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Books for Thirteens
By
Published: Jan 01, 2007
Category:
Beyond Classification
An obsessive reader turns 13 and stops reading. Cold. Is it the weekend blur of Bar Mitzvahs? The lure of video games and Second Life? Or is it — my view — that there is nothing so boring as a 7th or 8th grade reading list?
Not that there’s anything wrong with To Kill A Mockingbird.
What’s wrong, I suggest, is the mindset that says a 13-year-old is still very much a child. A fumbling creature who’s got big ideas, but whose reality is pimples and braces and awkward efforts to communicate with the opposite sex. Disney makes after-school sitcoms about these kids — I know, because “Drake and Josh” is one of our 5-year-old’s favorite shows.
And that’s the point. In the last few decades, everything has dropped down an age cohort or three. Kids know about sex long before they’re ready for it. They see real guns on TV at an age when they’re still playing with cap pistols. And if they’re interested in current events, they’re getting an early education in the wisdom of Don Corleone; “A lawyer with a briefcase can steal more than a thousand men with machine guns.”
So instead of trying to tempt young teenagers with the upper range of kiddie lit or those just-for-you-kids “Young Adult” books, why not just cut the hypocrisy and turn kids on to the books we love — books that, in many cases, we read when we were “too young” to read them?
You may be thinking: Well, he lives in a city. The kids he knows are verbal (to the point of mouthy). Current events? They’re probably better informed about the day’s disasters than Joe Lunchbucket. Savvy? They can see hypocrisy at twenty paces, and they’ve got fearsome sniffers for bullshit. These are, in short, too-cool-for-school readers.
True. But I’m not thinking about the target audience. I’m thinking about the books I devoured as a kid. And the books that I’ve given to kids, and that they’ve liked. No question: It’s an arbitrary, un-scientific list.
And more: This list is reality-based. In these books, people die. They lie and cheat. They use the occasional “bad” word. On occasion, they even have….sex. I’ve tried not to choose books that are the literary equivalent of rap records, but I haven’t gone out of my way to protect Jack and Jill’s precious innocence. At 13, they may be inexperienced — but they’re hardly innocent.
Translation: If you feel your middle-schooler needs to be “protected” from the world, please come back another day.
There are fewer “books for girls” here than I’d like. More about war than I wish. Maybe too many escape-and-survival stories; I’m a sucker for people who face long odds and win.
But one thing these books have in common: They’re addictive. And, when you finish, you want to talk about them. Which means that a wise parent might buy two copies — and read alongside the kid.
There are worse ways to spend an evening.
All Quiet on the Western Front
A German schoolboy believes his government’s patriotic appeal and rushes off to fight the Allies in World War I. A few years later, he’s got that thousand-yard stare. And then, on a day so quiet…..
Sky Burial
Soon after a Chinese student gets married, the Chinese Army sent her husband to Tibet — and he promptly dies there. The young widow can’t believe it. At the least, she must claim his body. And so she sets off, alone, to Tibet. Thirty years later, she’s still looking.
The Four Just Men
The government is about to execute a good man. The Four Just Men plan to free him. More, they announce the date and time. Are they cool heroes — or vile anarchists? A smart kid could debate this for hours.
John Tunis
Talented kids are thrown into the major leagues, and what they see at “the show” changes them. In these baseball novels by the masterful John Tunis, the uniforms and players are dated; the themes of courage and fair play are enduring.
The Queen’s Gambit
An 8-year-old orphan learns to play chess. She’s a prodigy; it seems she can beat everyone. But she’ll never be a champion until she can beat herself. Some pills, alcohol and sex — and one of the most thrilling comebacks I’ve ever read.
V for Vendetta
The movie should satisfy every rebellious impulse. But the virtual novel might be even better. And how unexpected of you to show up with it!
Papillon
A hellhole of a prison in French Guiana. A man wrongly convicted and sentenced to life in jail. A nail-biting escape.
Eye of the Needle
I love World War II thrillers, and Ken Follett’s is the best I’ve read — a German spy in England discovers the plans for D-Day. Can he get back to Germany in time to alert his superiors?
Day of the Jackal
Someone’s planning to shoot Charles de Gaulle, and he’s so good you don’t see how he can miss.
Banker to the Poor
Muhammad Yunus won the Nobel Prize for starting a bank that gives loans to people who seem too poor to pay. Is there anything more exciting than talking micro-credits with a kid?
We Die Alone
The crew of the fishing boat has never fished; these men have returned to Norway to sabotage the Nazis. But someone screwed up — the Germans sink the boat in the harbor. Everyone dies or is captured. Except one man. And in the dead of winter, he must cross the tundra. A World War II classic, road-tested on two generations.
And There Was Light
A blind French boy becomes a Resistance leader — and one of the most unusual heroes of World War II.
Donbas
Russians wrench a high school boy from his home in Romania and force him to work in the coal mines of Siberia. He knows he’ll die there. So he must escape. But when he’s injured? In winter?
Kabul Beauty School
Her husband is a jerk and the women of Afghanistan need help, so Deborah Rodriguez goes to Kabul and opens a beauty school. Clearly, nothing scares her — she’s a role model and a half.
The Tender Bar
His father leaves. His mother moves in with her family. One of the uncles works in a bar. And the patrons and bartenders pretty much raise the boy. It gets too “grown up” once the author reaches college, but until then, this book is the childhood your kid won’t have (thank the Lord).
