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Thanks for all the repsonses to my request for title suggestions for the
secondary level. I didn't receive many replies but here they are:
Ann McCaffrey's Series
Patricia Cornwell
Harry Potter Books
Orson Scott Card's science fiction is essential -- especially _Ender's
Game_, _Speaker for the Dead_, _Xenocide_, _Children of the Mind_,
_Ender's Shadow_, and one that is due out early in 2001, _Shadow of the
Hegemon_. The first four books in the Alvin Maker series are excellent
fantasy--alternate history: _Seventh Son_, _Red Propher_, _Prentice
Alvin_, _Alvin Journeyman_. Also good are _The Worthing Saga_ about a
future civilization/chaotic world, and _The Redemption of Columbus_
about time travel to "change" the course of history.
Almost anything written by Ursula LeGuin -- especially _The
Dispossessed_ and _The Left Hand of Darkness_. The Wizard of Earthsea
series (5 or 6 books) also is very good.
_Dune_, by Frank Herbert -- also his _The White Plague_.
_Foundation_, _Second Foundation_, _Foundation and Empire_, &
_Foundation's Edge_, by Isaac Asimov. Another Asimov series that I
think is called Robots and Empire begins with a book called _The Caves
of Steel_ and continues on for two or three more. I'd add two of
Asimov's early books: _I, Robot_, and _The Rest of the Robots_, because
they help to establish the origination and purpose of the "3 laws of
robotics" that govern robot behavior in the rest of these books.
The other classic science fiction writer that must be included is Ray
Bradbury -- especially _Fahrenheit 451_, _R is for Robot_, and _S is for
Space_.
Anne McCaffrey is well liked by both students and critics -- if you are
concerned about the "sexiness" of the Dragonriders of Pern series, start
with _Dragon Song_, _Dragon Singer_, _Dragon Drums_.
_Sabriel_, and _Shade's Children_ by Garth Nix.
_Red Mars_, _Green Mars_, _Blue Mars_, by Kim Stanley Robinson
_Eon_, by Greg Bear -- lots of advanced physical and mathematical
theory woven into the plot of this one. I've read a couple of others by
Greg Bear, who is an excellent science writer.
_Timescape_, by Gregory Benford. Benford is a professor of physics and
a superb storyteller.
_The Gate to Women's Country_, by Sheri Tepper. She has a number of
excellent fantasy-science fiction-women's emancipation novels
Joan Vinge is another sci fi author with strong female characters.
Vernor Vinge has some excellent books as well. I liked _A Deepness in
the Sky_ and _A Fire on the Deep_ very much. (Both won Hugos).
Check for the science fiction books that have won the major awards for
science fiction --
Nebula ( http://www.sfwa.org/awards/archive/pastwin.htm )
Hugo ( http://worldcon.org/hy.html ).
A friend has highly recommended books by Octavia Butler to me, but I
haven't read any of hers yet.
Mickey Zucker Reichart has a fantasy series _The Last of the Renshai_
based on Norse epics. She's a superb writer whose books I buy without
looking at reviews because I know they'll be good.
Other classic authors whose books I enjoy include Ben Bova, Arthur C.
Clarke, Frederick Pohl, Larry Niven, Robert Heinlein (Some of
Heinlein's books -- especially those about Lazarus Long, _A Stranger in
a Strange Land_, and _Glory Road_ -- are almost guaranteed to be
"challenged" as too full of sex & irreverence; others could be given to
upper elementary school students).
For the "younger" high school students, Madeleine L"Engle's _Wrinkle in
Time_ and its sequels are excellent as are books by Susan Cooper, Robin
McKinley, Philip Pullman, Diane Duane, and the J. K. Rowling books about
Harry Potter.
As you can tell by the length of my post, I am a sci-fi - fantasy
addict. Currently, I'm reading _Eon_ by Greg Bear and _Darwin's Radio_
by Gregory Benford. My favorite sci-fi novels contain a lot of social
commentary embedded within their plots, but I also am beginning to
appreciate the theoretical physics/mathematics used by Bear and Benford
to help explain time/space relationships.
I'm impatiently awaiting the 4th in Tad Williams' _Otherland_ series.
This is a continuing virtual reality mystery-adventure with sinister
undertones.
It is hard to keep up with the latest in all fields. Our school (1500
students, 9-12) has been subscribing to a paperback service called Atlantis
out of California. They send about 10 books per month, the latest
recommended for young adults based on a profile you select. Sci fi/ Fantasy
is one of the profiles. There are different levels of pricing depending on
how many titles you want a month. They send the cataloging on a diskette,
too. they have been pretty good for about 4 years.
Once in awhile they send an older title we already have. They are very fair
about replacements and fixing mistakes in their cataloging.
Kathy, here in Texas we librarians have a fantastic resource called the "Lone
Star" list. Every year Texas librarians put out a list of 53 books that they
have determined at the best and coolest new literature for high school
students. It is a wonderful mix of all genres. You can find this year's
list and the previous years' at www.txla.org. Just click on Lone Star Books
list. The committee that makes the list has the primary goal of choosing
books the kids will read.
Another fine source is the Best Books list put out every year by School
Library Journal in their Dec. issue. That list is for grades K-adult, so
you'll have to focus on the the list for older kids. They divide the list
for you, however. www.slj.com will get you this year's list. It may also
give you previous lists.
Another best choice is the ALA list of Best Books for Young Adults that
they put out every 3 (or is it 5?) years. You can find it a www.ala.org.
That list is about 25 pages long and lists books ALA thinks every high school
should have. It is grouped by type like biography, poetry, science fiction,
romance, etc.
One trick I've learned that I like to use when I'm going to "beef up"
just one part of my collection is go to a vendor's site (Follett or
Perma-bound work for this). Go to Collection Development or Advanced
searching. Then tell the site you want a list of books reviewed by Wilson
High School Catalog.. If Wilson recommeds the book, you're buying quality.
If I want to be really choosy, I tell the site I want books reviewed by
Wilson AND ALA Booklist. Both Wilson and Booklist do not list materials
unless they really like them. After choosing the reviews you want to limit
the search to, put in the Dewey numbers you want to search for. Voila!
You'll get a neat list of highly recommended titles that vendor can sell you
for that part of your collection.
For SciFi - try Terry Pratchett's Discworld series... Marion Zimmer
Bradley's Avalon series... Spider Robinson's Callahan series... and,
slightly older but still good, Stephen Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas
Covenant, Unbeliever.
Our fantasy is not moving at our 90% minority school but two things that are
moving our are graphic novel series such as "Rama" and our "Left Behind"
Christian Fiction. It has been really interesting to see this happen because
they are both appealing to such a different populations--but in both cases we
have book trading, reserves, and requests for the next one. Other than those
it seems to be the horror books and the face on the milk carton books. We
have
few indepth readers except in some of our spanish fiction.
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