And one other book that I can't remember ...

ALL three summer readings were about kids who went insane and were telling their stories from the insane asylum!!

YEAH for great role models!!!! The message was "everyone goes insane as a teenager and so give up and abandon all hope and sink into dispair and go to an insane asylum because that is the thing all the heros in all the books we want to read do!!"

ARGH!!!

Earlier in my education career all the books were "The BEST of Mankind facing TOUGH Challenges and the SUCCEEDING and making the BEST of the situation". That's a great message to have teenagers read in my opinion...

then it switched somewhere around 9th grade to .....

"The WORST of mankind, facing BAD times and FAILING" which just seems like the wrong message to have teenagers read in my opinion.