Literature and Language Arts

BASTARD OUT OF CAROLINA
by Allison Dorothy
Bone confronts illegitimacy, poverty, the troubled marriage of her mother and stepfather, and the stigma of being considered “white trash” as she comes of age in South Carolina.

THE ASTONISHING LIFE OF OCTAVIAN NOTHING, TRAITOR TO THE NATION, VOLUME 1: THE POX PARTY
by M. T. Anderson
Various diaries, letters and other manuscripts chronicle the experiences of Octavian, a young African American, from birth to age sixteen, as he is brought up as part of a science experiment in the years leading up to and during the Revolutionary War.

THE ASTONISHING LIFE OF OCTAVIAN NOTHING, TRAITOR TO THE NATION, VOLUME 2: THE KINGDOM ON THE WAVES
by M. T. Anderson
After escaping a death sentence in the summer of 1775, Octavian and his tutor find shelter but no safe harbor in British-occupied Boston and, persuaded by Lord Dunmore's proclamation offering freedom to slaves who join his counterrevolutionary Royal Ethiopian Regiment, Octavian and his friends soon find themselves engaged in naval raids on the Virginia coastline as the Revolutionary War breaks out in full force.

WHO THE HELL IS PANSY O’HARA?: THE FASCINATING STORIES BEHIND 50 OF THE WORLD’S BEST-LOVED BOOKS
by Jenny Bond and Chris Sheedy
From Harper Lee to Harry Potter, short, pithy chapters explore 50 of the greatest authors and their most famous literary creations.

SOMEDAY THIS PAIN WILL BE USEFUL TO YOU
by Peter Cameron
Eighteen-year-old James, living in New York City with his older sister and divorced mother, struggles to find a direction for his life.

CARAMELO, OR, PURO CUENTO
by Sandra Cisneros
LaLa learns the stories of her awful Grandmother and weaves them into a colorful family history. The “caramelo,” a striped shawl begun by her Great-Grandmother, symbolizes their traditions.

ELLA MINNOW PEA: A PROGRESSIVELY LIPOGRAMMATIC EPISTOLARY FABLE
by Mark Dunn
Ella Minnow Pea is a girl living happily on the fictional island of Nollop, South Carolina. Now Ella finds herself acting to save her friends, family and fellow citizens from the encroaching totalitarianism of the island's Council, which has banned the use of certain letters of the alphabet in this love letter to language.

EXTREMELY LOUD & INCREDIBLY CLOSE
by Jonathan Safran Foer
Oskar Schell, the nine-year-old son of a man killed in the World Trade Center bombing, searches the city for a lock that fits a black key his father left behind.

A LESSON BEFORE DYING
by Ernest J. Gaines
Tells the story of two men who, through no choice of their own, come together and form a bond in the realization that sometimes simply choosing to resist the expected is an act of heroism.

LOOKING FOR ALASKA
by John Green
Sixteen-year-old Miles' first year at Culver Creek Preparatory School in Alabama includes good friends and great pranks, but is defined by the search for answers about life and death after a fatal car crash.

THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME
by Mark Haddon
Despite his overwhelming fear of interacting with people, Christopher, a mathematically-gifted, autistic fifteen-year-old boy, decides to investigate the murder of a neighbor's dog and uncovers secret information about his mother.

THE KITE RUNNER
by Khaled Hosseini
Traces the unlikely friendship of a wealthy Afghan youth and a servant's son in a tale that spans the final days of Afghanistan's monarchy through the atrocities of the present day.

NEVER LET ME GO
by Kazuo Ishiguro
Hailsham seems like a pleasant English boarding school, far from the influences of the city. Its students are well tended and supported, trained in art and literature, and become just the sort of people the world wants them to be. But, curiously, they are taught nothing of the outside world and are allowed little contact with it. Within the grounds of Hailsham, Kathy grows from schoolgirl to young woman, but it's only when she and her friends leave the grounds of the school that they realize the full truth of what Hailsham is.

MISTER PIP
by Lloyd Jones
On a tropical island shattered by war, only one teacher chooses to stay behind: the eccentric Mr. Watts, who sweeps out the ruined schoolhouse and begins to read to the children each day from the Charles Dickens classic Great Expectations.

GOOD POEMS
edited by Garrison Keillor
Includes verse about lovers, children, failure, everyday life, death and transcendence. It's a book of poems for anybody who loves poetry whether they know it or not.

THE SECRET LIFE OF BEES
by Sue Monk Kidd
During the summer of 1964 in rural South Carolina, a young girl is given a home by three black, beekeeping sisters. As she enters their mesmerizing secret world of bees and honey, she discovers a place where she can find the single thing her heart longs for most.

THE GOD OF ANIMALS
by Aryn Kyle
Sixth grader Alice Winston is having a rough year. Her older sister elopes. Her depressed mother won't get out of bed. Her father struggles to save their faltering horse ranch. And Alice's school pal drowns. Caught in a dizzying adult world, Alice soon faces challenges that threaten to shatter her dreams and her family.

WICKED: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE WICKED WITCH OF THE WEST
by Gregory Maguire
When Dorothy triumphed over the so-called Wicked Witch of the West in Frank Baum's tales, we heard only Dorothy's side of the story. The Wicked Witch we think we know is the predictable, green-faced villainess straight out of MGM's imagination. But there's more to the story than that. Where did the Wicked Witch come from? How exactly was she wicked? Why shouldn't she want her sister's charmed shoes? And, most important, what is the true nature of evil?

THE ROAD
by Cormac McCarthy
America is a barren landscape of smoldering ashes, devoid of life except for those people still struggling to scratch out some type of existence. Amidst the destruction, a father and his young son walk, always toward the coast, but with no real understanding that circumstances will improve once they arrive. Still they persevere, and their relationship comes to represent goodness in a world that is utterly devastated.

KAFKA ON THE SHORE
by Haruki Murakami
Kafka Tamura runs away from home to escape his father's oedipal prophecy and to find his long-lost mother and sister. As Kafka flees, so too does Nakata, an elderly simpleton whose quiet life has been upset by a gruesome murder.

SUNRISE OVER FALLUJAH
by Walter Dean Myers
Robin Perry, from Harlem, is sent to Iraq in 2003 as a member of the Civilian Affairs Battalion, and his time there profoundly changes him.

THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA
by Philip Roth
A fascinating alternate history that takes a hard look at one of America’s legendary heroes, Charles Lindbergh, and at how bigotry and fear can shape politics.

LUCKY: A MEMOIR
by Alice Sebold
“You save yourself or you remain unsaved.” With these words, Sebold recounts the brutal rape that she was “lucky” to survive. Tragedy and hope combine as she makes her way through a survivor’s maze of emotions.

ROSENCRANTZ & GUILDENSTERN ARE DEAD
by Tom Stoppard
Two bit players from Shakespeare's Hamlet are thrust into a terrifying and surreal new situation.

BLANKETS
by Craig Thompson
Wrapped in the landscape of a blustery Wisconsin winter, Blankets explores the sibling rivalry of two brothers growing up in the isolated country, and the budding romance of two teens.

THE BOOK THIEF
by Markus Zusak
Trying to make sense of the horrors of World War II, Death relates the story of Liesel – a young German girl whose book-stealing and story-telling talents help sustain her family and the Jewish man they are hiding, as well as their neighbors.