Walpole High School Summer Reading Program Dear Walpole High Students : We are very proud of our Summer Reading: A Community of Readers Program. This year we are offering over sixty titles from which to choose; some of the titles were student suggestions. We hope that each student finds a title he or she can get excited about reading! All students must read one book chosen from the list. During the second week of September, you will meet with a group of students and at least one staff member who read the same book. Students will provide a written response to a prompt and then engage in a discussion of the book. Based on your written response and your participation in the discussion, you will receive a PASS/FAIL grade. Your participation in the Summer Reading program will be recorded on your official Walpole High School transcript and a passing grade will be worth 0.5 credits each year. A FAILING grade will keep you off the honor roll. As in the past, we recommend that you take brief reading notes (no more than one side of one sheet of 8 ½ x 11 hand written notes) while you read. You may bring both the book and the notes to your Summer Reading group. For complete list of summer reading books with brief synopses (from www.amazon.com), go to the Walpole High Website. Books are designated as: “E” (Easily read by everyone) “I” (an Intermediate read) “D” (reading level may be Difficult for some) PLEASE NOTE: Books with mature themes are limited to students who will be juniors and seniors. A note to parents: Our goal is to create a community of readers. We have selected books that we as teachers have enjoyed reading. We hope that by providing students a forum for reading, sharing, and discussing books that most interest them, they will find reading a pleasurable experience. We have identified books with mature themes and have restricted their selection to juniors and seniors; if you want more information about a book before your son or daughter selects it, please go to www.goodreads.com, www.barnesandnoble.com, or www.amazon.com to read their on‐line reviews. Reading can be a family activity; we encourage family members to read along and discuss the book selected. Reading provides pleasure as well as intellectual growth. The Walpole Public Library and the Walpole branch of Barnes and Nobles should have most of these titles available. Summer Reading Blurbs (Note: all blurbs were taken from Amazon) Title: Matched Reading level: Easy Author: Ally Condie Sponsored by: Ms. Allison Genre: Fiction/Young Adult Mature themes : No Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her: what to read, what to watch, what to believe. So when Xander's face appears on‐screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows he is her ideal mate . until she sees Ky Markham's face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black. The Society tells her it's a glitch, a rare malfunction, and that she should focus on the happy life she's destined to lead with Xander. But Cassia can't stop thinking about Ky, and as they slowly fall in love, Cassia begins to doubt the Society's infallibility and is faced with an impossible choice: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she's known and a path that no one else has dared to follow. Title: Insurgent Reading level: Easy Author: Veronica Roth Sponsored by: Ms. Loflin Genre: Fiction/Young Adult Mature themes: No One choice can transform you—or it can destroy you. But every choice has consequences, and as unrest surges in the factions all around her, Tris Prior must continue trying to save those she loves—and herself—while grappling with haunting questions of grief and forgiveness, identity and loyalty, politics and love. Tris's initiation day should have been marked by celebration and victory with her chosen faction; instead, the day ended with unspeakable horrors. War now looms as conflict between the factions and their ideologies grows. And in times of war, sides must be chosen, secrets will emerge, and choices will become even more irrevocable—and even more powerful. Transformed by her own decisions but also by haunting grief and guilt, radical new discoveries, and shifting relationships, Tris must fully embrace her Divergence, even if she does not know what she may lose by doing so. New York Times bestselling author Veronica Roth's much‐anticipated second book of the dystopian Divergent series is another intoxicating thrill ride of a story, rich with hallmark twists, heartbreaks, romance, and powerful insights about human nature. Title: The Pact Reading level: Easy Author: Jodi Picoult Sponsored by: Ms. Plank Genre: Fiction/Young adult Mature themes: Yes (gr 11 and 12) Until the phone calls came at three o'clock on a November morning, the Golds and their neighbors, the Hartes, had been inseparable. It was no surprise to anyone when their teenage children, Chris and Emily, began showing signs that their relationship was moving beyond that of lifelong friends. But now seventeen‐year‐old Emily is dead—shot with a gun her beloved and devoted Chris pilfered from his father's cabinet as part of an apparent suicide pact— leaving two devastated families stranded in the dark and dense predawn, desperate for answers about an unthinkable act and the children they never really knew. From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult— one of the most powerful writers in contemporary fiction—comes a riveting, timely, heartbreaking, and terrifying novel of families in anguish and friendships ripped apart by inconceivable violence Title: Stronger Reading level: Easy Author: Jeff Bauman and Bret Witter Sponsored by: Mr. Sturges Genre: Nonfiction/Memior Mature themes: No When Jeff Bauman woke up on Tuesday, April 16th, 2013 in the Boston Medical Center, groggy from a series of lifesaving surgeries and missing his legs, the first thing he did was try to speak. When he realized he couldn't, he asked for a pad and paper and wrote down seven words: "Saw the guy. Looked right at me," setting off one of the biggest manhunts in the country's history. Just thirty hours before, Jeff had been at the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon cheering on his girlfriend, Erin, when the first bomb went off at his feet. As he was rushed to the hospital, he realized he was severely injured and that he might die, but he didn't know that a photograph of him in a wheelchair was circulating throughout the world, making him the human face of the Boston Marathon bombing victims, or that what he'd seen would give the Boston police their most important breakthrough. Up until the marathon, Jeff had been a normal 27‐year‐old guy, looking forward to moving in with Erin and starting the next phase of their lives together. But when his life was turned upside down in ways he could never have fathomed, Jeff did not give up. Instead he faced his new circumstances with grace, humor, and a sense of purpose: he was determined, no matter what, to walk again. In STRONGER, Jeff describes the chaos and terror of the bombing itself and the ongoing FBI investigation in which he was a key witness. He takes us inside his grueling rehabilitation, and discusses his attempt to reconcile the world's admiration with his own guilt and frustration. And he tells of the courage of his fellow survivors. Brave, compassionate, and emotionally compelling, Jeff Bauman's story is not just his, but ours as well. It proves that the terrorists accomplished nothing with their act of cowardice and shows the entire world what Boston Strong really means. Title: Orr: My Story Reading level: Easy Author: Bobby Orr Sponsored by: Mr. Hanlon Genre: Nonfiction/Memoir/Sports Mature themes: No He has never written a memoir, authorized a biography, or talked to journalists about his past, but now he is finally ready to tell his story. Bobby Orr is often referred to as the greatest ever to play the game of hockey. From 1966 through the mid‐seventies, he could change a game just by stepping on the ice. No defenseman had ever played the way he did, or received so many trophies, or set so many records, several of which still stand today. But all the brilliant achievements leave unsaid as much as they reveal. They don’t tell what inspired Orr, what drove him, what it was like for a shy small‐town kid to suddenly land in the full glare of the media. They don’t tell what it was like when the agent he regarded as a brother betrayed him and left him in financial ruin. They don’t tell what he thinks of the game of hockey today. He is speaking out now because “I am a parent and a grandparent and I believe that I have lessons worth passing on.” Orr: My Storyis more than a book about hockey—it is about the making of a man. Title: Lone Survivor : The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 Reading level: Easy Author: Marcus Luttrell and Patrick Robinson Sponsored by: Mr. Kampper Genre: Nonfiction/True story of a soldier Mature themes: Yes (gr 11and 12) Four US Navy SEALS departed one clear night in early July 2005 for the mountainous Afghanistan‐Pakistan border for a reconnaissance mission. Their task was to document the activity of an al Qaeda leader rumored to be very close to Bin Laden with a small army in a Taliban stronghold.