Informational texts, complex fantasy, realistic fiction, traditional literature (folktales), biographies, autobiographies, memoirs, mysteries, historical fiction, short stories, genre combinations, diaries • Variety of structures (description, comparison and contrast, temporal sequence, problem and solution, etc.) • Topics that go well beyond readers’ personal experiences and content knowledge • Critical thinking • Heavy content load in many texts, both fiction and nonfiction, requiring study • Many themes presenting mature issues and the problems of society (racism, war, economic issues) and alternative interpretations • Some switching from setting to setting, including time change • Full range of literary devices (for example, flashback, stories within stories, symbolism, and figurative language) • Words used figuratively or with unusual or hard‐to‐understand connotations • Archaic words or words from languages other than English that do not follow conventional pronunciation patterns • Introduction to more abstract literary forms, such as satire

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