PJPII Grade Eight  -  Summer Reading List

Required Reading:

 1. Night   by Elie Wiesel

       Elie Wiesel was a teenager when he and his family were taken from their home
         in 1944 to the Auschwitz concentration camp, and then to Buchenwald.  Night
        is the terrifying record of Elie Weisel’s memories of the death of his family, the
        death of his spirit, and his despair as a deeply observant Jew confronting the
        absolute evil of man. 

2.  The Five People You Meet in Heaven  by Mitch Albom

      On his 83^rd birthday, Eddie dies in a tragic accident,  trying to save a little girl
       from a falling cart.  With his final breath, he feels two small hands in his-and
       then nothing.  He awakens in a place where your earthly life is explained to you
       by five people who are in it.  These people may have been loved ones or distant
       strangers.  Yet each one of them changed your path forever. 
 

* Read both novels carefully.  Taking notes and outlining key events in each chapter
provides a means for comprehending and summarizing. Assessments, follow-up activities, and discussions will center around both novels.

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The following books are recommended for eighth grade students.  The books on this
list are not required reading, but are provided for your reading pleasure. 
 

                    Diary of a Young Girl                              by Anne Frank

                    Flowers for Algernon                               by Daniel Keyes

                    Number the Stars                                      by Lois Lowry

                   A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court   by Mark Twain

                   Dogsong                                                      by Gary Paulsen