Book nerds I need your help

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

So my niece is just ruined but the most amazing piece of literature (her words. Lol) she's ever read. TFIOS. I hated that book. I commented that she and her friends need to read more classic literature if that was the best book they've ever read. Give me ideas for classics that 16 year olds will enjoy that are better than that crap.

mittensonkittens · June 2014

I haven't read that one. But since I enjoyed Twilight, I'm just gonna leave now. Apparently ms.mittens =/= book nerd

fieldpetal · June 2014

Oh my goodness. You're right, that is very sad. Ugh. Such a trite and depressing book.

Hmm. Off the top of my head I love Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre. But books don't have to be old or classics to beat TFIOS.
Harry Potter, Hunger Games are obvious choices...

A Great and Terrible Beauty
Inkheart
Daughter of Smoke and Bone
S.E. Hinton books
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
The Catcher in the Rye...

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

@ms.mittens, I didn't completely hate the Twilight books. The movies were AWFUL but I at least enjoyed the books for what they were. TFIOS was so incredibly bad. So you don't have to leave.

mittensonkittens · June 2014

What about TFIOS do you think appealed to her? Could she relate to the characters? Love? Youth? Tragedy? Modern language is probably a plus. I just know what I read in the synopsis, I've stayed away from the book because I didn't want to read about sick children.

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

ms.mittens said:

What about TFIOS do you think appealed to her? Could she relate to the characters? Love? Youth? Tragedy? Modern language is probably a plus. I just know what I read in the synopsis, I've stayed away from the book because I didn't want to read about sick children.

It's such a tragic love story! <<<<sarcasm font

I think she just thought it was the youth and the star crossed lovers kind of thing. A love that could never be. blah blah blah. It was pretentious and unrealistic while being completely predictable and then it ended with a whimper.

[Deleted User] · June 2014

I liked Anne of Green Gables. Little House on the Prairie was ok too. At that age I liked Christopher Pike stuff and RL Stine. Not what you would consider classics.

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

NKaeding said:

Meimsx said:

ms.mittens said:

What about TFIOS do you think appealed to her? Could she relate to the characters? Love? Youth? Tragedy? Modern language is probably a plus. I just know what I read in the synopsis, I've stayed away from the book because I didn't want to read about sick children.

It's such a tragic love story! <<<<sarcasm font
I think she just thought it was the youth and the star crossed lovers kind of thing. A love that could never be. blah blah blah. It was pretentious and unrealistic while being completely predictable and then it ended with a whimper.

Good thing Shakespeare wrote that story 500 years ago.

To be fair I don't really care for Romeo and Juliet either.

mittensonkittens · June 2014

Divergent
The Magicians
Hunger Games
Outlander
Game of Thrones

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

I love that there are so many books on your lists that I've read and I had already recommended to her.

EagleWife · June 2014

Meimsx said:

ms.mittens said:

What about TFIOS do you think appealed to her? Could she relate to the characters? Love? Youth? Tragedy? Modern language is probably a plus. I just know what I read in the synopsis, I've stayed away from the book because I didn't want to read about sick children.

It's such a tragic love story! <<<<sarcasm font
I think she just thought it was the youth and the star crossed lovers kind of thing. A love that could never be. blah blah blah. It was pretentious and unrealistic while being completely predictable and then it ended with a whimper.

I didn't LOVE the book, but I didn't hate it either. It is great that she IS reading, and thinking about what she read. I agree that it was predictable and unrealistic, but it sounds like it made an impact on her. If she hasn't read much and doesn't recognize that it's the classic age old story over and over again, then she might see it later in life once she is more well read.

All of the suggestions above sound like a great summer reading list. You could challenge her to read them and see if she likes any of them as much as TFIOS.

lrichmond86 · June 2014

When I was 16 I read Jane Eyre, East of Eden, and The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsby is still my favorite book of all time.

jennipalmer · June 2014

I like Scarlet Letter, The Crucible and most of Edgar Allan Poes stuff

arlingirl · June 2014

I just read Panic by Lauren Oliver...good YAF read.

I spent seven years teaching Language Arts and there are worse things than TFIOS, but not much. john Green writes horribly unbelievable teen characters. Ick. "An Aundance of Katherines" was better...kinda.

Some other choices for her:

Delirium series by Lauren Oliver
Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld
Harry Potter (always!)
Jane Eyre
The Secret Life of Sparrow Delaney
Hope Was Here
Mediator series by Meg Cabot
Daughter of Smoke and Bone
The Diviners
Great and Terrible Beauty

There's so many more...

arlingirl · June 2014

I totally just re-read and saw that you said *classics*. My bad. These are all current choices that are WAY better than TFIOS. I wasn't really reading classics at that age unless it was required. LOL And now they don't give us time to teach whole novels (it's ridiculous) and if they do they're usually more recent releases. At least what I've had the last few years.

fabk · June 2014

ms.mittens said:
Divergent
The Magicians
Hunger Games
Outlander
Game of Thrones

Outlander is my favourite series. Read it for the first time at 15. That being said, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to a 16 year old. But that is just me. Same with GOT. I think I would only recommend them to 16year olds who could handle them.

HP, HG, Delirium, Percy Jackson are all great or at least decent series.
Classics? Anne of Green Gabels, The Outsiders, Catcher in the Rye, P &P, Jane Eyre.

Personally I think if all she got out of TFIOS was the tragic love story than she is just jumping on the bandwagon. But that is just me.

mittensonkittens · June 2014

fabk said:

ms.mittens said:
Divergent
The Magicians
Hunger Games
Outlander
Game of Thrones
Outlander is my favourite series. Read it for the first time at 15. That being said, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to a 16 year old. But that is just me. Same with GOT. I think I would only recommend them to 16year olds who could handle them.

HP, HG, Delirium, Percy Jackson are all great or at least decent series.
Classics? Anne of Green Gabels, The Outsiders, Catcher in the Rye, P &P, Jane Eyre.

Personally I think if all she got out of TFIOS was the tragic love story than she is just jumping on the bandwagon. But that is just me.

I was really questioning whether to include Outlander and GOT, but Meimsx‌ knows her niece and what she can handle. GOT is getting a lot of press with the show, and I think there is an Outlander movie in the works. I was thinking that would make them feel sexy and current to a teen. But I don't exactly hang out with many teens these days.

sparkymcgeee · June 2014

Thankfully she loves to read so I'm not worried about her being upset about what I said to her. In fact she has already come back and said she's read a few of my suggestions. Like, the Giver, Of Mice and Men, And Night. So we're lucky we can have those types of discussions. I hope she reads P&P but she posted that she's rereading TFIOS already. Womp womp.

cwhitloc · June 2014

I like the British classics. Tess of the Dubervilles and Wuthering Heights.

Modern stuff, Kite Runner is a must. Just Google Rory's book list (from Gilmore Girls). Lots of classics there.

ceechie · June 2014

Watership Down
Life of Pi
Enders Game
The Lovely Bones (personally I never got through it, but when my sister was a teenage she was obsessed)
I loved John Steinbeck (East of Eden) and Fahrenheit 451 in high school.

opheliainwaders · June 2014

All of the Madeleine L'Engle books. Have her start with either A Wrinkle in Time or A Ring of Endless Light, maybe? Also loved Great Gatsby. Franny and Zooey? I second The Magicians, Hunger Games.

It might be a little young for her (but I still love them as an adult) - the Alanna books by Tamora Pierce?

And I can't neglect Phillip Pullman!

Ooh, and more Anne McCaffrey, definitely - Start with To Ride Pegasus, go in order from there (good teenage characters).

Gone With the Wind?

kolaczka · June 2014

Grendel - I was fascinated by the concept of the anti-hero.
Name of the Rose
Enders game and speaker for the dead
Lysistrata - the only play I ever enjoyed reading in high school
Till we have faces
Tombs of atuan - Ursula la guin
The witch of blackbird pond - a little younger than 16 - but my favorite book for many years
Pride and prejudice - the only one of that ilk that I actually finished and enjoyed
Lord of the flies

dinomama13 · June 2014

...backing out slowly. X_X I was never here.

I mostly read YA stuff. TFIOS, Divergent series, Hush Hush, Twilight, Hunger Games, stuff like that. I'm no help.

dliz87 · June 2014

@gulickr‌ Did you read The Circle of Magic series?

I am also a big fan of the Wizard of Oz books; I spent a summer going through that series long ago!

reallylongusername · June 2014

Julius Caesar, Cry the Beloved Country, Of Mice and Men, Death of a Salesman, Bean Trees, The Bluest Eye, The Things They Carried

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