Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Top Ten Tuesday: Forced Reads That Weren’t (Too) Painful


Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is anything back-to-school related. Basically, my entire life has been school. I’ve already written a lot about my college and grad school reading lists, so I’m going to focus on some books that I read as a younger person. Here are a few books I was forced to read in middle school and high school that I actually enjoyed.




Forced School Reads That Weren’t (Too) Painful








Tuck Everlasting – Natalie Babbitt (sixth grade language arts)


Doomed to—or blessed with—eternal life after drinking from a magic spring, the Tuck family wanders about trying to live as inconspicuously and comfortably as they can. When ten-year-old Winnie Foster stumbles on their secret, the Tucks take her home and explain why living forever at one age is less a blessing that it might seem. Complications arise when Winnie is followed by a stranger who wants to market the spring water for a fortune.






To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee (seventh grade language arts)


The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film, also a classic.






Summer of the Monkeys – Wilson Rawls (middle school book club)


A tree full of monkeys is the last thing fourteen-year-old Jay Berry Lee thought he'd find on one of his treks through Oklahoma's Cherokee Ozarks. Jay learns from his grandfather that the monkeys have escaped from a circus and there is a big reward for anyone who finds them. He knows how much his family needs the money. Jay is determined to catch the monkeys. It's a summer of thrills and dangers no one will ever forget.






Animal Farm – George Orwell (seventh grade language arts)


Revolution is in the air at Manor Farm after old Major, a prize boar, tells the other animals about his dream of freedom and teaches them to sing "Beasts of England." Mr Jones, the drunken farmer, is deposed of, and a committee of pigs takes over the running of the farm. The animals are taught to read and write, but the dream turns sour, the purges begin and those in charge come more and more to resemble their oppressors.
 





The Outsiders – S.E. Hinton (seventh (or eighth?) grade language arts)


According to Ponyboy, there are two kinds of people in the world: greasers and socs. A soc (short for "social") has money, can get away with just about anything, and has an attitude longer than a limousine. A greaser, on the other hand, always lives on the outside and needs to watch his back. Ponyboy is a greaser, and he's always been proud of it, even willing to rumble against a gang of socs for the sake of his fellow greasers—until one terrible night when his friend Johnny kills a soc. The murder gets under Ponyboy's skin, causing his bifurcated world to crumble and teaching him that pain feels the same whether a soc or a greaser.






The Giver – Lois Lowry (eighth grade language arts)


This haunting story centers on Jonas, who lives in a seemingly ideal, if colorless, world of conformity and contentment. Not until he's given his life assignment as the Receiver of Memory does he begin to understand the dark, complex secrets behind his fragile community.






Stargirl – Jerry Spinelli (eighth grade language arts)


From the day she arrives at quiet Mica High in a burst of color and sound, hallways hum “Stargirl.” She captures Leo Borlock’s heart with one smile. She sparks a school-spirit revolution with one cheer. The students of Mica High are enchanted. Until they are not. Leo urges her to become the very thing that can destroy her—normal.






Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck (ninth grade English)


Drifters in search of work, George and his simple-minded friend Lennie have nothing in the world except each other and a dream—a dream that one day they will have some land of their own. Eventually they find work on a ranch in California’s Salinas Valley, but their hopes are doomed as Lennie, struggling against extreme cruelty, misunderstanding and feelings of jealousy, becomes a victim of his own strength.






Night Shift – Stephen King (tenth (or eleventh?) grade English)


From the depths of darkness, where hideous rats defend their empire, to dizzying heights where a beautiful girl hangs by a hair above a hellish fate, this chilling collection of twenty short stories will plunge readers into the subterranean labyrinth of the most spine-tingling, eerie imagination of our time.






The Stand – Stephen King (twelfth grade modern lit class)


This is the way the world ends: with a nanosecond of computer error in a Defense Department laboratory and a million casual contacts that form the links in a chain letter of death. 
And here is the bleak new world of the day after: a world stripped of its institutions and emptied of 99 percent of its people. A world in which a handful of panicky survivors choose sides—or are chosen. A world in which good rides on the frail shoulders of the 108-year-old Mother Abagail—and the worst nightmares of evil are embodied in a man with a lethal smile and unspeakable powers: Randall Flagg, the dark man.






What was the best book you were forced to read in school?







16 comments:

  1. To Kill a Mockingbird, The Outsiders and Of Mice and Men were ones I did enjoy. I also enjoyed Catcher in the Rye which was a forced read. Great list!

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  2. I've not read or seen Tuck Everlasting but I know lots of people like it. I did read The Giver prior to see the film, and much to my surprise, I didn't care for it with as great of interest as I thought.

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  3. Oh my word - this list is actually readable!! LOL!! Stephen King? How awesome. I didn't do a TTT, I just posted a celebration post on my 100th post! Here's my link: http://marelithalkink.blogspot.co.za/2016/08/10-x-10-1-101th-dalmation-give-it-sniff.html

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  4. I've never read The Outsiders but I loved the movie version. It was especially fun seeing Swayze and all those guys that later became stars in an early role. :) I should read the book sometime.

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  5. Omg you read Stephen King in school?!! I'm so totally jealous. I love SK, The Giver, Of Mice and Men, and TKAM. I haven't read any of the others.

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  6. I'd read The Giver even before it was middle school assigned reading and I still love it

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  7. I loved Of Mice and Men too, even though I read it much more recently than school. It's such a poignant story.

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  8. I had to read To Kill A Mockingbird at school too. It's not my favourite book I've ever read, but it's certainly among the better ones that I've been assigned.
    My TTT: https://jjbookblog.wordpress.com/2016/08/30/top-ten-tuesday-72/

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  9. I've only read a couple of these, but I really remember loving Stargirl! I wasn't forced to read it though. I really want to read Tuck Everlasting just because I adored the movie as a teenager. Great list :D

    Here are my Top Ten!

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  10. Omg, you listed 5 of my favorite books from my childhood/teenage years!

    I loooved Tuckeverlasting. At least as a tween. Not sure how it'd hold up now, but I remember it fondly. The Giver and To Kill a Mockingbird are timeless, imo.

    I've never heard of teens being forced to read Stephen King in high school! I wish that had been my experience. Anyway, I read Nighshift as a teen as well, and it was pretty great. It's of the very first King books I read.

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  11. 1984 probably. Or Flatland, which we read for geometry class. LOL.

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  12. I join in the amazement that King was required reading for you! Stargirl and The Giver are books from my teaching era, not my student era. I think my fifth grade teacher read us Tuck Everlasting, I didn't realize Rawls had written any books besides Where The Red Fern Grows, and The Outsiders was passed hand to hand outside of class, because I was in 8th grade when the movie came out. As far as assigned reading, I enjoyed Animal Farm, Tale of Two Cities, The Scarlet Letter, Cry the Beloved Country, The Color Purple, and The Chosen.

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  13. First, how on earth do you REMEMBER this stuff!? I can barely remember what I read last week, and it was something I wanted to read! 😂 I have only read two of these- Of Mice and Men was required, and I read The Giver like, last year hah. I think I was supposed to read Animal Farm, but I am like, 99% sure that I just read the Cliffs Notes and called it a day with that one. Oops? I feel like you got to read WAYYY better stuff than I did though. Just saying ;)

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  14. ohhh I LOVED To Kill a Mockingird and The Outsiders and The Giver. :D I even re-read the Giver recently because it was so amazing. <3 Honestly I read a lot for school...homeschooling FTW...but do I remember all the books? NOT REALLY.😂 At least we still own them all, so one day I should go peruse the shelves and remind myself. I loved most of them though!!

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  15. The Giver, Tuck Everlasting, and To Kill A Mockingbird - I read those in school and they were all good!

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  16. We have a lot of books in common! Ones like Animal Farm, Of Mice and Men and also The Outsiders were books I had to read for school but actually really enjoyed. I also read To Kill A Mockingbird in school but only found that one to be okay :/ Otherwise, the books we read for school aren't too bad!

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