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BlackWolfDS wrote:

Amoux wrote:The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald is by far the best novel I've ever read.

You had to read it for school didn't you?
I honestly didn't like it that much when they made us read it...I liked Load of the Flies as a school book better.

Yes, I had to read it, but in my opinion, it is an excellent book.

Though, I've never had to read the Lord of the Flies.

ah, I loved Lord of the Flies! great book! OH! Animal Farm was a great book I had to read for school, too! my 9th grade english teacher REALLY didn't like Karl Marx, by the way.

and yeah, I'm reading The Great Gatsby right now for my english class. really good so far.

Heh, I remember when I had to take 20th Centry Novel, in high school. I never finished a single book in their...I usually just rented out the movies they where based on. That and sometimes the cliffnotes. Still got a B in the class

Lord of the Flies is a fantastic story. And a BIG warning on how savage and brutal humans can be. TOPS!

uh-huh, lupine!

lupine wrote:Lord of the Flies is a fantastic story. And a BIG warning on how savage and brutal humans can be. TOPS!

It's a DAMN good book.

Too bad I don't have the will to read it again...

ravaged_warrior wrote:

lupine wrote:Lord of the Flies is a fantastic story. And a BIG warning on how savage and brutal humans can be. TOPS!

It's a DAMN good book.

Too bad I don't have the will to read it again...

I agree....once the teachers start making you analyze the book and making you do work sheets.....reading it is dead. x.x

The easiest way to kill a good book is to teach it, badly, to a class.

Back when I was at high school (before most people reading this were born... sigh...) I had an English teacher that taught mediocre Shakespeare... and a geography teacher that really brought Shakespeare to life (once or twice a month when we got too far ahead of the other classes, probably). Said geography teacher was also a theatre producer (and as far as I know is still doing it) and talked the English department into sending class groups to his production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream". He took a few liberties with the costuming (but very little with the script)... to the extent that Titania and Oberon were dressed as `fifties bikers (complete with someone's precious old Triumphs - I think - manhandled up the backstage stairs and into the theatre) and with Puck in a dyed "Flock of Seagulls" type hairdo on a BMX bicycle...

(this is from memory from 25 years ago and there's been a lot of brain cells lost to alcohol between then and now, so some of this might no longer be totally accurate...)

yeah, so many books have been ruined by bad teaching. i prolyl woulda liked Scarlet Letter if my teacher hadn't made us analyse it so much.

I recently read Brooklyn Looper by Sean Farley. I had to read for Creative Writing because the author came in to talk to us about the book and how he came about writing it and self-publishing it.
It's about these two boys from Brooklyn who have a wonderful friendship that could never be broken. What's unique about this friendship is that one friend is a bookie and the other is a strong, athletic and smart student. They are completely different people and yet they have a strong friendship.
I must say, it was a really good book. There was so many references to nostalgic events (mostly from the 80s and 90s) that you felt connected to the story (references such as the OJ chase, Mets winning the 86 world series, the death of Nortorious B.I.G. and others). I definitly recommend this book, especially if you're looking for an easy, quick read; it was around 225 pages. By the way, I should warn that there is a lot of cursing, mostly the F word, just in case if people aren't too comfortable with that.

I'm currently reading the Golden Compass.