Ten books: Revisit a favourite. Re-read a classic.
Summer Reading Club finishes this Friday. Challenge yourself to read or re-read one of the Ten Classic book suggestions below. Don't forget to fill in and return your entry form to one of the Summer Reading Club entry form boxes ( located at each branch of the library) for a chance to win an iPad Mini!
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| To Kill a mockingbird |
A classic of modern American Literature, this Pulitzer Prize winner by Harper Lee, has never been out of print. It is a powerful story examining prejudice, right and wrong, stirring up controversy since it was first published in 1960.
Readalikes:
Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey
A lesson before dying by Ernest J Gaines
Cry: the beloved country by Alan Paton
A time to kill by John Grisham
The secret life of bees by Sophie Monk Kidd
Mark Twain defined a classic as a book which "people praise and don't read". Not true with his classic adventure story, The adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This is one of the most loved and best known American classics. In addition to entertaining readers for generations, it has defined the first-person novel in America, and continues to demand study, inspire reverence, and stir controversy.
Readalikes:
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
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| The adventures of Huckleberry Finn |
Readalikes:
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
Gulliver's travels by Jonathan Swift
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The call of the wild by Jack London
The book about a boy and a Bengal tiger trapped in a row boat for 227 days, was the winner of the Manbooker Prize for fiction, 2002. Read the book, watch the movie and compare!
Readalikes:
The god of small things by Arundhati Roy
The white tiger by Aravind Adiga
True history of the Kelly gang by Peter Carey
A fine balance by Rohinton Mistry
The blind assassin by Margaret Atwood
George Orwell presents his dystopian vision of the future in 1984. Spookily accurate...
Readalikes:
Brave new world byAldous Huxley
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
A clockwork orange by Anthony Burgess
Do androids dream of electric sheep? by Philip K. Dick
The giver by Lois Lowry
Set in the cold war era, this classic tale from 1951 is a post-apocalyptic novel about a plague of blindness which befalls the entire world, allowing the rise of an aggressive species of plant, the valuable human engineered triffids. After reading this book, you may never look at gardening the same way again.
Readalikes:
The call of the wild by Jack London
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| Life of Pi: A novel |
Readalikes:
The god of small things by Arundhati Roy
The white tiger by Aravind Adiga
True history of the Kelly gang by Peter Carey
A fine balance by Rohinton Mistry
The blind assassin by Margaret Atwood
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| Nineteen Eighty Four |
Readalikes:
Brave new world byAldous Huxley
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
A clockwork orange by Anthony Burgess
Do androids dream of electric sheep? by Philip K. Dick
The giver by Lois Lowry
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| The day of the triffids |
Set in the cold war era, this classic tale from 1951 is a post-apocalyptic novel about a plague of blindness which befalls the entire world, allowing the rise of an aggressive species of plant, the valuable human engineered triffids. After reading this book, you may never look at gardening the same way again.
Readalikes:
The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham
The death of grass by John Christopher
The war of the worlds by H .G Wells
A canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M.Miller
Blindness: A Novel: by Jose Saramago
The first of five books in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction "trilogy" by Douglas Adams (with the sixth written by Eoin Colfer). After Earth is demolished to make way for a new hyperspatial expressway, Arthur Dent begins to hitch-hike through space.
Readalike authors:
Jasper Fforde
Christopher Moore
Neil Gaiman
Terry Pratchett
Connie Willis
A detective novel by Agatha Christie featuring the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.While en route from Syria to Paris, in the middle of a freezing winter's night, the Orient Express is stopped dead in its tracks by a
snowdrift. Passengers awake to find the train still
stranded and to discover that a wealthy American has been brutally stabbed to
death in his private compartment- that is locked from
the inside. With no escape into the wintery landscape the
killer must still be on board.
Readalike authors:
Ruth Rendell
Ngaio Marsh
P.D James
Ellis Peters
Margery Allingham
Rebecca's narrative takes the form of a flashback. The heroine, who remains nameless, lives in Europe with her husband, Maxim de Winter, traveling from hotel to hotel, harboring memories of a beautiful home called Manderley, which, we learn, has been destroyed by fire. The story begins with her memories of how she and Maxim first met, in Monte Carlo, years before.
Readalikes:
Haunted ground by Erin Hart
The lantern by Deborah Lawrenson
The secret keeper by Kate Morton
The thirteenth tale by Diane Setterfield
Nine coaches waiting by Mary Stewart
This allegorical novel starts as an adventurous tale of a group of boys marooned on an island. The novel depicts human interaction, showing the brutal side of human nature, as the boys recreate a society on the island. As the novel progresses, the boys initial innocence gives way to somrthing much darker...
Readalikes:
The hunger games by Suzanne Collins
Gone by Michael Grant
The Outsiders by S. E Hinton
Of mice and men by John Steinbeck
One flew over the cuckoo's nest by Ken Kesy
Featuring themes of teenage angst and alientation, this is the classic tale of two days in the life of troubled 16 year old narrator and protagonist, Holden Caulfield.
Readalikes:
The adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut Jnr.
The perks of being a wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
An abundance of Katherines by John Green
A canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M.Miller
Blindness: A Novel: by Jose Saramago
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| The Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy |
The first of five books in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction "trilogy" by Douglas Adams (with the sixth written by Eoin Colfer). After Earth is demolished to make way for a new hyperspatial expressway, Arthur Dent begins to hitch-hike through space.
Readalike authors:
Jasper Fforde
Christopher Moore
Neil Gaiman
Terry Pratchett
Connie Willis
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| Murder on the Orient Express |
Readalike authors:
Ruth Rendell
Ngaio Marsh
P.D James
Ellis Peters
Margery Allingham
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Readalikes:
Haunted ground by Erin Hart
The lantern by Deborah Lawrenson
The secret keeper by Kate Morton
The thirteenth tale by Diane Setterfield
Nine coaches waiting by Mary Stewart
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| Lord of the flies |
Readalikes:
The hunger games by Suzanne Collins
Gone by Michael Grant
The Outsiders by S. E Hinton
Of mice and men by John Steinbeck
One flew over the cuckoo's nest by Ken Kesy
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| The catcher in the Rye |
Readalikes:
The adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut Jnr.
The perks of being a wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
An abundance of Katherines by John Green
Do you have a favourite classic novel? Tell us about this or about other books you have read and re-read, in the comments.
