And now, you're BRILLIANT! :)

I read 1984 when I was 12. My sister was 14 and studying it at school. She came home and said, "We're reading this really amazing book..." and my sister was never an enthusiastic reader. So I pinched her copy one weekend and couldn't put it down. I simply couldn't relate to some of it, but "You are the dead" gave me a physical fear reaction.

The one I feel I read far too young was The Lord of the Flies. I've said before that it shocked me deeply. A kind of internal shudder akin to an ice cube down the back of the neck. Like some people's first (too-early) experience of pron. The horror of that book stayed with me for years.

Mrs. Z teaches it in her 7th grade lit. class.

Start her with: 1984, Animal Farm, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World.

Don't let her read William Burroughs' The Naked Lunch when she's 14, please. Wait till she's... say, 50.

However, I recommend William Gibson's Neuromancer to anyone with a pulse. And Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Dick. The Lathe of Heaven, Ursula Le Guin. The Diamond Age, also Stephenson.

She HATES Ursula Le Guin after Wrinkle. Brave New World I think is a bit meh if you haven't experienced workplace type politics. Have you read Hunger Games, Pie? I'd be interested to hear your take on it. (Yes, it's a teen book)

Clockwork Orange was another book that our English teacher turned us onto. He was a brilliant English teacher. He gave us really cool stuff to read outside of the syllabus. Catch 22 was one he got me into as well. I still remember the passage he used with us for a language exercise; it was the bit in the plane when Yossarian realises the other guy's been hit by shrapnel, and his guts are hanging out.

never read 1984 OR Animal Farm OR Clockwork Orange.

Did read Naked Lunch and Fear of Flying as a tween. Liked Erica Jong - felt Burroughs was a tard but just prolly coz I couldn't figure out wtf was going on.

Bart and Milhouse come out of a theatre with the marquis NAKED LUNCH. Bart says, "I can think of two things wrong with that title."

Wrong author -- Madeleine L'Engle wrote A Wrinkle in Time. Ursula K. Le Guin wrote the Earthsea series (highly recommended).

I found the religious themes of L'Engle's works to be utterly heavy-handed. Le Guin, on the other hand, explicitly turns Christian themes on their heads.
Le Guin rocks.

No, I haven't read Hunger Games. I will look it up!

Gawd I must've been tired :lol: We read wrinkle and earthsea back to back as bedtime stories. That's my defence and I'm sticking to it. I'm not a huge fan either. Hebe was kind of ambivalent about Earthsea, but it was a while ago -it may be time for a revisit.

The fourth book in the Earthsea series (Tehanu) is much more feminist and a little less D&D-ish.

The boy, 11, read Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies this year. I don't know if I would even recommend 1984 to him... I was pretty meh about it myself.

I love 1984, read it in early high school, IIRC, although I have memories of seeing the original black and white movie version prior to that. The events in room 101 are a bit heavy for a preteen or tween, but contextually a lot better than that Twilight crap, so I'd say let the kid loose on it, and be available for any questions.

1984, Brave New World. Is the day to day life. We are kept we are monitored, I see no hope.

I gave Earthsea a try recently. Got through two and a half of the books before losing interest. Nothing seems to happen in those tales, and they move at the pace of a Swedish film. Frankly, give me LotR for satisfaction of the mature reader -- and HP, all seven books, for the less mature. Also for the slightly better love scenes.

1984 and Lord of the Flies were teenage fare for me. Fear Of Flying was not an erotic novel. It was a neurotic novel. For erotic, give me Phil Foglio any day.