JUNE - FarawayReads for Teens
“Science fiction is the most important literature in the history of the world, because it's the history of ideas, the history of our civilization birthing itself. ...Science fiction is central to everything we've ever done, and people who make fun of science fiction writers don't know what they're talking about.” ― Ray Bradbury
The Watertower by Gary CrewIt is a story for sophisticated readers who can sense the alien threat that is present as two boys go for a swim at the old water tower. The stunning illustrations and understated text combine very effectively to convey the enigmatic latent menace. (an intriguing, thought-provoking picture book for young & old... whoops... older!)
Obernewtyn by Isobelle Carmody
(pronounced as Ober-new-tin)
I wondered if I had been caged too long to contemplate freedom.’ Elspeth is one of a new breed born into a world struggling back from the brink of the Apocalypse. A world where the all-powerful Council rules with ruthless force, destroying those who stand in it's way. Drawn inexorably to the remote and sinister mountain keep of Obernewtyn, only Elspeth, with her mysterious powers, can stop the masters of Obernewtyn unleashing the evil forces of the past…
Tomorrow, when the war began by John Marsden
Somewhere out there Ellie and her friends are hiding. They're shocked, they're frightened, they're alone. Their world has changed, with the speed of a slamming door. They've got no weapons - except courage. They've got no help - except themselves. They've got nothing - except friendship. 'Tomorrow, When the War Began' (movie) is the first of an enormously popular series that has been translated and published all over the world. It is the book that started the series that became the legend...
Dragons of Autumn Twilight by Margaret Weis & Tracy HickmanLifelong friends, they went their separate ways. Now they are together again, though each holds secrets from the others in his heart. They speak of a world shadowed with rumors of war. They speak of tales of strange monsters, creatures of myth, creatures of legend. They do not speak of their secrets. Not then. Not until a chance encounter with a beautiful, sorrowful woman, who bears a magical crystal staff, draws the companions deeper into the shadows, forever changing their lives and shaping the fate of the world. No one expected them to be heroes.
Least of all, them. (Promise Me... that you will start reading this series soon. If you read nothing else this year ... let it be this one!)
Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life & wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television 'family.' But then he meets an eccentric young neighbour, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television. When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life. (this is a classic tale of mind control and manipulation by the ruling powers of the day)