Read this when
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Everything he'd been taught said turn his friend in. He tore up the letter instead. "All right, then, I'll go to hell."
Who it's for
Huck's first-person voice lets the reader watch a boy argue with the morality he was raised in, in real time, and feel guilty for doing the decent thing.
Feelings it meets
What it is
Mark Twain's novel, published in the UK and Canada in December 1884 and in the US in February 1885, is narrated by Huck Finn, a boy who fakes his own death to escape his abusive father, Pap. On Jackson's Island he meets Jim, an enslaved man who has escaped, and the two travel down the Mississippi River on a raft, encountering a range of characters and moral dilemmas.
Where to find it
Public domain in the US (1884–85, English); free on Project Gutenberg and Standard Ebooks, with free LibriVox recordings. In print and in libraries (Libby/Hoopla); many commercial audiobooks.
Before you start
Heads up: Child abuse and frequent racial slurs.
Age: Ages 14+
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest To children ardent for some desperate glory, The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori.Wilfred Owen, Poems, “Dulce et Decorum Est”
