Novels & Books in Verse

An epic poem composed by the Roman poet Virgil between the years of 29 and 19 BCE, the Aeneid represents one of the most important and influential works in Western literature. It centers on the story of Aeneas, a refugee from the Trojan War who was fated to found the Roman nation in Italy. This guide refers to the Oxford World Classic’s edition of the Aeneid, translated by Frederick Ahl. All study guide citations refer... Read Aeneid Summary

Written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning and first published in 1856 at the height of the Romantic Movement, Aurora Leigh is a narrative novel in blank verse that divided critics by challenging the standard positions within contemporary debates regarding class and gender. Standing at nine books and 11,000 lines, it is the first feature-length poem in English that places a female artist at the center of the plot, and as such, it catapulted its equally atypical... Read Aurora Leigh Summary

Anne Carson's Autobiography of Red: A Novel in Verse reimagines the myth of Herakles and Geryon, the red winged monster whom Herakles slays in his tenth labor. Carson bases her version on fragments of the epic poem by Ancient Greek poet Stesichoros. Stesichoros' version of Herakles' tenth labor is unique in that it is told not from Herakles' perspective, but from "Geryon's own experience" (6). Using this as inspiration, Carson retells Geryon and Herakles' story... Read Autobiography Of Red Summary

Beowulf is an epic poem written in Old English by an anonymous author around the year 1000 CE. While most of the poem was discovered intact, some of it had been destroyed, likely burned in a fire. The surviving piece was generally regarded as of more interest to historians and anthropologists than to literary scholars until writer and academic J. R. R. Tolkien argued otherwise in a 1936 paper entitled "Beowulf: The Monsters and the... Read Beowulf Summary

Kwame Alexander’s Booked is a young adult novel in verse about the life of Nick Hall, an eighth-grader and soccer aficionado who struggles to meet his parents’ expectations and honor his own self-identity in the wake of his parents’ separation. The book is both a sports novel and a reflection on Nick’s experiences struggling with an injury and major changes in his home life. The book is geared toward 10- to 12-year-old readers and includes... Read Booked Summary

Brown Girl Dreaming (2014) is a memoir in verse by Jacqueline Woodson, a children’s and young adult fiction writer. Published by Nancy Paulsen Books, a division of the Penguin Group, the memoir won the National Book Award, the Newberry Honor Book Award, and the Coretta Scott King Award.Plot SummaryBrown Girl Dreaming covers Woodson’s childhood, detailing her family history and her beginnings as a writer. Woodson was born in Columbus, Ohio, on February 12, 1963, the... Read Brown Girl Dreaming Summary

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The Inferno is the first book of Dante Alighieri’s great medieval epic, The Divine Comedy: a monument of world literature. Written between 1308 and 1320, the three-part poem charts Dante’s transformative journey through Hell and Purgatory to Heaven itself. The poem’s form—terza rima, an endlessly circling pattern of interweaving triple rhymes—reflects its major theme: the wisdom, power, and love of the trinitarian Christian God. Like every book of the Comedy, Inferno ends with the word... Read Dante's Inferno Summary

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Home of the Brave is a 2008 juvenile novel by Katherine Applegate that is written entirely in free verse. The story revolves around the protagonist, a young boy named Kek, who has fled from violence and upheaval in his native Sudan and traveled alone to the United States. Kek’s father and older brother were killed in an attack on their camp, and Kek was forced to leave his mother behind to save his own life... Read Home of the Brave Summary

House Arrest is K. A. Holt’s 2015 novel in free verse. Narrated in the first-person voice of 12-year-old Timothy, the novel is comprised of fifty-two weeks of journal entries that he is required to write as part of his probation for stealing a wallet to pay for his infant brother Levi’s medication. The novel is divided by seasons.During winter, Timothy begins his journal and weekly meetings with his probation officer, James, and his court-appointed psychologist... Read House Arrest Summary

The story opens in February 1975. Hà lives with her mother and three older brothers (Brother Quang, Brother Vũ, and Brother Khôi) in Saigon, South Vietnam. Hà knows her father, a naval officer, only through Mother’s stories and memories; he disappeared nine years earlier, a victim of the Communist Army of North Vietnam. Hà learns fractions, practices embroidery, and celebrates the start of the new lunar year on Tết (February 11). As spring and Hà’s... Read Inside Out And Back Again Summary

Book DetailsLong Way Down (2017) by Jason Reynolds is a young adult novel in free verse about Will Holloman, a young Black boy struggling to make a decision after his brother, Shawn, is shot dead in the street. Will plans to seek revenge, but before he can leave the elevator of his building, he is greeted by a series of ghosts who confuse and complicate his perspective on Shawn’s death and the idea of revenge... Read Long Way Down Summary

First published in 1993, Virginia Euwer Wolff’s Make Lemonade is a young adult novel written in free verse. The novel received numerous awards, including the Golden Kite Award for Fiction and the Parents’ Choice Book Award, and was named an ALA Best Book for Young Adults and School Library Journal Best Book. While Wolff herself defines her novel as “prose” with “stanzas” rather than poetry, she includes poetic imagery and innovative use of language and... Read Make Lemonade Summary

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Karen Hesse’s Out of the Dust is a historical middle-grade novel in verse first published in 1997. Through 110 first-person free verse poems, the narrative tells the story of two years in the life of Billie Jo Kelby, young daughter of a struggling farming family in the Oklahoma Panhandle in the mid-1930s. After a tragic accident results in the death of Billie Jo’s mother and baby brother, she and her father must find a way... Read Out of the Dust Summary

Book Details & Major ThemesParadise Lost by John Milton is a long-form epic poem consisting of 12 books and more than 10,000 lines of blank verse. Published in 1667, Milton’s poem is an argument on God’s justice explored through a creative retelling of the Genesis story of Adam and Eve's temptation, fall, and expulsion from Eden. Through this biblical narrative, Milton explores themes of Individual Freedom and Self-Determination, The Paradox of the Pursuit of Knowledge... Read Paradise Lost Summary

Paradise Regained by John Milton is an epic narrative poem that was initially published in 1671. A widely-revered essayist, dramatist, and lyric poet, Milton is perhaps best known for Paradise Lost, an epic poem he wrote in 1667. Whereas Paradise Lost depicts Lucifer’s fall from Heaven and Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden of Eden, Paradise Regained centers on the temptation of Christ, drawing on the Gospel of Luke for its inspiration.Milton’s 1671 epic... Read Paradise Regained Summary

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