World Literature Suggestions

[sophiescat]

My mother is looking for books by authors who are neither American nor British who she can recommend to high school students (think summer reading type assignments).     She is especially looking for the sort of genre fiction (romance, sci-fi, mystery) that would appeal to reluctant readers or really those people who are never going to be English

Comments

[reginafuroris]

Alexandre Dumas was the author that I was addicted to in high school due to teacher Ralph. Good fictions in historical context. :)

Can't think of others, but I may.

[elwe]

parelle also recommends Dumas's short fiction and The Little Prince.

[elwe]

And Phantom of the Opera and Jules Verne. And now she says she'll try to think of some non-French stuff.

[madmyndi]

I second the Jules Verne. Journey to the Center of the Earth and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea were just GREAT. There are also fabulous 1950's movies versions of those two books, which can be fun for follow-ups.

[edjoesu]

The only international genre fiction author that I can think of that one could really assign to high school students is Lem, but I'm sure there are others.

In terms of straight fiction I remember Life of Pi (Martel); Handmaid's Tale (Atwood); Siddhartha (Hesse); The Stranger (Camus); Candide (Voltaire) as all having been popular with students, and all of those have the advantage of being short. (Given the prevalence of easily available book summaries that's actually fairly important.) I bet you could get some mileage out of Murakami. and I've heard good things about the Kite Runner (Hosseni) and The Alchemist (Coelho).

If the students are picking from a list one can really go wild -- Dostoevsky is perfectly reasonable here, as are genre authors like Greg Egan and lots of other things.

[soraciel]

Instead of Haruki Murakami, I'd suggest Banana Yoshimoto. Murakami tends to be beloved by some, and intensely hated by others. Miyuki Miyabe (specifically "Brave Story") is really popular. Hong Ying is a fantastic Chinese author, but her books are very edgy in a sexual way, so she might want to be careful before recommending them to high school students.

I read "The Stranger" in high school and it has remained seared on my mind since.

L.M. Montgomery (if a Canadian's okay?), Italo Calvino ("Invisible Cities" is fantastic), Murasaki Shikibu ("Tale of Genji"), Sei Shonagon (her diary can be extremely catty, sort of ancient chick lit).

Australia?

[madmyndi]

Would she accept an Australian author? The Ladies of Missalonghi by Colleen McCullough (author of the Thorn Birds) is a charming, quick read which probably falls under "Genre: Romance". It's more of a novella, but enchanting enough I reread it regularly.

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