My Most Difficult Assignment

My junior year of high school, we had to write a research paper surrounding a text that we chose at the beginning of the year. We were supposed to choose our novel from a specific list, read it first semester and provide complete annotations, then prepare a research paper on it throughout second semester for submission at the end of the year. Unfortunately, we were supposed to sign up for our books one particular morning before school, and I got to school right before the last bell telling us to get to class. I looked at the list to find that my first and second choices had already been taken, so I looked through the list very quickly and just randomly chose a book with a title that jumped out at me. The book I chose was called The Spy, by James Fenimore Cooper, the famed writer of The Last of the Mohicans. I could not have chosen a harder text on which to write a report. The novel was written in older English and featured a large amount of uneventful plot. I found myself nearly falling asleep while reading it, which led to me pushing off the assignment to the very limit of my ability. As a result, I did not finish the annotations in time and ended up submitting my book partially untouched. My annotations were also pretty awful because I was rushing through to try and finish the book in time for the due date. However, my struggles did not end there. I had to do research on James Fenimore Cooper, other books of his, and different plot and conceptual elements within The Spy. Cooper is one of the lesser known authors in American history, and The Spy is even more obscure. Research is supposed to be interesting because you discover elements that surround the novel that were previously unknown. However, I could almost argue that the research component was worse than the reading. I tried to start my assignment early because I did not want to get stuck at the end of the semester again, but the difficulty I faced with the assignment led me to put it off once again. I once again ended up in a panic at the end of the semester, trying to cobble together a research paper on a book I hated. It was by far my most difficult assignment, and it has definitely encouraged me to approach schoolwork with more planning.