Using YA books as the key to tackling more challenging reads

I was thrilled at the response to my presentation on Young Adult novels: The key to unlocking more challenging reads at the recent School Librarians' Conference - it was a little idea that transmogrified into something quite wonderful at my school, and I'm so pleased that other librarians are keen to give it a go at their schools too.

So here's the list of the books that I used as examples - but as I said during my presentation, there must be loads more out there, so if you have any others you can think of, please add them by commenting on this post, and I'll repost the updated list every couple of months.

How I'm doing it:

• pairing up Young Adult books with classics and more challenging reads,
• identifying themes and structures they can relate to,
• so they can use that knowledge in tackling their more challenging reads
  

• Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet with Noughts and Crosses by Maloria Blackman and Like No Other by Una Marche
• Classic text: The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne with Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
• Classic text: 1984 by George Orwell with The Giver by Lois Lowry
• An old YA with a new YA: The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger with Dr Bird's Advice for Sad Poets by Evan Roskos
• Intertextuality: Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath with Belzhar by Meg Wolitzer
• Multiple narrators: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver with How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr, Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell, Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth
• Multiple pairings: We Were Liars by E. Lockhart with King Lear by Shakespeare, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte and The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Historical fiction: Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks with Rose Under Fire and Code-named Verity by Rose Weitz
• Feminist novels: The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood with Bumped by Megan McCafferty