Bloggers of the Week

I'd love for everyone to check out Clara's awesome blog post about Looking for Alaska by John Green.  She writes with such great voice and really uses punctuation in a way to help us hear her voice.  

Another great blog post comes to us from Garrett Jackson where he blogs about Cesar Milan and his amazing work with dogs!  He includes a lot of great details from his book as well as his thoughts.  

Please choose one of these blog posts to analyze today in class!

Cincinnati: Home Sweet Home

Mosquitoland is a book about a girl.  A girl named Mim who is on a journey.  A real traveling journey, but also an emotional one.  Mim picks up her life living with her dad and step mom and sets off to Cleveland, where she's learned her mom is sick.  Mim travels via bus (several busses), meets some friends, and grows as a person.  One of my favorite lines from the whole book (so far) was when she and her two friends reach Cincinnati.  Here's the part from the book:

"Walt looks up and points through the windshield.  The entire city of Cincinnati is spread before us in breathtaking panorama.  I take in this new clearness of the day with my good eye, in absolute awe of the sudden and wonderful metamorphosis.  It's a landscape worthy of documentation" (Arnold 194).

I mean, I've lived in Cincinnati for 34 years and I love it.  But I would never describe it so majestically as Arnold did.  But really, if you haven't been to downtown Cincinnati recently, it's pretty amazing.  Here are a few pics from the Smale Riverfront Park a few weeks ago with my kids.  It's spectacular.

The Banks by the Reds stadium.  Another win.  We really do have a cool city, and I love how Arnold described it as a metamporphosis.  Because it wasn't always so nice.  It realy has developed.  Changed.  Grew.

Right now, I'm 60% through the book and Mim and her friends are catching a Reds game.  (They even bought their tickets from a scalper).  I'm curious about a few things in this book.  Here are my questions:

• Will Mim make it to Cleveland to see her mom?
• Will her mom still be alive?
• Will her friends that she's met along the way stay in her life?
• If David Arnold described Cincinnati so majestically, how will he describe Cleveland?

Hopefully I'll have some answers in my next post!  So far, this is a good YA book. It's also one that I think would appeal to both male and female readers.  Happy reading!

Three Weeks with My Brother by Nicholas Sparks

If you've never read anything by Nicholas Sparks, I will summarize his works in a few words.  Cheesy.  Romantic.  Sappy.  Predictable.  I think you get the drift.   And that's not always bad.  I love reading these books when I want to read something romantic or that doesn't make me think too hard.  The story lines are simple and easy to follow; that's not necessarily a flaw.

So when his memoir, Three Weeks with my Brother, popped up on my recommended reading list, I thought, "Why not?"  I was shocked how much I loved this book.  It basically told two interwoven stories.  The first was about his three-week trip around the world with his brother, Micah, the only other living relative in his childhood family.  The second story was about his childhood, growing up with Micah, his sister, Dana, and their parents, as well as his current family, wife Cat and five children.  The chapters typically alternated and it was very easy to pick right up where you left off when switching stories.

The story line of his trip around the world was interesting.  He and Micah traveled all around the world seeing sights I can only dream of.  They met some extraordinary people and reflected on their own lives, relationships, careers, children, etc.  But the part that I really connected with was his childhood story and the story of his own family.

I felt like Nicholas Sparks and I have a lot in common, and I will reflect by looking at some specific quotes from his memoir.

Quote #1: “Never forget that anticipation is an important part of life. Work's important, family's important, but without excitement, you have nothing. You're cheating yourself if you refuse to enjoy what's coming.” 

Micah said this to Nicholas when Nicholas was worried about leaving his family for so long and not being able to relax and enjoy life.  My husband frequently says the same thing to me, though not quite so eloquently.  I have so many different things on my plate: work, raising a family, a child with some special speech needs, a crazy dog, keeping up with the work of owning a home.  Sometimes I get overwhelmed by all these things and don't plan things for myself.  Something I probably need to do more often.

Quote #2: “You’re choosing to let life control you, instead of the other way around. That’s the big secret. You choose the kind of life you want to live.” 

I just love this quote.  I think it's important for myself, my students, and my own children.  Sometimes life is tough.  Sometimes we are faced with situations we wouldn't choose or don't want.  Sometimes we have to make decisions we don't want to make.  But our attitude and our actions speak volumes.  If you don't like a situation, it is up to you to improve it.  No one else is going to do it for you.  This applies to my own life right now; my third child is 2 and still not talking.   There are a lot of different suggestions from medical personnel and speech therapists to explain his silence.  But I'm not sitting idly.  I'm teaching him sign language, taking him to speech, and trying to help him find his voice.  Sitting around and waiting for him to talk is not my plan.  I'm taking action.  Just like Nicholas Sparks did.  (By the way, he also had a son who struggled with speech - just another connection).

So should you read this book?  I say yes, especially if you've read some of his other works!

Spring Break Reading Machine

I did not go anywhere for spring break.  :(

But, I am managing to get in a ton of reading!  I just devoured a book called Margot by Jillian Cantor, which I'm going to write about today.  Normally, historical fiction is not my preferred genre.  But I've read several other books by Cantor recently and really enjoy her writing.  So much so, that I downloaded Margot to my Kindle without even reading the book description.

Here's a short synopsis: Margot is Margot Frank, the sister of the beloved Anne Frank (The Diary of Anne Frank in case you didn't know).  The book imagines that she didn't actually die in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp during the Holocaust, but instead escaped, was helped by a nun and an old friend of her mother's, and ends up living in Philadelphia, PA as an adult.  She lives in secret though, changing her name to Margie Franklin and keeping her past hidden from everyone she comes in contact with.  She disguises herself as a Gentile and finds an office secretary job.  Eventually though, her sister's diary is published and then is made into a movie.  After that, the demons of the Holocaust experience return with a vengeance to haunt her.

I really, really liked this book, despite it being historical fiction.  Like I mentioned earlier, the writing was great.  Here is an example of a line I really enjoyed: "You have to love someone to yell at them so intensely; you have to care so unbelievably much that your anger explodes and burns across the sky like the Soviet's Sputnik I've read so much about" (Cantor location 721).  I love the simile and the repetition at the beginning of each phrase.  Plain 'ol good writing!

The one qualm I had with this book was that Margot Frank did die in the concentration camp.  She died of Typhus.  Pretending that she didn't die and lived this new life in America bothered me a little bit.  You can't change the past.  I know Cantor was just imagining what her life might have been like, but I still can't get past the moral feeling that it was just a little wrong.  Imagine how her father might feel reading this book?  He was the only one in their family who survived the Holocaust and I think reading something like this might just bring back the pain even more.  Something to think about for sure.

Monument 14

It seems like every way you turn there is another dystopian YA novel.  And I usually end up liking them, so I suppose it's a good thing they are out there!

Last year, one of my students read Monument 14 by Emmy Laybourne.  At the time, I dismissed it.  But when I found myself in the Learning Commons (formerly known as the Media Center) and saw it on the shelf, I figured it couldn't hurt.

The main plot of this novel is that there is a super-Tsunami that causes all sorts of unique weather patterns.  The storm erupts on the main characters' way to school; their bus driver manages to crash the bus into a Superstore (reminds me of Walmart).  The kids survive in the store while many outside are dying due to lack of resources, harmful chemicals in the air, and citizen violence.

This book reminded me so much of the Life As We Knew It series I read last year.  Here are several things that were in common: dystopian; involved people doing crazy things for food; characters struggling to survive; learning to help others when disaster strikes; and they are both part of a series.

There was one major difference though.  The characters in Monument 14 had to be smart, but they had everything they needed (at least the main characters who were inside the Superstore).  The ones outside, well, they were another story.  The characters did not starve - there was plenty of food, appliances, clothing.  Due to their location, they had whatever they needed.  In the other series, they were not so fortunate.  The main characters were at home.  No stockpile of goods, no grocery stores, no garden.  Their survival was more real and desperate.  

If you like dystopian lit, I'd recommend both of these books.  I haven't read the 2nd or 3rd book of the Monument 14 series, but I devoured all four in the Life As We Knew It series last spring.  If you liked The Hunger Games, it's worth a shot.  I feel like dystopian novels are fun to read - they are a good escape from the "real world" but always leave me feeling like I need to prepare for the end of the world and stockpile groceries in the basement for an apocalypse.

Searching for Sky by Jillian Cantor

It's been awhile since I've read a book in a matter of days.  Searching for Sky was a book I couldn't put down.  It is YA, so will definitely be of interest to you.  And I downloaded it from Overdrive from the MHS school library, so I know you can access it easily.

Here's a short synopsis: Sky and River have grown up on a deserted island with Sky's mom, Petal, and River's dad, Helmut.  Petal and Helmut die from eating poisonous mushrooms, so Sky and River are left to survive by themselves on the island.  Only then, they are miraculously rescued by two men on a boat and taken back to California, a completely foreign land to Sky and River, who back on the mainland are known as Megan and Lucas.  You'd think they would be happy to be there, with their needs met so easily.  But when they learn a dark secret from their families' pasts, they greatly miss their simple life on the island and yearn to return.

The best thing about this was the author's writing style.  She told the story from Sky's perspective, a young girl who had been on the island since the age of one.  Sky never had any formal schooling, and, therefore, the writer's voice indicates this.  Here are two short excerpts from page 2 at the beginning of the book so you can get an idea of Sky's narration:

"'River'-I shake my head-'you promised you wouldn't.' Past Rocks, Ocean grows deeper, cooler, darker, and the water pulls you hard, so if you aren't careful, you could easily be swept out, swept away into the deep, great nothingness that lies beyond us.'"

"I can't stay mad at him, because I'm starving too.  When one of us doesn't spear a fish or catch a bird or a rabbit in my traps, we eat purple flowers, blue berries, and green leaves that we keep stocked inside Shelter for emergencies.  Every plant in our world is valuable in that it can be eaten, drunk, or used in Shelter in some way.  Except for mushrooms.  Now, we know better."

You may notice that many nouns don't have an article associated with them.  They are simply Rocks, Ocean, Shelter, etc. to Sky and River.  The best thing about this author is that she was able to subtly change Sky's voice as Sky changed as a character.  As Sky learned about life in California, she started to correct her voice and explain her understanding within her internal thoughts.

I loved this book!  It was a quick read, engaging, well-written, and had a unique plot with several unexpected twists.  Read on, friends!

The Moon and More by Sarah Dessen

I think I'm feeling the winter blahs.  It's been cold.  Snowy.  Gray.  And I LOVE summer.  There's just something about laying by the pool and reading a good book.  So I went to one of my go-to chick-lit YA authors, Sarah Dessen for a beach read.  The Moon and More is about a teenage girl named Emmaline.  Her mom was a teen mom; her biological father a stranger.  Her family runs a beach vacation home rental business in Colby, North Carolina and each family member does his or her part.

Emmaline starts the summer with a boyfriend, Luke, her high-school sweetheart of four years, and quickly falls for a boy visiting Colby from New York.  She takes a break from Luke and explores a new romance with Theo, who is spending the summer in Colby to film a documentary about a local artist.

The novel itself was fairly predictable, but it was exactly what I needed and (almost) made me feel like summer was here.  (Don't worry - you haven't missed anything.  It's definitely not).

One thing I loved about the narration is that the main character, Emmaline, is extremely intelligent, witty, and wise.  She has so many internal thoughts that I considered golden lines:

• "Again, it occurred to me how weird it was to be permanent in a place that to everyone else was only temporary.  Like I could never be sure if they were the ones who weren't real, or if I was" (Dessen 85).
• "But as was so often the case, it was the one person missing who you thought about more than the ones who were right in front of you" (Dessen 86).
• "You think it's all obvious and straightforward, this world.  But really, it's all in who is doing the looking" (Dessen 266).
• "The mistakes you make now count.  Not for everything, and not forever.  But they do matter, and they shape you.  If you take nothing else from what I've been through, at least remember this: make your choices well.  Because you'll always be accountable for them.  That's what being an adult is about" (Dessen 345).
• "The thing is, you can't always have the best of everything.  Because for a life to be real, you need it all: good and bad, beach and concrete, the familiar and the unknown, big talkers and small towns" (Dessen 435).

I know that was a lot of quotes at once, but I really feel like if you look at Emmaline's internal thoughts and dialogue, you really gain an understanding into her character.  So should you check out The Moon and More?  Yes...though females would probably like it best.  Happy reading!

Mistress by James Patterson and David Ellis

For the record, I have always loved James Patterson.  He is a great suspense writer, great style, creative plots.  And to me, Mistress did not disappoint.  Quick plot summary: Ben is a journalist living in Washington, D.C. when he discovers that the girl of his dreams, Diana Hotchkiss, commits suicide by jumping off a balcony.   Ben quickly realizes that the dead body is not Diana's and that the woman was murdered.  Ben delves into uncovering the crime while also having flashbacks to the childhood death of his own mother (an apparent suicide).

This book kept me on the edge of my seat.  Since Ben was figuring out so many different elements of the crime, he had many different groups of people trying to kill him.  He was dodging bullets, hiding out, living in disguise...all to find out the truth behind Diana's death/disappearance.

Have you even seen The Bourne Identity?  Ben reminded me of Matt Damon's character in so many ways.  Genius.  Deceptive.  Paranoid.  Clever.  Skilled.  Hunted.  Quick-thinking.  Rich.  There are so many comparisons.  (The one you may notice in the trailer that they do NOT have in common is the amnesia).  You can check out what I'm talking about in this trailer.  I'd imagine Mistress would have a similar vibe if made into a motion picture.

Overall, I give Mistress 4 out of 5 stars.  It was well-written and suspenseful and would engage even the most reluctant reader.  The one thing that kept this book from 5/5 stars was the ending.  While it did provide some closure to the main conflict, I thought it was way too sudden and didn't tie up all subplots.    I think most YA readers would enjoy this one!

New Blog

I've been blogging about books for almost two years.  Kind of hard to believe!  We started this independent reading initiative in 2013 and I love blogging about books; more importantly, I love reading my students' blogs about their reading.  Since our district is switching to Google (for everything: classroom, mail, etc.), we received new Google email addresses.  Since everything else will be tied to this new Google account, I decided to set up a new blog.  If you want to read about what I've read the past couple of years, please visit me here:

Mrs. Palmer's Book Blog from 2013-2015