1st Nine Weeks Annotated Reading List

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2006. Print.

Brave New World tries to create a utopian society by making everything controlled and comfortable. The people living outside of this society do not really view it as a utopia. In order to create the utopia all fear, danger, happiness, religion, and love was removed from society. The book is very controversial, so it raised questions about many hot topics in our world today, including drugs and individualism. John is a very interesting character in this book. He is not from the Brave New World so he is not used to everything being controlled. When he gets there he does not like what he sees. He doesn't want stability, he wants emotion. John is one of the only characters in the book that is willing to stand up for what he believes. Because of the way he is he has a hard time fitting in with the people living in the Brave New World society. (259 pages)


Picoult, Jodi. Nineteen Minutes: a Novel. New York: Washington Square, 2008. Print.

Nineteen Minutes is an interesting story about a school shooting, and how the people deal with the consequences. Peter, a junior in high school, has always been bullied. He eventually snaps and starts shooting kids and teachers in the school. Most of the people that were shot were only shot once, except one kid. He was shot once in the stomach and once in the head. Most of the book is spent trying to figure out why this one kid was shot twice and the girl standing right next to him was not shot at all. My favorite part of the book was that the shooter seemed human. Every other book with a school shooting makes the shooter seem like this terrible person that has no human qualities at all. One character that I really liked was Josie Cormier. She was the person that wasn't shot, but her boyfriend was the kid that was shot twice. I really like Josie because she was relatable. She was popular, but had many insecurities. She loved her mom, but did not have a great relationship with her. She reminds me a lot of myself. Surprisingly, Josie plays a very important role in the school shooting, directly and indirectly. (455 pages)


Postman, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. New York, N.Y., U.S.A.: Penguin, 2006. Print.

Amusing Ourselves to Death is a non-fiction book about how television is taking over our lives. Neil Postman believes that television is not good for our society. He thinks that television is the soma (the drug used to create bliss in Brave New World) of our society. He brings up many interesting points to back up this statement. He states that images and entertainment are now more important than facts and information. The thing that I think is really interesting is the fact that this book was written in 1985, but Postman's ideas still apply. Back then television wasn't as prominent as it is now. Surprisingly, his statements not only still hold true in our world, but are more true now than they used to be. Based on what Postman said, if we continue living the way we are now then we will eventually live in a society like the Brave New World society: completely technology dependent. (163 pages)



Sparks, Nicholas. A Bend in the Road. New York: Warner, 2001. Print.

In A Bend in the Road Miles is a police officer in a small town. Recently his wife died in a hit and run; the person driving the car was never found. He is having a hard time recovering until he meets his son's young, beautiful, and single teacher, Sarah. They quickly fall in love and later realize they are more connected than they originally thought. The setting of this book is something I found interesting. It is set in a small town in North Carolina that reminded me a lot of where I live. There is a part of town that is really old, and on or around Halloween everyone goes there for a scare. That is the same here; many people go to Main Street or to a Haunted House on Halloween. Miles loved the small town life. He liked knowing everyone that lived around him, Sarah is completely opposite. She likes living in a big city, and having things around her that are exciting. The setting played an important role in the book. (352 pages)