Xpwn3ntial said:
Manicotti said:
I think Dune is a bit much for an 11 year old.
OT: i, Robot is a good read. Anything Asimov, really.
I started with Lord of the Rings and Dune (my sister gave me a hard-bound copy with the first 3 books in it). I managed to get LoTR confiscated a total of 21 times until my teachers just gave up and let me read in class (sheesh, I don't know what their problem was, I was being quiet, reading something good and I could multi-task enough to sortof pay attention to whatever boring stuff they were droning on about).
Dune was amazing, and made it an annual tradition to re-read it over 3 weeks every year for the next 10 years. Every time I came away with something new. When I was 10 it was just a cool sci-fi story. When I was about 15 I started to grasp some of the more complicated philosophical stuff about limits and the illusion of limits. As I got older I began to understand more and more of what he was talking about. I still read the novel occassionally, about once every 3 or 4 years now, but every time it gives me food for thought.
I really don't like it when people say, "X is too young for this novel". It's ridiculous and it drove me nuts at school when teachers and librarians told me to "try something easier". Sure I didn't grasp all of it, but it did make me think. Dividing books into age groups smacks of mediocracy and aiming to be mediocre is the biggest sell-out possible.