recommendations

[anadamous]

What novels would your recommend for high school ESL (Cantonese, Mandarin) boys currently scoring ~300 on the verbal portion of the SAT? What's a little challenging, not too slangy, and awesome

Comments

[azelmaroark]

This.

[hollywoodveg]

I was just going to suggest The Outsiders. Absolutely one of my favorite books ever.

Also, Ender's Game is amazing.

[apintrix]

Octavian Nothing is technically YA (Historical Fiction) but reads great for grown-ups too, you might try that.

[octette]

I second the suggestion for Gordon Korman. My mom is an ESL and reading teacher for grades 6-8, and she finds that it's a lot easier to get her kids interested in reading contemporary books about kids they can relate to. She has terrific success with Holes by Sachar, Ralph S. Mouse by Cleary, and, if the kids are mature enough (and advancing in their reading skills quickly enough), The Giver by Lowery. She's also been having a lot of kids requesting books about vampires, and instead of recommending the Twilight series, she recommends Evernight by Claudia Gray. She's finding that a lot of her eighth grade male students really enjoy it.

The Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan is also probably right on their level -- and it's about a kid who discovers that his dad is actually Poseidon, and that he's supposed to have magical demigod powers, but they don't work right. I have never met a kid who didn't love these books.

[elucreh]

Lord of the Flies?

Gordon Korman's Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag and Son of Interflux, Cynthia Voigt's A Solitary Blue, Anne Fine's Book of the Banshee, Sarah Rees Brennan's Demon's Lexicon, Diana Wynne Jones's Archer's Goon and Dark Lord of Derkholm, Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief and its sequels, think about James Herriot's autobiographical All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, and All Things Wise and Wonderful.

[elucreh]

Oh, AND--Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, ABSOLUTELY, I can't believe I forgot that one.

[octette]

Yes! I totally second this Suzanne Collins recommendation! And for the less advanced/mature readers, her other series, beginning with Gregor the Overlander, is also fantastic.

[elucreh]

I didn't know she had written other things! I need to go find those immediately.

[trinity_clare]

Seconding the calls for Holes, The Giver, A Separate Peace, Ender's Game, and Call of the Wild. I...hesistate to suggest Harry Potter?

I know there are people in this world who liked All Quiet on the Western Front, but when I read in high school my class hated it with a burning passion, so I'd maybe look for something else first.