John Paul II Catholic School 2020 Summer Reading

For this summer, we would like to encourage our students to develop a love of reading and, hopefully, become lifelong readers. Each student will choose one book only for his or her grade level. (Of course, if you would like to read both of the selections, that would be great.) There is no written assignment to be done over the summer, but there will be a “book club” type discussion upon school reopening.

These are the selections for students in Mr. Synnett’s classes:

12th Franz Kafka “The Metamorphosis” "The Metamorphosis" is a short novel by Franz Kafka, first published in 1915. It is often cited as one of the seminal works of fiction of the 20th century and is widely studied in colleges and universities across the western world. The story begins with a traveling salesman, Gregor Samsa, waking to find himself transformed into an insect.

12th Muriel Barbery “The Elegance of the Hedgehog” A New York Times bestseller that “explores the upstairs-downstairs goings-on of a posh Parisian apartment building.” It is a novel that exalts the quiet victories of the inconspicuous among us, and "teaches philosophical lessons by shrewdly exposing rich secret lives hidden beneath conventional exteriors.”

11th Jon Krakauer “Into the Wild” Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild examines the true story of Chris McCandless, a young man, who in 1992 walked deep into the Alaskan wilderness and whose SOS note and emaciated corpse were found four months later, internationally bestselling author Jon Krakauer explores the obsession which leads some people to explore the outer limits of self, leave civilization behind and seek enlightenment through solitude and contact with nature.

11th Charles Portis “True Grit” True Grit tells the story of Mattie Ross, who is just fourteen years of age when a coward going by the name of Tom Chaney shoots her father down in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and robs him of his life, his horse, and $150 in cash money. Mattie leaves home to avenge her father's blood. With the one-eyed Rooster Cogburn, the meanest available U.S. Marshal, by her side, Mattie pursues the homicide into Indian Territory. True Grit is eccentric, cool, straight, and unflinching, like Mattie herself. From a writer of true cult status, this is an American classic through and through.

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10th F. Scott Fitzgerald “” The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s third book, stands as the supreme achievement of his career. This exemplary novel of the Jazz Age has been acclaimed by generations of readers. The story of the fabulously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful , of lavish parties on ; it is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s.

10th Ernest Hemingway “The Old Man and the Sea” Set in the Gulf Stream off the coast of Havana, Hemingway's magnificent fable is the story of an old man, a young boy and a giant fish. Here, in a perfectly crafted story, is a unique and timeless vision of the beauty and grief of man's challenge to the elements in which he lives. Not a single word is superfluous in this widely admired masterpiece, which once and for all established his place as one of the giants of modern literature.

Mrs. Strasser has chosen these for her students. Check the name of your course.

Advanced English 7 Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz They said his uncle Ian died in a car accident. But Alex Rider knows that is a lie, and the bullet holes in the windshield prove it. Yet he never suspected the truth: his uncle was really a spy for Britain’s top-secret intelligence agency. And now Alex has been recruited to find his uncle’s killers . . .(fiction/mystery/adventure)

Wanted by Caroline B. Cooney When Alice Robbie receives a strange call from her father, instructing her to drop everything, get in his precious Corvette, and meet him at her favorite ice cream shop, she cannot help feeling like something is wrong. But before she can even leave, Alice discovers the horrifying truth: Her father has been murdered. Even worse, someone has hacked into Alice’s email and framed her with a confession of guilt. With no one to corroborate her story, Alice has no choice but to become a fugitive. Caught up in a living nightmare, Alice must figure out who really killed her father, and why, before the police can put her behind bars—or the killer puts her six feet under . . . (fiction/mystery)

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English 8 Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko Twelve-year-old Moose moves to Alcatraz in 1935 so his father can work as a prison guard and his younger, autistic sister, Natalie, can attend a special school in San Francisco. It is a time when the federal prison is home to notorious criminals like gangster Al Capone. Depressed about having to leave his friends and winning baseball team behind, Moose finds little to be happy about on Alcatraz. He never sees his dad, who is always working; and Natalie's condition- - her tantrums and constant needs--demand all his mother's attention. Things look up for Moose when he befriends the irresistible Piper, the warden's daughter, who has a knack for getting Moose into embarrassing but harmless trouble. (fiction/historical fiction/humor)

M is for Magic by Neil Gaiman Bestselling author and master storyteller Neil Gaiman here presents a breathtaking collection of tales that may chill or amuse readers—but always embrace the unexpected:

• A teenage boy who has trouble talking to girls finds himself at a rather unusual party. • A sinister jack-in-the-box haunts the lives of the children who owned it. • A boy raised in a graveyard makes a discovery and confronts the much more troubling world of the living. • A stray cat fights a nightly battle to protect his adopted family from a terrible evil.

These eleven stories illuminate the real and the fantastic and will be welcomed with great joy by Neil Gaiman's many fans as well as by readers coming to his work for the first time. (Fiction/suspense/short story collection)

Pre-AP English 1 The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien Like every other hobbit, Bilbo Baggins likes nothing better than a quiet evening in his snug hole in the ground, dining on a sumptuous dinner in front of a fire. But when a wandering wizard captivates him with tales of the unknown, Bilbo becomes restless. Soon he joins the wizard’s band of homeless dwarves in search of giant spiders, savage wolves, and other dangers. Bilbo quickly tires of the quest for adventure and longs for the security of his familiar home. But before he can return to his life of comfort, he must face the greatest threat of all - a treasure- troving dragon named . The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams Seconds before the Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of The

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Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy who, for the last 15 years, has been posing as an out-of-work actor. Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have.") and a galaxy full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed, three- armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; and Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the years. Where are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? Why do we spend so much time in between wearing digital watches? For all the answers stick your thumb to the stars. And don't forget to bring a towel!

English 1 Holes by Louis Sachar Stanley Yelnats isn't so surprised when a miscarriage of justice sends him to a juvenile detention center. After all, his family has been ridden with bad luck ever since a one-legged gypsy put a curse on his great-great grandfather. He is told that the hard labor he must perform, digging five-foot holes in the dried-up soil where Green Lake once sat, is meant to build character. But it soon becomes clear to Stanley that the warden is really using the boys to search for something valuable. The story of the hidden treasure, along with the warden, Stanley's friend Zero, and the curse on the Yelnats family are all part of a compelling puzzle that has taken generations to unravel. (fiction/mystery)

Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty & the Beast By: Robin McKinley New York Times best-selling author Robin McKinley has won numerous awards for her writing, including the prestigious Newbery Medal. Though her two sisters are beautiful, Beauty, despite her name, is thin and awkward - but she is also courageous. So when her father makes a terrible promise to a Beast living in an enchanted castle, Beauty knows she must volunteer to be the Beast's prisoner. (fiction/fantasy)

AP Language & Composition The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio: How My Mother Raised 10 Kids on 25 Words or Less by Terry Ryan

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The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio introduces Evelyn Ryan, an enterprising woman who kept poverty at bay with wit, poetry, and perfect prose during the "contest era" of the 1950s and 1960s. Standing up to the church, her alcoholic husband, and antiquated ideas about women, Evelyn turned every financial challenge into an opportunity for innovation, all the while raising her six sons and four daughters with the belief that miracles are an everyday occurrence. (nonfiction)

Walden on Wheels: On the Open Road from Debt to Freedom by Ken Ilgunas The story of a student who went to extraordinary lengths - including living in a van on a campus parking lot - to complete his education without sacrificing his financial future. In a frank and self-deprecating voice, memoirist Ken Ilgunas writes about the existential terror of graduating from college with $32,000 in student debt. Inspired by Thoreau, Ilgunas set himself a mission: get out of debt as soon as humanly possible. To that end, he undertook an extraordinary 3-year transcontinental journey, driving to Alaska and taking a series of low-paying jobs. Debt-free, Ilgunas then enrolled himself in a master's program at Duke University, using the last of his savings to buy himself a used Econoline, his new "dorm." The van, stationed in a campus parking lot, would be an adventure, a challenge, a test of his limits. It would be, in short, his "Walden on Wheels." Ilgunas went public in a widely read Salon article that spoke to the urgent student debt situation in America today. He offers a funny and pointed perspective on the dilemma faced by those who seek an education but who also want to, as Thoreau wrote, "live deep and suck out all the marrow of life." (nonfiction)

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King On Writing begins with a mesmerizing account of King's childhood and his early focus on writing to tell a story. A series of vivid memories from adolescence, college, and the struggling years that led up to his first novel, Carrie, offer a fresh and often funny perspective on the formation of a writer. King then turns to the tools of his trade, examining crucial aspects of the writer's art and life, offering practical and inspiring advice on everything from plot and character development to work habits and rejection. King was in the middle of writing this book when he was nearly killed in a widely reported accident. On Writing culminates with a profoundly moving account of how his need to write spurred him toward recovery and brought him back to his life.

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Mrs. Martos has chosen these books for her English 7 courses: “Eleanor and Park”, Rainbow Rowell - Set over the course of one school year in 1986, this is the story of two star-crossed misfits—smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try. “I, Funny”, James Patterson - Jamie Grimm is a middle schooler on a mission: he wants to become the world's greatest standup comedian - even if he doesn't have a lot to laugh about these days. He is new in town and stuck living with his aunt, uncle, and their evil son Stevie, a bully who doesn't let Jamie's wheelchair stop him from messing with Jamie as much as possible. But Jamie doesn't let his situation get him down. When his Uncle Frankie mentions a contest called The Planet's Funniest Kid Comic, Jamie knows he has to enter. “Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer”, John Grisham - In the small city of Strattenburg, there are many Faithlawyers, and though he’s only thirteen years old, Theo Boone thinks he’s one of them. Theo knows every judge, policeman, court clerk—and a lot about the law. He dreams of being a great trial lawyer, of a life in the courtroom. But Theo finds himself in court much sooner than expected. Because he knows so much—maybe too much—he is suddenly dragged into the middle of a sensational murder trial. “Chomp”, Carl Hiassen - Wahoo Cray lives in a zoo. His father is an animal wrangler, so he's grown up with all manner of gators, snakes, parrots, rats, monkeys, snappers, and more in his backyard. The critters he can handle. His father is the unpredictable one. “Hush”, Jacqueline Woodson - Twelve-year-old Toswiah finds her life changed when her family enters the witness protection program.

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