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School Assignments Bettendorf
High School The following four books are the selected summer reading choices. All summaries are quoted from the publishers. A
Break with Charity: A Story about the Salem Witch Trials by Ann
Rinaldi “Susanna desperately wants to join the circle of girls who meet every week at the parsonage. What she doesn't realize is that the girls are about to set off a torrent of false accusations leading to the imprisonment and execution of countless innocent people. Susanna faces a painful choice. Should she keep quiet and let the witch-hunt panic continue, or should she "break charity" with the group--and risk having her own family members named as witches?” The House of
the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer “Matteo Alacran was not Born; He was Harvested. His DNA came from El Patron, lord of a country called Opium -- a strip of poppy fields lying between the United States and what was once called Mexico. Matt's first cell split and divided inside a petri dish. Then he was placed in the womb of a cow, where he continued the miraculous journey from embryo to fetus to baby. He is a boy now, but most consider him a monster -- except for El Patron. El Patron loves Matt as he loves himself because Matt is himself. As Matt struggles to understand his existence, he is threatened by a sinister cast of characters, including El Patron's power-hungry family, and he is surrounded by a dangerous army of bodyguards. Escape is the only chance Matt has to survive. But escape from the Alacran Estate is no guarantee of freedom because Matt is marked by his difference in ways he doesn't even suspect.” Speak by
Laurie Halse Anderson ”Melinda is a friendless outcast at Merryweather High. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, and now nobody will talk to her, let alone listen to her. As time passes, she becomes increasingly isolated and practically stops talking altogether. It is through her work on an art project that she is finally able to face what really happened at that terrible party: she was raped by an upperclassman, a guy who still attends Merryweather and who is still a threat to her. It will take another violent encounter with him to make Melinda fight back. This time she refuses to be silent.” Whale Talk
by Chris Crutcher “There is
bad news and good news about the Cutter High School swim team. The bad
news is that they don't have a pool. The good news is that only one
of them can swim anyway. A group of misfits brought together by T. J.
Jones (the J is redundant) to find their places in a school that has
no place for them, the Cutter All Night Mermen struggle to carve out
their own turf. T. J. is convinced that a varsity letter jacket—unattainable
for most, exclusive, revered, the symbol (as far as T. J. is concerned)
of all that is screwed up at Cutter High—will be an effective carving
tool. He's right. He's also wrong. Still, it's always the quest that
counts and the bus on which the Mermen travel to swim meets—piloted
by Icko, the permanent resident of All Night Fitness—soon becomes
the cocoon inside which they gradually allow themselves to talk, to
fit, and to bloom.” |
