Does "The Hunger Games" belong in a middle-school library?

[Anonymous]

^ Adding: I'm not really clear on what the YA classification even means. Is my 13 year old a young ADULT? Not really. He is a teen, with teen interests. He isn't a little kid anymore, but he is hardly a "young" grown up, yet. He's right at an age where a book like To Kill a Mockingbird will make a huge impression on him.

[Anonymous]

I loved Little Women and all the SE Hinton books, but I wouldn't consider them great literature.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Well, o.k. But middle school kids have been reading classics like The Outsiders, To Kill a Mockingbird, the Diary of Anne Frank for decades. And there is a reason for that - those particular classics are usually right at a middle school kid's interest level. That doesn't mean that the kid can't read the book well before middle school or well after middle school. It just means that the impact of the story will be best felt in/around middle school.

The Outsiders is actually a YA book -- not just published for teenagers, but written by a teenager. Anne Frank's diary was written by a teenager (and edited by her father, but anyway).

A teenager can read To Kill A Mockingbird and get a lot out of it, just as a teenager can read The Yearling and get a lot out of it; or really, just as a teenager can read most books and get a lot out of it. But somebody who read To Kill A Mockingbird as a teenager, and then re-reads it as an adult, will find a lot of stuff they missed when they read it as a teenager.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Well, o.k. But middle school kids have been reading classics like The Outsiders, To Kill a Mockingbird, the Diary of Anne Frank for decades. And there is a reason for that - those particular classics are usually right at a middle school kid's interest level. That doesn't mean that the kid can't read the book well before middle school or well after middle school. It just means that the impact of the story will be best felt in/around middle school.

The Outsiders is actually a YA book -- not just published for teenagers, but written by a teenager. Anne Frank's diary was written by a teenager (and edited by her father, but anyway).

A teenager can read To Kill A Mockingbird and get a lot out of it, just as a teenager can read The Yearling and get a lot out of it; or really, just as a teenager can read most books and get a lot out of it. But somebody who read To Kill A Mockingbird as a teenager, and then re-reads it as an adult, will find a lot of stuff they missed when they read it as a teenager.

I think that the same sort of thing could be said for the Children's Classics like Sounder, Old Yeller, Where the Red Fern Grows. Kids love animal stories. These stories were written for kids and they appeal to kids. But adults/teens can read and enjoy these stories and they will see things, get meanings that the younger crowd might miss. The Phantom Tollbooth is a children's classic but anyone who is familiar with it knows that MUCH of the meaning will fly right over the heads of elementary school kids.

Many of the classic fairy tales that we read to our preschoolers/kinders today are actually retold versions of tales that were written for adults.

[Anonymous]

Hunger Games is so much better than the Twilight series!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hunger Games is so much better than the Twilight series!

Heh. So is the Kleenex I just threw out. Raise the bar a bit

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hunger Games is so much better than the Twilight series!

Heh. So is the Kleenex I just threw out. Raise the bar a bit

There is a lot of bad contemporary teen fiction out there. Twilight would be about the worst that I've ever seen in terms of popular literature, on so many levels. If Twilight is assigned reading in middle school, you might as well assign Harlequin romances in HS and call it a day.

At least Hunger Games is thought provoking and could be used as a springboard into other literature - Ender's Game, 1984, Fahrenheit 451.

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

You sure could have -- at least back in my day. I distinctly remember somebody in my eleventh-grade American Literature class presenting a book report on Dune.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hunger Games is so much better than the Twilight series!

Heh. So is the Kleenex I just threw out. Raise the bar a bit

There is a lot of bad contemporary teen fiction out there. Twilight would be about the worst that I've ever seen in terms of popular literature, on so many levels. If Twilight is assigned reading in middle school, you might as well assign Harlequin romances in HS and call it a day.

At least Hunger Games is thought provoking and could be used as a springboard into other literature - Ender's Game, 1984, Fahrenheit 451.

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

Provoked thoughts about Ender's Game:

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/604605424

Orson Scott Card, George Orwell, Ray Bradbury -- one of these things is not like the other, one of these things doesn't belong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

You sure could have -- at least back in my day. I distinctly remember somebody in my eleventh-grade American Literature class presenting a book report on Dune.

Yes, but you have no idea what kind of grade that certain somebody got on their report....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

You sure could have -- at least back in my day. I distinctly remember somebody in my eleventh-grade American Literature class presenting a book report on Dune.

Yes, but you have no idea what kind of grade that certain somebody got on their report....

A good grade, I expect. It was a good book report.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hunger Games is so much better than the Twilight series!

Heh. So is the Kleenex I just threw out. Raise the bar a bit

There is a lot of bad contemporary teen fiction out there. Twilight would be about the worst that I've ever seen in terms of popular literature, on so many levels. If Twilight is assigned reading in middle school, you might as well assign Harlequin romances in HS and call it a day.

At least Hunger Games is thought provoking and could be used as a springboard into other literature - Ender's Game, 1984, Fahrenheit 451.

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

Provoked thoughts about Ender's Game:

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/604605424

Orson Scott Card, George Orwell, Ray Bradbury -- one of these things is not like the other, one of these things doesn't belong.

To be fair I have never read Ender's Game - it is on my "to read" list, though. However, I do know that it is one of those books, like The Outsiders, that tends to resonate with middle school readers, particularly boys. I do know some well read people (mostly men) who have very fond memories of reading Ender's Game in middle school. Now I really must read it .

[Anonymous]

I'm not entirely clear on what Dune has to do with Stephen King.

YA is a made up category for US booksellers, seems kind of pointless to debate what does and doesn't qualify.

I think Hunger Games is a solid series.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Back in the day, you could never have read and written a book report on a Stephen King novel (not for English class). Now King is taught in college, lol.

You sure could have -- at least back in my day. I distinctly remember somebody in my eleventh-grade American Literature class presenting a book report on Dune.

Yes, but you have no idea what kind of grade that certain somebody got on their report....

A good grade, I expect. It was a good book report.

I suppose it depends on the unit that you were doing. Maybe the book was appropriate for that unit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not entirely clear on what Dune has to do with Stephen King.

YA is a made up category for US booksellers, seems kind of pointless to debate what does and doesn't qualify.

I think Hunger Games is a solid series.

I've never read Dune but I seem to remember it being more along the lines of what would be considered a pleasure read (like King books were pleasure reads). That doesn't mean that Dune isn't/wasn't a good story, it was just one that you read on your own time. It wasn't necessarily taught/discussed in an English class. But it's also not one that I would have necessarily been interested in as a teen, so it's possible that I simply chose another book to read, instead.