Let's talk books, people...ones our kids will actually like...

    This summer, I was trying to figure out what kids in the ninth grade actually like to read.  I already knew about the vampire craze:  Cirque du Freak, Twilight Saga, Vladimir Todd.  I had already read books like Emily Strange, and Gossip Girl.  I wanted to read something that wasn't fantastical.  Something that teens could read, in the pg-13 range.  After weeks of searching, I finally found one, albeit one that only girls will probably be interested in. Tee hee. ;)




Young adult novel



Falling is Like This by Kate Rockland is a contemporary story about a female journalist still living at home, who falls in love with a famous punk rock star, but finds her independence in the end.  The protagonist is about twenty-two, so I was worried about students connecting, but in the end, I realized that reading about someone who was older who makes not so great decisions might be an eye opener for some of my students who are struggling to find who they are.  Some iffy situations occur in the novel that may not be so great for students; such as, drinking, allusions to sexual content, drug use, and language, but Huckleberry Finn, The Awakening, Catcher in the Rye, and Of Mice and Men are all classics and have all been used in the school systems for literary purposes.  I don't think that this book could be categorized as a "classic" just yet, but I do think that it should be on every high school English classroom library shelf.  :)  Courtney Love's caption on the front cover of the novel in and of itself will attract those students who don't normally read to think twice.  Maybe they'll think, "Hmm, books can be cool."