10th_Summer Reading_2009 - Friends' Central School

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"material cultures" approach to the past. For example, in the chapter "Remember me as you pass by," he looks at the way that changes in the carving of tombstones show changing attitudes towards death. He considers houses, dishes, and the archaeological research into a small community called "Parting Ways," a free black community established in Massachusetts at the end of the 18th century. Something fun to read if you feel like getting your history on! 8. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield Ms. Novo The Thirteenth Tale opens with a letter from one book-loving stranger to another: Vida Winter, the most famous and flamboyant writer in England, writes to Margaret Lea, who runs a rare book shop with her father and has never read a single one of Vida’s books. Over many years, Vida has spun implausible, fantastic tales about her origins to countless interviewers—and now, out of the blue, invites Margaret to become her official biographer, promising finally to reveal truthfully the secrets of her past. To her own surprise, Margaret takes her up on the offer, traveling to Vida’s mysterious, decrepit family home to interview her. Margaret is surprised to find how strongly she is attracted to Vida; at the same time she is suspicious, a scholar who vows to test the validity of each part of Vida’s story. The story that unfolds is hard to believe and yet compels belief, and the relationship between Vida and Margaret, storyteller and recipient, is replicated in the relationship that develops between Margaret, the novel’s narrator, and us, its readers as we travel through this world of ghosts, mistaken identity, secrets, surprises, disaster, disguise, loneliness, suspense and, ultimately, resolution. 9. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery Ms. Schumacher Renee is a concierge for an elegant residence in Paris. Subjected to the ignorance of the elite tenants of the building, she plays into the stereotypes they believe apply to all those who are not rich like themselves. In reality, Renee is a genius, a lover of Tolstoy and Japanese films. Paloma is a twelve-year-old tenant of the same building for which Renee is a concierge. Paloma is disillusioned by all the wealth she sees around her. She too is bright, but she has also decided that upon her thirteenth birthday, she will kill herself. However, both Paloma and Renee’s lives will be turned upside down when a new resident moves into their elite Parisian apartment building. Join me for a delightful adventure into the Parisian world of Paloma and Renee. 10. The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game by Michael Lewis Mr. Morris From npr.org: If you read the big stories about NFL football, you'll notice that some positions get a lot more attention than others: receivers, quarterbacks and running backs. Sometimes even menacing linebackers or brilliantly athletic cornerbacks get attention, too. But Michael Lewis' new book about football, The Blind Side, makes a counterintuitive argument: that the pivotal position on a football team today is the offensive left tackle. Through the story of Michael Oher, a top-notch football prospect with the rare qualities of a "perfect" offensive left tackle, The Blind Side traces how the position's importance has evolved, and how money has affected the game.
11. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini Ms. Gowen-Tolcott When I read this novel last year, I was profoundly moved. This is a tale of the struggle of women in the Afghan society during the past thirty years. In this novel, love, friendship and sacrifice play major roles. In a clear and powerful style, the author shows how the political events that annihilated a country could not destroy the resilience of the main characters. Since Afghanistan is still facing an uncertain fate, this novel is timely and compelling, and makes us hope for a better future for its citizens, especially the women. 12. Measure for Measure AND Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare Terry Guerin Let’s talk politics, sexual and otherwise, in two of Shakespeare's more obscure "problem" plays. 13. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak Mrs. Brodsky Last spring, while browsing in a bookstore in Sydney, Australia, I decided I should read a book by an Australian author. The Book Thief was my choice and once I got through the first 30 pages, I couldn't put it down! The story, set in Nazi Germay, begins as a young Liesel Meminger travels to a small town outside of Munich. Along the way, her brother dies and during his funeral, Liesel steals her first book, The Gravedigger’s Handbook. Narrated by Death, The Book Thief tells the story of Liesl over the next five years: her foster parents, the ill-tempered Rosa and mellow, accordion-playing Hans (who teaches her to read her first stolen book), her best friend Rudy, the poverty-stricken life she leads in wartime Germany, the books she steals, the Jew in the basement and the words that inspire them all. 14. Memories of Amnesia by Lawrence Shainberg Mr. Sheppard For those who prefer their humor dark, keep reading. If you're also kept up at night by the haunting fact that your precious consciousness is somehow born from that ugly, wrinkled mass of neurons and blood vessels resting easy on your pillow, this book is for you. When an insightful brain surgeon begins to observe, in himself, symptoms of brain disease, his medical knowledge becomes a blessing and a curse. Horrified and curious, he forges ahead on a precarious path as both patient and doctor, protagonist and antagonist, host and disease. Through infected and infecting prose, come see what happens as a man's mind erodes before your eyes, and self- discovery becomes inextricable from self-destruction. 15. Remainder by Tom McCarthy Mr. Kennedy Jonathan Lethem, one of our best novelists, describes Remainder as "a stunningly strange book about the rarest of fictional subjects: happiness." He is not wrong. A man recovering from a random and rather serious injury receives an enormous financial settlement for his pain. What to do with the money? Charity? Self-indulgence? No, he wants to feel real again. The only way he can think to make that happen is to recreate a moment from his past and place himself in that space. What starts out as a harmless quest becomes a deadly obsession in this Kafkaesque tale. By the time you realize you are trapped in McCarthy's world you will not be able to find the exit, much less use it.
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10th_Summer Reading_2009 - Friends' Central School

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