Another give-me-book-rec post!

[cahn]

I feel that I ought to know the answer to this, but it is easier to ask you because I know you will have good solutions!

E. needs to read a science-fiction book that is appropriate for her age (12/6th grade/middle grade). If she were two years older I'd give her Ender's Game or Becky Chambers, but she's not. She says she likes fantasy better than SF but I suspect this is at least partially because she hasn't really read much SF, most of the stuff I know about being aimed a little above her head (she's read Dragon Pearl and liked it but is using it for another category). I'd considered giving her a Heinlein juvenile but I think she should probably be just a little older for that too. I also gave her The Martian to look at, which she rejected on account of it being too long :) (If it's something that I think will suit her interests enough, I'll give it to her anyway even if it's long, but Martian was already pushing things a bit -- I'll give it to her in a year or two and I think it'll work better for her then.)

(If there are sentient animals or puzzles to solve that would be a plus, but not required. Another reason she likes fantasy better is because there are more sentient animals, I think.)

Comments

(K)

[(Anonymous)]

D is only reading SF that B gives her, which is to say Becky Chambers and Scalzi's Zoe's Tale (which is the one book in Old Man's War with a teenage girl as narrator). She's also read some Cory Doctorow -- Little Brother and For the Win. These tend to push her patience, but she does like them. I think all of these have some sex, but at a level that we're comfortable with. (B has been reading the Lady Astronaut books and says that the sex in those is adult enough that he's not going to push them on D, even though she would probably like other aspects of the books. If she sought them out, we'd let her read them, but we'd probably discuss them with her.) She's a militant enough feminist that she doesn't give the time of day to golden age SF. Eventually I will try to reason with her about The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, but I'll survive if she never reads The Rolling Stones or Have Spacesuit, Will Travel. I might give her Panshin's Rite of Passage at some point.

Re: (K)

[cahn]

Yeah, I am not totally sure that E is ready to tackle Becky Chambers. Though the last Scalzi I read had a big plot twist that was a middle-grade-type plot twist... And yes, I'm fine with sexual content, which is not the problem -- it's the level of inferencing and knowledge of social norms (especially for adults) that's the issue for her. I feel like I have to be careful about giving her books that are too advanced for her; when I was her age I'd regularly read books that were too advanced for me and they were good for me and I often enjoyed them despite that, but when she reads books that are too advanced for her, she often just gets frustrated and decides she doesn't like them/the author/the genre. (I am pretty sure that this is why, despite liking fantasy in general, she doesn't like Harry Potter.)