Which of these books should i read? Looking for reccomendations??

Question

For 2 projects for school, i have to read 1 book from the following 2 lists. Any suggestions???
Enemy Women -Paulette Jiles
Cobb -Al Stump
A Rumor of War -Philip Caputo
Slaughterhouse-5 -Kurt Vonnegut
Assasination Vacation -Sarah Vowell
Devil in the White City -Erik Larson
When the Emperor was Divine -Julie Otsuka

list 2
The Color Purple -Alice Walker
Song of Solomon -Toni Morrison
The Bluest Eye -Toni Morrison
On the Road -Jack Kerouac
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest -Ken Kesey
A Streetcar Named Desire -Tennesse Williams
Of Mice and Men -John Steinback
A Farewell to Atrms -Ernest Hemingway
A Prayer for Owen Meany -John Irving
The Bean Trees -Barbara Kingsolver

Any reccomendations are greatly appreciated. Please give me a summary of the book and what you thought about it. Remember, 1 from each list please. Thank you so very very much!

Answer 1

~Slaughterhouse 5: so it goes.
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest: So he went.

Actually, if you start reading either, you shouldn't be able to put either one down. Don't view it as an assignment, view it as a teacher doing you a favor and turning you on to a really good treat.

Answer 2

Slaughterhouse 5

amazon.uk review:
It took Vonnegut more than 20 years to put his Dresden experiences into words. He explained, "there is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre. Everybody is supposed to be dead, to never say anything or want anything ever again." Slaughterhouse Five is a powerful novel incorporating a number of genres. Only those who have fought in wars can say whether it represents the experience well. However, what the novel does do is invite the reader to look at the absurdity of war. Human versus human, hedonist politicians pressing buttons and ordering millions to their deaths all for ideologies many cannot even comprehend. Flicking between the US, 1940's Germany and Tralfamadore, Vonnegut's semi- autobiographical protagonist Billy Pilgrim finds himself very lost. One minute he is being viewed as a specimen in a Tralfamadorian Zoo, the next he is wandering a post-apocalyptic city looking for corpses. Slaughterhouse Five-Or The Children's Crusade A Duty-Dance with Death is a remarkable blend of black humour, irony, the truth and the absurd. The author regards his work a "failure", millions of readers do not. Released the same time bombs were falling on South East Asia, this title caused controversy and awakening. Essential reading for all. So it goes. --Jon Smith

and

A Prayer for Owen Meany +++
- a great story about a little boy who is essentially very short and does not look anything like the age he is.

I think this review from Amazon.com sums it up pretty well.

Owen Meany is a dwarfish boy with a strange voice who accidentally kills his best friend's mom with a baseball and believes--accurately--that he is an instrument of God, to be redeemed by martyrdom. John Irving's novel, which inspired the 1998 Jim Carrey movie Simon Birch, is his most popular book in Britain, and perhaps the oddest Christian mystic novel since Flannery O'Connor's work. Irving fans will find much that is familiar: the New England prep-school-town setting, symbolic amputations of man and beast, the Garp-like unknown father of the narrator (Owen's orphaned best friend), the rough comedy. The scene of doltish the doltish headmaster driving a trashed VW down the school's marble staircase is a marvelous set piece. So are the Christmas pageants Owen stars in. But it's all, as Highlights magazine used to put it, "fun with a purpose." When Owen plays baby Jesus in the pageants, and glimpses a tombstone with his death date while enacting A Christmas Carol, the slapstick doesn't cancel the fact that he was born to be martyred. The book's countless subplots add up to a moral argument, specifically an indictment of American foreign policy--from Vietnam to the Contras.
+++ This story was turned into a movie "Simon Birch" read the book first, I was a little disappointed by the movie as some of the power from the book was lost.

Answer 3

List 1:Slaughterhouse Five, after which I reccomend you read pretty much anything else by Vonnegut

List 2:One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, or A Streetcar Named Desire

Answer 4

From List 1 definatly read Slaughterhouse-5 -Kurt Vonnegut - Billy Pilgrim has lost his hold on the fourth dimension. All the elements of his life are experienced randomly. He flits back and forwards in time. There is his life as a soldier in World War II. There is his time in a psychiatric ward. There is his dull optician's life and there is the end of his life spent on an alien planet being observed by pan-dimensional beings, the possible instigators of his time-spanning life.

List 2 - A Streetcar Named Desire -Tennesse Williams - It is a love story, a culture clash and it deals with alcoholism, abuse and much much more - it is a timeless classic that made an impression and and impact when it was written ad still is intriging today

Answer 5

I've read almost all of the books on your list. If you are looking for a sweet book that is easy to read and understand yet has a great plot I would go with "The Bean Trees" by Barbara Kingsolver. It is a great book. It is quite contemporary I believe the story is less than 10 years old.
I would not recommend "Song of Solomon" or any book by Toni Morrison unless you are into speding hundreds of pages being depressed where nothing good ever happens.

Answer 6

Slaughterhouse 5 and The Color Purple

Answer 7

I haven't heard of any authors from List1 except Kurt Vonnegut.
But List 2 has some good reads including my all time favourite - A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving) - would heartily recommend that.

Also Of Mice and Men is good, but a rather sad story.

Answer 8

The Color Purple is a great book about racism and inner growth in difficult situations. There is also a film (as there is for most of the books in list 2). Haven't read any from list 1.

Answer 9

Either Slaughterhouse-5 or Of Mice and Men. I suggest Slaughterhouse-5, though, it's much more interesting and one of my favorite classics. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is a great read too!

Answer 10

Devil In The White City and The Color Purple

Answer 11

I really LIKED the color purple. I only survived some of those. One flew over the cuckoo's nest wasn't bad either. Of Mice and Men is short, deep and good but they pick it to death because thats the one the non readers choose.