Words to Remember for a 13-Year-Old Boy

The Boston Globe

They aren't wrapped yet. They're lying side-by-side on the dining room table in no particular order, stiff-spined, some with glossy covers, some matte, some thick with pages, some slim, some traditional paperbacks, some the mass-market kind, all of them with that new book smell.

For weeks I'd been thinking about what to get my grandson, Adam, for his 13th birthday. Anything sports, his mother said. Anything for the summer. Anything you get him, he will like. He doesn't care.

But I cared.

"Do you remember your 13th birthday?" I'd been asking friends and strangers for weeks. And no one did. I wanted Adam to remember his.

So I thought about Adam and me. I thought about our relationship and the things we share, what we talk about. And it's books. What he is reading. What I am reading. Why we like what we like. He told me months ago that I would like all three of "The Hunger Games" series, but that "Catching Fire," the second in the series, wasn't as good as books one and three. And when I found myself skimming through "Catching Fire," I thought: Adam is right.

But what books would I give him? How would I decide? The number of books was easy. I would give him 13 because he's turning 13. But which 13? What kinds of books? Young adult? Books that are popular now? Classics?

I decided to choose 13 books that have had an impact on me.

I wasn't home when I made this decision. I was on vacation. So I couldn't look through my bookshelves and say, yes, that one definitely, and, no, not that one.

I had to sit and think about all the books that I still think about, that come back to me at random times. I cut up hotel stationery into the shape of index cards and wrote down the names of these books. "The Diary of Anne Frank." "Marjorie Morningstar." "Angela's Ashes." "The Kite Runner." "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." "The Secret Life of Bees." "No Exit." "Tea and Sympathy." "Rabbit, Run." "Eleni." I must have had 50 books when I started.

But then I began the whittling process. "Marjorie Morningstar," even in these gender-neutral days, is a coming-of-age book for girls only. "The Diary of Anne Frank?" He'd already read it. "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings?" Maybe. Updike? He's too young for Updike. Hemingway? Fitzgerald?

There was so much choice.

I sorted the cards into yes, maybe, and no. And then I sorted them again and again and again until I got my 13. I eliminated many because a 13-year-old is too young for serial killers and middle-aged angst. And I eliminated many because they were similar to each other. "Eleni" and "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" and "The Book Thief" didn't make the cut. This bothers me. Next year, when he is 14, they will be on the list.

On each index card, I wrote a few sentences about why this book was important to me and, if I remembered, how old I was when I read it. Later today I will copy these sentences into Adam's books. And then I will wrap the books. And on his birthday, I will give them to him.

I know he won't read them all at once. I know he may not read them for years. And he may not read every one. But he'll have them, always. And someday, when he's a man and some stranger asks him, "Do you remember your 13th birthday?" I think he will.

Adam's 13 books:

"On the Beach" by Nevil Shute

"The Stand" by Stephen King

"To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee

"Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes

"All Quiet on the Western Front" by Erich Maria Remarque

"Ethan Frome" by Edith Wharton

"Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

"A World Lit Only by Fire" by William Manchester

"Roots" by Alex Haley

"All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr

"Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck

"The Call of the Wild" by Jack London

"The Last of the Scottsboro Boys" by Clarence Norris