Magnetic

Hey, I'm in the seventh grade and read at the college level. I've been reading alot of Louis L'Amour and want a book or author that will challenge me. Any ideas?

Katastrof

What do you like to read? And what have you already read? I'm not sure if being able to read at a college level will allow you to fully get some literature at a college level. But here's a few challenging books and also some of my personal recommendations:

*Challenging: In order of least difficult to most
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Light in August by William Faulkner
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
Brothers Karamazov by Fyoder Dostoevsky
The Iliad and Odyssey by Homer
Ulysses by James Joyce
Where's Waldo? In Hollywood by Martin Handford

*Note: Honestly, if you can read and appreciate any of this stuff when you're in grade 7, than you're a pretty smart kid. I've gotten through a third of the list myself.


Recommendations (stuff I enjoyed when I was in grade 7-8 )
The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien
The Hatchet by Gary Paulson
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Dafoe
Dracula by Bram Stoke
Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

__________________
Read: A Novel Idea
Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them, and you have their shoes."
~ Frieda Norris

Metanoia

Weaveworld by Clive Barker (fantasy fiction)
Call of the Wild by Jack London (fiction)
White Fang by Jack London (fiction)

__________________
There are moments I wish would never end. But if they didn't, then I couldn't reminisce with a longing heart and tears in my eyes...I wish you memories not for your mind, but for your heart.

*~Katelyn~*

Wintermute

VALIS.

Let me know if your sanity is intact after.

__________________
"I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read." - Samuel Johnson

starseed

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

I agree. GREAT, wonderful, amazing book. I read it in grade.. 8th or 9th I believe and was floored. A must read.

MiloDaePesdan

Proof you don't have to go to college to read a story.

Something challenging? Hmm...*evil grin*

"Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov.



Milo
EDIT: Also try "The Call of Cthulhu" by H.P. Lovecraft. Then any time you come across some tentacly thingie monster and "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn" online, you'll understand where it comes from.

__________________

TheBlackKeys

Frank Herbert's Dune is thematically dense, even with an atypical bildungsroman plot at the center of it. It'll probably take effort if you're not especially into science fiction. Otherwise, one of my favorites and the first book I recommend to anybody who actually reads.

kerr511

Soooo much to list. When I was that age I wish someone told me about Ender's Game and Speaker for te Dead by Orson Scott Card, challenging in many respects but also extremely enjoyable.
It is important to challenge yourself but I would say equally important to not read beyond your level. It would be a terrible shame to read something great and to not appreciate ot because you dont properly understand it.
Some great suggestions above too.

aspiretowrite

I recommend

The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series of books by Alexander McCall Smith.
The Outsiders by S E Hinton
The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
A PAssage to India - by E M Foster
Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
Anthing by Chinua Achebe especially Man of the People.
Sam Selvon - The Lonely Londoners


And if you're feeling really adventurous try Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. Toughest book I ever read.

Good Luck

__________________
Mr President. If a child can buy pornography for five dollars on any street corner, isn't that too high a price to pay for free speach?

No but I do think five dollars is too high a price to pay for pornography.

GooGooMuck

I recommend:
Things Fall Apart (Chinua Achebe)
The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)

__________________
You better duck...
When I show up...
The GooGooMuck!

RomanticRose

Five Smooth Stones by Ann Fairbairn
Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy (The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills, The Last Enchantment)

__________________

lisajane

Anna Karenina - Tolstoy

__________________
'Beauty stands and waits with gravity to start her death-defying leap. And he, a little charleychaplin man, who may or may not catch her fair eternal form spreadeagled in the empty air of existence.' - Laurence Felinghetti, 'The Acrobat'

tristiano

i cant believe no one has mentioned ender's game. read it if you haven't. i don't think its challenging.. you should read it anyways. then the sequels. i might not have been a stupid seventh grader if i read those and understood the political aspects of the sequels.

__________________

RomanticRose

someone did, look at post #8

__________________