Monday, April 16, 2007

Suggestions for a Reading List

I've been mentoring a 12-year-old girl through the Vancouver School Board. This is in writing and specifically fantasy writing. There are a fair number of kids who are needing mentors in writing and more in the SF and speculative fields. If anyone is interested in mentoring you can always look it up on the internet.

However, I'm trying to give her a list of fiction books to read that would expand her knowledge of the field. Her writing style is quite good and her grammar and sentence structure is better than mine was at twenty. By the time she's in Grade 10 she will also be doing some university level courses, and she wants to become a professional writer.

So far, she's enamored with the Harry Potter series and wrote half a novel about some kids searching for the stealer of some dragon eggs. So she likes magic and dragons.

I think back to when I was 12 and I was starting to write then myself. My older brother had moved out and left a lot of his books behind so I was reading Heinlein and Herbert then, plus John Christopher. I was also reading Bradbury and Poe; perhaps that's why I am the way I am today.

But here I am, trying to compile a list and finding my shelf doesn't always hold those earlier books. I want to give her some classics and some new stuff, (both SF and fantasy) but books that represent the range in the field, keeping in mind that something like China Mieville's books may be a little too sophisticated for her for a few years. She's still reading a lot of young adult books but I know she has the capacity to read more complex tales than that, just by the style of her writing.

If you have any suggestions of books to add to this list, I'd love to hear them.