Summer reading list grade 11 Each student at Avon Middle High School is required to read

Summer reading list grade 11

When we first meet 14-year-old Susie Salmon, she is already in heaven. This was before milk carton photos and public service announcements, she tells us; back in 1973, when Susie mysteriously disappeared, people still believed these things didn't happen. In the sweet, untroubled voice of a precocious teenage girl, Susie relates the awful events of her death and her own adjustment to the strange new place she finds herself.

As a young man, Jacob Jankowski was tossed by fate onto a rickety train that was home to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. It was the early part of the great Depression, and for Jacob, now ninety, the circus world he remembers was both his salvation and a living hell. A veterinary student just shy of a degree, he was put in charge of caring for the circus menagerie. It was there that he met Marlena, the beautiful equestrian star married to August, the charismatic but twisted animal trainer. And he met Rosie, an untrainable elephant who was the great gray hope for this third-rate traveling show. The bond that grew among this unlikely trio was one of love and trust, and, ultimately, it was their only hope for survival.

Set in South Carolina in 1964, The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted "stand-in mother," Rosaleen, insults three of the town's fiercest racists, Lily decides they should both escape to Tiburon, South Carolina-a town that holds the secret to her mother's past. There they are taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters who introduce Lily to a mesmerizing world of bees, honey, and the Black Madonna who presides over their household.

This story is about an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of treasure buried in the Pyramids. Along the way he meets a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an Alchemist, all of whom point Santiago in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago will be able to surmount the obstacles along the way, but what starts out as a journey to find worldly goods turns into a meditation on the treasures found within.

For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one?

Minny, Miss Celia, Aibileen, and Yule May are maids employed by Skeeter's friends. Each woman cooks, cleans, and cares for her boss's children, suffering slights and insults silently and sharing household secrets only among themselves. In the wake of the Junior League push to create separate bathrooms for the domestic help within private homes, Skeeter contacts a New York book editor with an idea. Soon she's conducting clandestine meetings with "the help" to capture their stories for publication. It is a daring and foolhardy plan, one certain to endanger not only the positions but the lives of the very women whose stories she transcribes -- as well as her own.

As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends--and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is.

1. Imagine that you are asked to go before the school committee. The people on the committee are not sure they should include your outside reading book in the English curriculum. You need to persuade the committee by answering the following Question: Should your book be included in the next year’s curriculum? Why or why not?

Note: In answering the question, please consider the following:

A. Audience – to whom are you writing?

B. Specific quotes and references to the book will strengthen your argument.

2. Compare contrast this summer reading novel to any other that you read this past year in class in terms of characters and themes. Make specific references to both books.

3. Why would you recommend this book to another student? Or why, would you recommend this book? Make at least three convincing points to persuade your reader. Make specific references to the book that you have read.

4. Write a letter to the author of the book asking why the main character acted like she/he did or why, in the case of a non-fiction book, the author developed a particular idea and thought it was important. Then, have the author respond back to you in her/his own voice answering your question.

1. 
   Find an example of 15 literary terms in the novel
   
2. 
   Identify your chosen term and then cite an example found in the novel. Be sure to include the page number and quotes.
   

3. 
   compose an original song or poem on a theme from your novel
   
4. 
   must be a minimum of 25 lines