2012 Summer Reading Guide - Hopkins School

Herbert, Frank Dune
In this masterpiece of science fiction, Paul Atreides seeks vengeance for the death of his father while
embracing his own superhuman abilities on the desert planet Arrakis.
Ishiguro, Kazuo Never Let Me Go
Ruth, Kathy, and Tommy seem like normal children: they go to school, they pick fights, they fall in
love. Yet these three children are anything but normal. They are clones, destined to donate their
organs to humans so that the humans can live longer, even as the donors slowly fall apart. Ruth,
Kathy, and Tommy’s brief but passionate loves and lives intertwine in this frightening yet compelling
story of the destruction wrought by time.
Jordan, Robert The Eye of the World
Robert Jordan’s world is full of heroes and antiheroes, hope and dismay, blessings and curses, and
whatever else lies in between. Jordan follows epic tradition through universal themes in the first The
Wheel of Time series.
MacDonald, George Back of the North Wood
A series of enchanted adventures in and out of the mind of a sick child, who finds a friend in the
north wind and a land at her back.
Martin, George R.R. A Game of Thrones
Winter is coming to the Seven Kingdoms, and the honorable Lord Stark of the North must scatter his
family and travel south to protect the King, the realm, and his own children from the ruthless
machinations of the evil queen and other contenders for the Iron Throne.
Morrow, James Towing Jehovah
An aging sea captain is assigned the top-secret mission of towing God's corpse from the Atlantic to
theNorth Pole. The meaning of faith becomes central through the various crew members' reactions to
the mission.
Sagan, Carl Contact
Ellie Arroway discovers a signal from the star Vega. There are messages on several levels, one of
which contains the design of a ship that moves faster than light.
Tevis, Walter Mockingbird
A brilliant and moving novel about our future in a world populated by zoos full of robotic animals,
people on sedatives, a humanity unable to reproduce, a robot who longs to die, and a man who
learns to read.
Valente, Catherynne M. Deathless
Deathless is inspired by the Russian folktale “The Death of Koschei the Deathless”, but is set in a
version of Communist Russia where mythical creatures have joined the Party. Marya Morevna grows
up vaguely aware of strange, magical happenings around her but she is thrown into another world
when Koschei, a devil in a sharp uniform, shows up to steal her away. Beautifully written, Deathless
is clever, feminist and unexpected.
SHORT STORIES AND ESSAYS
One Thousand and One Arabian Nights
Thousands of years’ worth of Mesopotamian Mythology and Arabic folk tales, collected into one of the
most influential storybooks of all time. Open sesame!
The Mabinogion
Eleven Welsh stories that were transmitted orally for centuries before being written down in the
thirteenth century comprise an enchanting mixture of magic, myth, fantasy, and history.
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