guide.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Followed by Grandpa Ed in his RV and backed by her brother and friends, Annabelle, eighteen, runs from Seattle to Washington, D.C., becoming a reluctant activist as people connect her journey to her recent trauma.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
In Jackson, Mississippi, in 1962, there are lines that are not crossed. With the civil rights movement exploding all around them, three women start a movement of their own, forever changing a town and the way women--black and white, mothers and daughters--view one another.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson face a mystery on the moors in this classic caper from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
The four brilliant tales in If It Bleeds prove as iconic as their predecessors. In the title story, reader favorite Holly Gibney (from the Mr. Mercedes trilogy and The Outsider) must face her fears, and possibly another outsider—this time on her own. In “Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” an intergenerational friendship has a disturbing afterlife. “The Life of Chuck” explores, beautifully, how each of us contains multitudes. And in “Rat,” a struggling writer must contend with the darker side of ambition.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
From the bestselling author of Everything I Never Told You and Our Missing Hearts comes a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Former "Boston Globe" reporter Zuckoff unleashes the exhilarating, untold story of an extraordinary World War II rescue mission. A plane crash in the South Pacific plunges a trio of U.S. military personnel into the unknown land of jungle-clad New Guinea.
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This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Bestselling author Martin returns with a captivating story about two strangers who crash into a frigid mountain wilderness and must rely on each other to survive.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Roger Ackroyd knew too much. He knew that the woman he loved had poisoned her brutal first husband. He suspected also that someone had been blackmailing her. Then, tragically, came the news that she had taken her own life with a drug overdose. But the evening post brought Roger one last fatal scrap of information. Unfortunately, before he could finish reading the letter, he was stabbed to death
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author, an epic novel of love and war, spanning from the 1940s to the present day, and the secret lives of those who live in a small French town.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
The author of "Bird in Hand" and "The Way Life Should Be" delivers a captivating story of two very different women who build an unexpected friendship: a 91-year-old woman with a hidden past as an orphan-train rider and the teenage girl whose own troubled adolescence leads her to seek answers.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
At once brutal and tender, despairing and rashly hopeful, spare of language and profoundly moving, this work is a fierce and haunting meditation on the tenuous divide between civilization and savagery, and the essential, sometimes terrifying power of filial love
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
The unforgettable true story of Christopher Knight, who found refuge from the pressures of modern society by living alone in the Maine woods for twenty-seven years.
This is an option for 11th grade CP and H students.
Virginia Hall sought a career in Foreign Service in 1930s Europe, but a physical handicap, her gender, and her outspoken political views stymied her diplomatic ambitions. A secret British intelligence group trained her in non-traditional sabotage techniques, and she became the greatest World War II spy heroine.
This is the required book for 12th grade CP and H students.
Based on the extraordinary final lecture by Carnegie Mellon University professor Pausch, given after he discovered he had pancreatic cancer, this moving book goes beyond the now-famous lecture to inspire readers to live each day with purpose and joy.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria for the West. Beautiful, self-assured Ifemelu heads for America, where despite her academic success, she is forced to grapple with what it means to be Black for the first time. Quiet, thoughtful Obinze had hoped to join her, but with post–9/11 America closed to him, he instead plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
In 1915, long since retired from his crime-fighting days, Sherlock Holmes is engaged in a reclusive study of honeybees on the Sussex Downs. Never did the Victorian detective think to meet an intellect matching his ownuntil his acquaintance with Miss Mary Russell, a young twentieth-century lady whose mental acuity is equaled only by her penchantfor deduction, disguises, and danger. Under Holmess reluctant tutelage, Russell embarks on a case involving a landowners mysterious fever and the kidnapping of an American senators daughter in the wilds of Wales. Then a near-fatal bomb on her doorstepand another on Holmesssends the two sleuths on the trail of a murderer who scatters bizarre clues and seems utterly without motive. The villains objective, however, is quite unequivocal: to end Russell and Holmess partnershipand then their lives.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Eleven years after donating her blue sweater to Goodwill, Novogratz spotted a young boy in Africa wearing that very sweater. In that moment, she realizes how all people are connected, which sets the author on a lifelong course to fight poverty worldwide.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
First published in 1970 by Morrison, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Literature, the novel tells the story of 11-year-old Pecola Breedlove, the nightmare at the heart of her yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
It's the summer of 1973, and Joe Castle is the boy wonder of baseball, the greatest rookie anyone has ever seen. The kid from Calico Rock, Arkansas, dazzles Chicago Cubs fans as he hits home run after home run, politely tipping his hat to the crowd as he shatters all rookie records. Calico Joe quickly becomes the idol of every baseball fan in America, including Paul Tracey, the young son of a hard-partying and hard-throwing New York Mets pitcher. On the day that Warren Tracey finally faces Calico Joe, Paul is in the stands, rooting for his idol but also for his dad. Then Warren throws a fastball that will change their lives forever.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
This new novel from award-winner Atkinson is a breathtaking story of families divided, love lost and found, and the mysteries of fate. As Private Detective Jackson Brodie investigates three cases, startling connections and discoveries emerge.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
The author of The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, and What the Dog Saw draws upon history, psychology, and powerful storytelling to challenge how we think about obstacles and disadvantage, and to fundamentally reshape the way we think about suffering and adversity.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Andy Barber has been an assistant district attorney in his suburban Massachusetts county for more than twenty years. When a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: his fourteen-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student. As the crisis reveals how little a father knows about his son, Andy will face a trial of his own--between loyalty and justice, between the truth and allegation, between a past he's tried to bury and a future he cannot conceive.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy. But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
A groundbreaking YA thriller about a Native teen who goes undercover to root out the crime and corruption threatening her community.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
In 1946, writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a stranger, a founding member of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. And so begins a remarkable tale of the island of Guernsey during the German occupation, and of a society as extraordinary as its name.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
When it comes to artificial intelligence, we either hear of a paradise on earth or of our imminent extinction. It’s time we stand face-to-digital-face with the true powers and limitations of the algorithms that already automate important decisions in healthcare, transportation, crime, and commerce. Hello World is indispensable preparation for the moral quandaries of a world run by code, and with the unfailingly entertaining Hannah Fry as our guide, we’ll be discussing these issues long after the last page is turned.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
With the publication of this book, Capote permanently ripped through the barrier separating crime reportage from serious literature. As he reconstructs the 1959 murder of a Kansas farm family and the investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, Capote generates suspense and empathy.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can't remember exactly when the feeling took root--that desire to look, to move closer, to touch. Whenever it started growing, it definitely bloomed the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign of a lesbian bar called the Telegraph Club. Suddenly everything seemed possible. But America in 1954 is not a safe place for two girls to fall in love, especially not in Chinatown. Red-Scare paranoia threatens everyone, including Chinese Americans like Lily. With deportation looming over her father--despite his hard-won citizenship--Lily and Kath risk everything to let their love see the light of day.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
"Olive Kitteridge" offers profound insights into the human condition--its conflicts, tragedies, and joys. Strout constructs her stories with rich irony and moments of genuine surprise and intense emotion" ("USA Today").
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
John Irving’s poignant, provocative, funny, and inspiring modern classic, A Prayer for Owen Meany, is the story of two boys eternally bonded in childhood by a bizarre accident: the abruptly orphaned Johnny Wheelwright and the diminutive Owen Meany, the only child of a New Hampshire granite quarrier. Owen believes he is God’s instrument on earth, and he is right. Linked by tragedy and mystery, they make their way together through the extraordinary events of their lives toward the unavoidable martyrdom that must ultimately separate them—in an unforgettable novel of destiny, devotion, and faith that is John Irving at his very best.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Austen's perfect comedy of manners--one of the most popular novels of all time--features splendidly civilized sparring between the proud Mr. Darcy and the prejudiced Elizabeth Bennet as they play out their spirited courtship in a series of eighteenth-century drawing-room intrigues.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Wynn and Jack have been best friends since freshman orientation, bonded by their shared love of mountains, books, and fishing. Wynn is a gentle giant, a Vermont kid never happier than when his feet are in the water. Jack is more rugged, raised on a ranch in Colorado where sleeping under the stars and cooking on a fire came as naturally to him as breathing. When they decide to canoe the Maskwa River in northern Canada, they anticipate long days of leisurely paddles and picking blueberries and nights of stargazing and reading paperback Westerns. But a wildfire making its way across the forest adds unexpected urgency to the journey. One night, with the fire advancing, they hear a man and a woman arguing on the fog-shrouded riverbank; the next day, a man appears on the river, paddling alone. Is this the same man they heard? And if he is, where is the woman?
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Set in South Carolina in 1964, The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted Black "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily decides to spring them both free. They escape to Tiburon, South Carolina—a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. Taken in by an eccentric trio of Black beekeeping sisters, Lily is introduced to their mesmerizing world of bees and honey, and the Black Madonna. This is a remarkable novel about divine female power, a story that women will share and pass on to their daughters for years to come.
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This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
A breathtaking multigenerational love story that spans two continents, two World Wars, and the quest of two star-crossed lovers to find each other again.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
It is 1970 in a small town in California. “Bean” Holladay is twelve and her sister, Liz, is fifteen when their artistic mother, Charlotte, takes off to find herself, leaving her girls enough money to last a month or two. When Bean returns from school one day and sees a police car outside the house, she and Liz decide to take the bus to Virginia, where their widowed Uncle Tinsley lives in the decaying mansion that’s been in Charlotte’s family for generations. An impetuous optimist, Bean soon discovers who her father was, and hears stories about why their mother left Virginia in the first place. Money is tight, and the sisters start babysitting and doing office work for Jerry Maddox, foreman of the mill in town, who bullies his workers, his tenants, his children, and his wife. Liz is whip-smart—an inventor of word games, reader of Edgar Allan Poe, nonconformist. But when school starts in the fall, it’s Bean who easily adjusts, and Liz who becomes increasingly withdrawn. And then something happens to Liz in the car with Maddox.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
By turns lyrical and dramatic, hilarious and heartbreaking, The Sound and the Fury is the tragic story of beautiful Caddy Comapson and the dissolution of her family.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
Set at the end of World War II, in a crumbling Bavarian castle that once played host to all of German high society, a powerful and propulsive story of three widows whose lives and fates become intertwined—an affecting, shocking, and ultimately redemptive novel from the author of the New York Times Notable Book The Hazards of Good Breeding
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
The passionate love story of stubborn Cathy and wild-as-the-wind Heathcliff has been a favorite since its original publication in 1848.
This is an option for 12th grade CP and H students.
In 1666, a young woman comes of age during an extraordinary year of love and death. Inspired by the true story of Eyam, a "plague village" in the rugged hill country of England, "Year of Wonders" is a richly detailed evocation of a singular moment in history, written by the author of "Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women.