<p>“Jude the Obscure” is probably the book I despised the most that I once had to read. It’s dreadful.</p>
<p>^I went on a real Thomas Hardy kick in high school because the Masterpiece Theater productions were so good, but I admit that Jude is a bit of a downer! The one I never managed to actually read though, was The Mayor of Casterbridge.</p>
<p>Well as for Stevens, I remember “Anecdote of the Jar”, “Study of Two Pears” and “Peter Quince at the Clavier” which aren’t too difficult and I love “Contrary Theses (I)”:
</p>
<p>My son enjoyed Red Harvest by Dashiel Hammett.</p>
<p>Anyway, here’s a list that might spark a memory or two of a forgotten title:</p>
<p>[AP</a> Literature: Titles from Free Response Questions since 1973](<a href=“http://homepage.mac.com/mseffie/AP/APtitles.html]AP”>http://homepage.mac.com/mseffie/AP/APtitles.html)</p>
<p>Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried seems to be on many High School English reading lists lately.</p>
<p>
I’d say that’s a bit of an understatement! “Done because we are too menny”</p>
<p>Catch-22 is a must read.</p>
<p>Song of Solomon turned me into a reader. Its fabulous.</p>
<p>I vote for My Antonia too. </p>
<p>Why are you stuck on Twain and Hemingway? Just curious</p>
<p>A couple more American female authors you might consider:</p>
<p>Eudora Welty & Katherine Anne Porter. Both have short works.</p>
<p>EW: The Optimist’s Daughter, or Delta Wedding,</p>
<p>KAP: Pale Horse, Pale Rider</p>
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</p>
<p>That book was so depressing from beginning to end (but what happens to the kids really took the cake) that I quit reading Thomas Hardy! Did the guy need meds?</p>
<p>Decades ago, my first week as a college freshman I met a girl I kinda liked who was groupie crazy about Jude the Obscure. It didn’t work out…</p>
<p>Scarlett Letter</p>
<p>Call of the Wild</p>
<p>I notice that many fiction books suggested in this thread have been read by my kids from 8th grade to 12th grade. It looks like the kids should read any books from 16th century to 21st century that represent different genres (poetry, drama, fiction, and expository prose) listed by the College Board.</p>
<p><a href=“Supporting Students from Day One to Exam Day – AP Central | College Board”>Supporting Students from Day One to Exam Day – AP Central | College Board;
<p>Hmmmm… there are a lot of IB books sitting around my son’s room now that he has launched to college. And as always lots more titles at the library. </p>
<p>Can somebody suggest which books would be good for a mom with some extra time on her hands (but probably not enough patience for Moby Dick)?</p>
<p>you don’t really need patience for Moby Dick. It’s just a walloping good fish story interspersed with a lot of New Yorker type articles about whaling. Give it a try.</p>
<p>colorado-mom - Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame was amazing, although you could skip the bird’s eye description of Paris and not miss a beat. What kinds of things has he got lying around?</p>
<p>Colorado mom–</p>
<p>I have to say that the one thing I am convinced is true is that reading Henry James before you are 40 is a shame. I would just start with Portrait of a Lady, and go forward.</p>
<p>Proust, depending on your patience, like youth, is often also wasted on the very young.</p>
<p>And, rereading The Scottish Play or Hamlet or Lear by Shakespeare, AND especially The Tempest, is so great when we aren’t kids. Actually see these plays asap, if possible.</p>
<p>YMMV</p>
<p>IloveLA, I love your description of Moby Dick though you have to add that there are a few chapters of freeform poetry. (i.e. “The Whiteness of the Whale”) [Moby</a> Dick; or, The Whale by Herman Melville - Chapter 42 - The Whiteness of The Whale :: American Literature, Classic Books and Short Stories](<a href=“http://www.americanliterature.com/Melville/MobyDickorTheWhale/43.html]Moby”>Moby-Dick; or, The Whale - Chapter 42 - The Whiteness of The Whale)</p>
<p>Thinking outside the box, I found Peter Mathiessen’s novel Far Tortuga intoxicatingly wonderful. </p>
<p>Thomas Pynchon had this to say about it, “I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve ever read by Matthiessen, and this novel is Matthiessen at his best-- a masterfully spun yarn, a little otherworldly, a dreamlike momentum . . . It’s full of music and strong haunting visuals, and like everything of his, it’s also a deep declaration of love for the planet. I wish him and it all kinds of fortune.”</p>
<p>I love Far Tortuga, too! It’s really a lovely book in the Hemingwayesque tradition of doomed men doing doomed manly things without talking too much about it. Matthiessen’s Watson trilogy (Shadow Country) about the Ten Thousand Islands region in SW Florida is great, too, although less lyrical than Far Tortuga.</p>
<p>
A whale is not a fish. ;)</p>
<p>Although not an american lit novel, years ago when I was in high school I read the book Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier for a high school english class. I remember staying in bed all day reading this book and loving it. I have often thought about going back and rereading it to see if it appeals to me now. I have recommended this book to several people and they always come back and tell me that they enjoyed it.</p>