Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources Book recommendations: Appropriate adult fiction

I don't think The Chocolate War has stood the test of time. Tried to teach it to 9th graders a few years back and it was painful.



This is a wonderful but pretty challenging book. Personally, I think it would be tough for an 11 year old, even a gifted 11 year old.



This is a great and engaging book--but lots of adult themes, including a landowner who rapes his peasants.



Amen! Obviously, the Wrinkle in Time series is classic (and awesome for gifted characters), but the Wizard of Earthsea books are just as wonderful.

I would leave the adult Heinlen books for later - fathers initiating daughters into sex might start conversations you don't want. There is also quite a lot of mild sado masachism and sexism. I like them but you do need a filter.

There is also homosexuality in the Pern novels. This would worry me no more than any other sexuality but you may disagree. The three about Melody, harper of Pern are usually recommended for younger kids.

I just read whatever was around by 12 so maybe just read the ones listed and work out a system for choosing from the adult shelves? I read a lot that was probably not suitable.

Has she read Watership Downs?

Thanks! This is helpful. I agree, in that I read Wyrd Sisters and thought she might like it. (I did.) I'm a Pratchett newbie, though. We are all newly in love!

She has read Sharon Creech, Mrs. Frisby, and Diana Wynne Jones. The children's section, while not totally exhausted, is pretty thoroughly mined, and also I'm fairly up on it...but this way of thinking through the adult stuff is a new mindshift.

Oh, and I seem to recall that the Menolly (Pern Harper Hall) novels also have a subtext alluding to a romantic relationship between the very young Menolly and the much older Masterharper.

I read all the original Dragonrider and Dragonsong novels when I was about nine and ten, and, I think, just ignored anything that didn't make sense in my experience, which still left enough for a good read.

I second Watership Down. The Plague Dogs, also by Richard Adams, is also good, but a bit heavier for a tween (though I read it at about 12).

Another author:

Zilpha Keatley Snyder--The Changeling, Greensky trilogy, many others.

I also read Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber at around this age. Someone else may recall if there is a lot of potentially age-inappropriate material in it.

Oh, and T. H. White's The Once and Future King trilogy. The original "The Sword in the Stone" was quite child-friendly. The revision, which appears to be the canonical version nowadays, is a bit darker.

My tween loved Roger Lancelyn Green's classic re-tellings of "King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table" and "Robin Hood".

They have a romance between Menolly and the not-eyebrow-raisingly-older harper Sebell, which does get physical (in a very brief allusion that certainly went over my head when I read them originally). I don't think there's anything explicit between Menolly and the Masterharper in the Harper Hall books themselves. There might be something in the later books.

I also read the Dragonrider and Dragonsong books at a tween and ignored the stuff I didn't understand, will no ill effects. Oh, and The Ship Who Sang! And I remember loving Zilpha Keatly Snyder, too.

I loved loved loved Heinlein as a teenager and adult, but there are sexist/sexual material in his later books (but please note no actual sex). He writes strong women characters, but also throws in a bit of "dirty old man" into the mix, if that makes sense. However his short stories might be good choices. Here is a pretty good article that talks about Heinlein and his views of sexuality as portrayed in his books.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/02/books/review/heinleins-female-troubles.html?_r=0

The thing I truly love about Heinlein is his amazing creativity, and his sense of humor. I am a woman, and he is one of my favorite writers.

I do remember as a child loving the Dragonriders of Pern as well as the Amber series. I also loved all the mysteries… like Agatha Christie and Sherlock Holmes.

I am sure she may have read this already, but has she read any of the Mysterious Benedict Society series?

Don't forget the Dune Trilogy

She's read Zilpha Keatley Snyder and tried Mysterious Benedict (not her thing). You all are thinking of great stuff, but I was trying to come up with adult fiction that might work.


She has not read Dune and neither have I. It's appropriate? Once and Future King is on my list---forgot to put it up there. I'll edit the original post at some point.

Dune is sort of appropriate--depending on how you feel about a series of novels all premised on wars and political maneuvering over an addictive hallucinogen.

I did read the original trilogy at about this age.