Only 2 weeks until school starts...

and reality is starting to dawn on all of us.  New shoes, backpacks, and lunchboxes are lined up on one wall in my bedroom.  All the kids have finished their summer camps and classes.  Our oldest is getting serious about his summer homework.
Yes, at the ripe old age of 12 our son has three summer assignments from 2 classes, and unlike the "packets" in elementary school these assignments are not optional.  If he turns them in on the second day of school instead of the first he only gets half credit.
This kid spent ten days at summer camp and a week on a missions trip.  No time for homework there.  He volunteered to help at vacation bible school.  No time for homework there. He also spent four weeks with his grandparents, no homework there either.
Summer vacation is from Memorial day weekend-August 15. Since it started with a holiday weekend, that means "real time" started around May 31st this year. That means his entire summer break is eleven weeks.  He volunteered,camped, and had other commitments for about 8 of those weeks.  That left one week at the beginning of the summer and these two weeks at the end for visiting with his friends and homework.
Now don't get me wrong.  I understand honors classes require extra time & effort.  He does too.  That's why he's not playing football this fall.
I understand the point of  summer project planning, reading logs, and even requiring a book to be a particular category.  What I don't understand, is requiring a specific book, especially one that is clearly oriented to one gender.
When they did sports statistics as math problems, everyone cried foul!  How are girls supposed to be interested in that?
Well, explain to me then, how a normal 12 year old boy from a "traditional" family is going to be interested in a book like Define Normal.  It's about 2 girls, peer counseling, and foster care.  It is ALL about relationships, especially female relationships.   Yes, we are supposed to stretch our perspectives...but how many of us took our sons to see The Joy Luck Club?   I understand there aren't nearly as many boys in honors English as girls, but to me, reading requirements like this are part of why.  It shuts out boys as effectively as older math class models shut out girls.
There are plenty of other books out there about breaking down stereotypes, that at least have some primary male characters, (not just fringers to say hey, guys have these issues too.  Those characters that might have added a male angle/perspective to this book were not developed.)
Even Little Women is more boy friendly than this book.  And there are girls I know who cringed at this title too.  If you want to teach a lesson, give a list of titles with that lesson.  Don't force feed, especially when assigning about five pages of writing to go with it, and especially over the summer, when a kid should be able to have some time to just be a kid.