Anything by Ernest Hemingway might be good. He wrote with very clean, simple prose. Many writers from the 1800s and the early 1900s spelled dialects phonetically, and you might find that difficult to follow. My second language is Spanish and I even have a degree in it, but non-standard grammar and spelling slow me down, and I think you'll feel the same.

Since you like "The Wizard of Oz," and you say you're still learning and need to stay motivated, how about some classic middle-grade novels?

• "The Call of the Wild," by Jack London, about a dog in the Yukon during the Gold Rush.
• "The Black Stallion," by Walter Farley, about a boy who tames a half-wild horse and goes on to win races.
• "Johnny Tremain," by Esther Forbes, about a boy growing up at the start of the American Revolution.
• "Where the Red Fern Grows," by Wilson Rawls, about a boy and his two hunting dogs. Prepare to cry at the end.
• "Little House in the Big Woods," by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Or any of the "Little House" books. They're the semi-autobiographical story of a girl growing up in rural America in the 1800s. The first book was published in 1932 and each book has been a well-loved classic ever since. The darkest book is "The Long Winter," and it's a fan favorite.

In movies, how about:

• "Bringing Up Baby," (1938) about a man, a crazy heiress, and her pet leopard named Baby.
• "It Happened One Night," (1934) about a naive rich woman trying to flee her father and the man who falls in love with her after a lot of adventures.
• "Paper Moon," (1973) about an orphaned girl, the man who may or may not be her father, and their funny adventures and petty criminal activities on the road during the Great Depression. Tatum O'Neal played the little girl and won an Academy Award at the age of 10.