Welcome!

Welcome to our AP Lit & Comp summer reading blog!

Our summer of YA reading has come to a close …

This blog is part of the summer independent study of three graduate students who are working towards M. A. degrees in Literature and Teacher Certification for grades 6 – 12.  The goal of our study is to expand our knowledge of YA (young adult) literature and collaborate on ways to incorporate this literature into the English classroom.

We’re conceptualizing YA literature as literature that either 1) features a protagonist who is a young adult or 2) appeals to an audience of young adult readers.

We established this blog as an online place for us discuss and review the books that we read.  This blog will be used as proof of our reading, as a discussion tool, and as a resource for peers.  It is also a forum through which we can also discuss possible approaches to teaching these books (and other YA books) in the classroom. 

We’ve found that as the summer has progressed, we’ve shared ideas with one another, visited our libraries, and kept up on the latest releases in the YA book world.  Our reading list, therefore, has evolved as our interests have been piqued.

Below is the list of books we read this summer.  Group titles are indicated with an asterisk: *.

*American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

*The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Carbon Diaries 2015 by Saci Lloyd

Code Talker: A Novel about the Navajo Marines of World War Two by Joseph Bruchac

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin

Enter Three Witches by Caroline B. Cooney

For the Win by Cory Doctorow

The Geography Club by Brent Hartinger

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow           

*The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Into the Wild by Sarah Durst

Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

*The Lightening Thief by Rick Riordan

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow

Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

*The Misfits by James Howe

Monster by Walter Dean Myers

Mutiny: A Novel of the Bounty by John Boyne

Nation by Terry Pratchett

The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton

Paper Towns by John Green

The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan

The Secret Life of Sonia Rodriguez by Alan Lawrence Sitomer

So B. It by Sarah Weeks

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes by Chris Crutcher

Thin Wood Walls by David Patneaude

Uglies by Scott Westerfield

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

We Were Here by Matt De La Pena

What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell