High School Summer Reading List

Books on the High School Summer Reading List for Trumbull students.

Updated June 13, 2024
T
Trumbull Library System
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Half of a yellow sun /
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi,
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE BAILEYS PRIZE BEST OF THE BEST Winner of the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction 2007, this is a heartbreaking, exquisitely written literary masterpiece This novel from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is set in Nigeria during the 1960s, at the time of a...
Purple hibiscus /
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi,
Paper Book
Fifteen-year-old Kambili's world is circumscribed by the high walls of her family compound and the frangipani trees she can see from her bedroom window. Her wealthy Catholic father, although generous and well-respected, is repressive and fanatically religious. Her life is lived under his shadow and...
City of the beasts /
Allende, Isabel,
Paper Book
An ecological romance with a pulsing heart, equal parts Rider Haggard and Chico Buarque - one of the world's greatest and most beloved storytellers broadens her style and reach with a Amazonian adventure story that will appeal to all ages. Fifteen-year-old Alexander Cold has the chance...
The house of the spirits /
Allende, Isabel,
Paper Book
Beartown /
Backman, Fredrik,
Paper Book
Beartown is a small town in a large Swedish forest. For most of the year it is under a thick blanket of snow, experiencing the kind of cold and dark that brings people closer together - or pulls them apart. Its isolation means that Beartown has been slowly...
A long way gone :
Beah, Ishmael,
Paper Book
The first-person account of a 26-year-old who fought in the war in Sierra Leone as a 12-year-old boy. 'My new friends have begun to suspect that I haven't told them the full story of my life. "Why did you leave Sierra Leone?" "Because there is a war."
The Paris architect /
Belfoure, Charles,
Paper Book
1942, Paris. Architect Lucien Bernard accepts a commission that will bring him huge wealth - and maybe a death sentence. He has to design a secret hiding place for a wealthy Jewish man, a space so invisible that even the most determined of Nazi soldiers won't discover it. When one of Lucien's...
Circle of friends /
Binchy, Maeve,
Ebook
'What better books to raise the spirits than the gentle, insightful Irish tales of Maeve Binchy?' HELLO! Magazine _____________________________________________ TROUBLE IS BREWING FOR THIS CIRCLE OF FRIENDS Generous-hearted Benny Hogan and the elfin...
The Da Vinci code /
Brown, Dan,
Paper Book
Robert Langdon, Harvard Professor of symbology, receives an urgent late-night call while in Paris: the curator of the Louvre has been murdered. Alongside the body is a series of baffling ciphers. Langdon and a gifted French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, are stunned to find a trail that leads to the...
The boys in the boat :
Brown, Daniel,
Paper Book
Now a major motion picture, directed by George Clooney. From the Great Depression to Nazi Germany, The Boys in the Boat is the astonishing true story of the 1936 American men's eight rowing team on their quest for Olympic gold. 'It is impossible not to get...
The trigger :
Butcher, Tim,
Paper Book
On a summer morning in Sarajevo a hundred years ago, a teenage assassin named Gavrilo Princip fired not just the opening shots of the First World War but the starting gun for modern history, when he killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Yet the events Princip triggered were so monumental that his own...
The luminaries /
Catton, Eleanor,
Paper Book
Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2013 - The astonishing and epic second novel from the prize-winning author of The Rehearsal.
Dead Mountain :
Eichar, Donnie,
Paper Book
The New York Times and Wall Street Journal Nonfiction Bestseller that explores the gripping Dyatlov Pass incident that took the lives of nine young Russian hikers in 1959. What happened that night on Dead Mountain? In...
Killers of the Flower Moon :
Grann, David.
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE EDGAR AWARD FOR BEST FACT CRIME SHORTLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN NON-FICTION SHORTLISTED FOR THE ?CWA ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION 'A riveting true story of greed, serial murder and racial injustice' JON KRAKAUER<...
Homegoing /
Gyasi, Yaa.
Paper Book
A BBC Top 100 Novels that Shaped Our World Effia and Esi: two sisters with two very different destinies. One sold into slavery; one a slave trader's wife. The consequences of their fate reverberate through the generations that follow. Taking us from the Gold Coast of Africa to...
The curious incident of the dog in the night-time /
Haddon, Mark,
Paper Book
OVER TEN MILLION COPIES SOLD The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Timeis a murder mystery novel like no other. The detective, and narrator, is Christopher Boone. Christopher is fifteen and has Asperger's Syndrome. He knows a very great deal about maths...
An astronaut's guide to life on Earth /
Hadfield, Chris,
Paper Book
Colonel Chris Hadfield has spent decades training as an astronaut and has logged nearly 4,000 hours in space. During this time he has broken into a space station with a Swiss Army knife, disposed of a live snake while piloting a plane, been temporarily blinded while clinging to the exterior of an...
Human acts /
Han, Kang,
Paper Book
A riveting, poetic and unrelentingly powerful work from the author of the 2016 Man Booker International Prize-winning novel The Vegetarian.
Unbroken :
Hillenbrand, Laura.
Paper Book
The incredible true story of Louis Zamperini, now a major motion picture directed by Angelina Jolie. THE INTERNATIONAL NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER In 1943 a bomber crashes into the Pacific Ocean. Against all odds, one young lieutenant survives. Louise Zamperini had already transformed...
A thousand splendid suns /
Hosseini, Khaled.
Paper Book
This is the story of an unusual and lifelong friendship between two Afghan women, spanning from the idyllic mid 1950s to post-September 11 Kabul. Bound by tragedy and fate, by political circumstance and custom, the two women live through the Soviet war, the harrowing days of the Afghan civil war and...
The code breaker :
Isaacson, Walter.
Paper Book
'The Code Breaker's confident, cinematic style makes Crispr accessible like never before, taking readers on a journey that is exciting, as well as ethically treacherous.' - The Financial Times 'A page-turner. It weaves history and contemporary events into a...
Klara and the sun /
Ishiguro, Kazuo,
Paper Book
Klara and the Sun is the first novel by Kazuo Ishiguro since he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature 2017.

The National English Honor Society has chosen Sing, Unburied Sing by Jesmyn Ward and Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro as the common reader texts for 2024-2025.

Then she was gone /
Jewell, Lisa.
Paper Book
A missing girl. A buried secret. From the ten-million-copy bestselling author comes a brand new look for this compulsively twisty psychological thriller that will keep you hooked to the very last page. 'A tense, clever page-turner that everyone will...
Henna artist /
Joshi, Alka.
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER A REESE WITHERSPOON x HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK CLUB PICK "Captivated me from the first chapter to the final page."--Reese Witherspoon Vivid and compelling in its portrait of one woman's struggle...
Milk and honey /
Kaur, Rupi.
Paper Book
The book is divided into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose. Deals with a different pain. Heals a different heartache. milk and honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness...
The secret life of bees /
Kidd, Sue Monk.
Paper Book
· A QUEEN'S READING ROOM PICK 2023 · OVER 125 WEEKS ON THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST · MADE INTO AN AWARD-WINNING MOVE STARRING QUEEN LATIFAH, DAKOTA FANNING, ALICIA KEYS, SOPHIE OKONEDO AND JENNIFER HUDSON · AN ACCLAIMED...

From the St. Joseph High School Summer Reading List.

Shoe dog :
Knight, Philip H.,
Paper Book
'A refreshingly honest reminder of what the path to business success really looks like ... It's an amazing tale' Bill Gates 'The best book I read last year was Shoe Dog, by Nike's Phil Knight. Phil is a very wise, intelligent and competitive fellow who is also a...
Dead wake :
Larson, Erik,
Paper Book
On 1 May 1915, a luxury ocean liner as richly appointed as an English country house sailed out of New York, bound for Liverpool. The passengers - including a record number of children and infants - were anxious. Germany had declared the seas around Britain to be a war zone. For months, its...
Hidden figures :
Lee Shetterly, Margot.
Paper Book
SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE The #1 New York Times Bestseller Set amid the civil rights movement, the never-before-told true story of NASA's African-American female mathematicians who played a crucial role in America's space program. Before...
The girl with seven names :
Lee, Hyeonseo,
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER An extraordinary insight into life under one of the world's most ruthless and secretive dictatorships - and the story of one woman's terrifying struggle to avoid capture/repatriation and guide her family to freedom. As a child growing...
Every falling star :
Lee, Sungju.
Ebook
Every Falling Star, the first book to portray contemporary North Korea to a young audience, is the intense memoir of a North Korean boy named Sungju who is forced at age twelve to live on the streets and fend for himself. To survive, Sungju creates a gang and lives by thieving, fighting,...
The beekeeper of Aleppo /
Lefteri, Christy,
Paper Book
The International Number One Bestseller, for readers of The Tattooist of Auschwitz and The Kite Runner.
The high mountains of Portugal /
Martel, Yann.
Paper Book
A train in winter :
Moorehead, Caroline
Paper Book
On an icy dawn morning in Paris in January 1943, a group of 230 French women resisters were rounded up from the Gestapo detention camps and sent on a train to Auschwitz - the only train, in the four years of German occupation, to take women of the resistance to a death camp.The youngest was a...
Reading Lolita in Tehran :
Nafisi, Azar.
Ebook
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * We all have dreams--things we fantasize about doing and generally never get around to. This is the story of Azar Nafisi's dream and of the nightmare that made it come true. For two years before she left Iran in 1997, Nafisi gathered seven...
Things I learned from falling /
Nelson, C.
Paper Book
The things they carried
O'Brien, Tim,
Paper Book
The million copy bestseller that redefined the way the world saw war. One of the ten books - novels, memoirs and one very unusual biography - that make up our Matchbook Classics' series, a stunningly redesigned collection of some of the best loved titles on our backlist....

From the St. Joseph High School Summer Reading List.

The tiger's wife /
Obreht, TOea.
Paper Book
The Orange Prize winning debut from a truly extraordinary talent. 'Having sifted through everything I have heard about the tiger and his wife, I can tell you that this much is fact: in April of 1941, without declaration or warning, the German bombs started falling over the city and did not...
Humble pi :
Parker, Matt
Paper Book
**The First Ever Maths Book to be a No.1 Bestseller**'Wonderful ... superb' Daily Mail What makes a bridge wobble when it's not meant to? Billions of dollars mysteriously vanish into thin air? A building rock when its resonant frequency matches a gym class...
Packing for Mars :
Roach, Mary.
Paper Book
No Marketing Blurb
The last resort :
Rogers, Douglas,
Paper Book
In The Last Resort, journalist Douglas Rogers tells the eye-opening, harrowing and, at times, surprisingly funny story of his parents' struggle for survival in war-torn Zimbabwe.
The god of small things /
Roy, Arundhati.
Paper Book
The Asian literary phenomenon of the 90s. More magical than Mistry, more of a rollicking good read than Rushdie, more nerve-tinglingly imagined than Naipaul, here, perhaps, is the greatest Indian novel by a woman. Arundhati Roy has written an astonishingly rich, fertile novel, teeming...
The shadow of the wind /
Ruiz ZafOon, Carlos,
Paper Book
Snow flower and the secret fan /
See, Lisa.
Ebook
Lily is the daughter of a humble farmer, and to her family she is just another expensive mouth to feed. Then the local matchmaker delivers startling news: if Lily's feet are bound properly, they will be flawless. In nineteenth-century China, where a woman's eligibility is judged by the shape and...
The bookseller of Kabul /
Seierstad, UAsne,
Paper Book
THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER 'An intimate portrait of Afghani people quite unlike any other ... compelling' CHRISTINA LAMB, SUNDAY TIMES For more than twenty years Sultan Khan, a bookseller in Kabul, defied the authorities - be they communist...
Between shades of gray /
Sepetys, Ruta.
Paper Book
The haunting and powerful Second World War novel by Ruta Sepetys that inspired the feature film, ASHES IN THE SNOW, OUT NOW. One night fifteen-year-old Lina, her mother and young brother are hauled from their home by Soviet guards, thrown into cattle cars and sent away....
The Rosie project /
Simsion, Graeme C.
Paper Book
Discover the delightfully heartwarming and life-affirming bestseller about one man's unlikely journey through love, perfect for fans of Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine THE INTERNATIONAL MILLION COPY BESTSELLER 'I couldn't put this book down. It's...
The art of war.
Sun Tzu,
Paper Book
Conflict is an inevitable part of life, according to this ancient Chinese classic of strategy, but everything necessary to deal with conflict wisely, honorably, victoriously, is right before us at all times. The key to skillful action in any situation is in knowing those things that make up the...
Drive your plow over the bones of the dead /
Tokarczuk, Olga,
Ebook
The lemon tree :
Tolan, Sandy.
Paper Book
In the summer of 1967, not long after the Six Day War, three young Palestinian men ventured into the town of Ramla in Israel. They were cousins, on a pilgrimage to see their childhood homes, from which they and their families had been driven out nearly twenty years earlier. One cousin had the door...
Sing, unburied, sing /
Ward, Jesmyn.
Paper Book
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2018WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD 2017ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S BEST BOOKS OF 2017SELECTED AS A BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW STATESMAN, THE FINANCIAL TIMES, THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK...

The National English Honor Society has chosen Sing, Unburied Sing by Jesmyn Ward and Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro as the common reader texts for 2024-2025.

Educated :
Westover, Tara.
Paper Book
THE MULTI-MILLION COPY BESTSELLER A BETWEEN THE COVERS PICK Selected as a book of the yearby AMAZON, THE TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, GUARDIAN, NEW YORK TIMES, ECONOMIST,NEW STATESMAN, VOGUE, IRISH TIMES,...
I am Malala :
Yousafzai, Malala,
Paper Book
Don't give up, don't give in :
Zamperini, Louis,
Paper Book
'IF YOU CAN TAKE IT, YOU CAN MAKE IT' Louis Zamperini lived one of the most amazing lives imaginable. As a young boy he was a troublemaker but his will to succeed drove him on to become an Olympian at the 1936 Games. With the outbreak of war, Louis volunteered for the army and...

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