New Book

As you can probably tell by the title of this blog, I’ve finished ender's game. I have to say, when I saw the movie I thought it was really good, but the book was way better. Since I finished my book, I needed to find a new one, so I turned to my kindle. I haven’t read any of the books on their in a while, so I looked to find one. I found a book called "deadly memories" that I started reading a while ago, but never finished. I got bored and dropped the book, but now that I’ve started reading it again, I find it interesting so far. I plan on reading this book all the way through this time.

It starts with a boy named Jake looking through a crowd for someone he'd probably never seen in a long time, seen as though one of the first sentences is "Maybe Andrea was back." All we really know about her yet is that she has very, very red hair. As the author describes it "...he [Jake] had never seen another person with such an outrageous hair color." I’m only on page 48, so I’m not into the book enough to know if its god or not, but I can say that the beginning is interesting and draws the reader in

Ender's Game

For my blog, I've decided to read and review the book "Ender's Game" by the American author Orson Scott Card. The book is based in the future where children are sent to schools where they're tested in many ways to see if they have an equal balance of skills and emotions. If they pass and get through the program, they're sent to a space station where they’re trained to become soldiers. The entire system is based on training the children for war. The government aims to find children who will become new leaders and fighters that they need. They believe they need this army because a while ago there was an "invasion" of bug-like aliens. The government believes that they'll be back again anytime, so they want to be prepared. I'm not going to give away any spoilers, so onto the next thing.

 Of the many people who have already read this book, most have only positive comments to make. I can do nothing but approve of these comments, because I agree with them.  The characters are well developed, the story line makes sense and is mostly easy to follow, and people just seem to fall in love with Ender's character from the first pages. This book became so popular that it was even made into a movie. Most people talk about how they loved the movie. They say it’s amazing and other praises of this sort but, as those who read this book know, the book is better than the movie.

Fahrenheit 451 Characterization

I’ve been reading a new book, called Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury. One thing I’ve noticed about this book it that it has very interesting characters. Even if it is set in the future,  the characters and setting don’t seem very different from modern day life, other than people burn books and they have technology that is a little more advanced.

One character that I, personally enjoyed, is named Clarisse. She’s a young, strange girl who says she’s “seventeen and crazy…” Clarisse meets our main character, Guy Montag, when they are both taking a walk outside on a quiet night. She dies soon after, by getting hit by a car, but she changes Guy's outlook on life before she goes. She teaches him that details are sometimes the most important part of life, and people often end up missing them. I think she really changes the book and if she didnt exist, the story would have been bvery differant.

This is what I believe Clarisse looks like:

 

Reflective Blog Post

 

Link to best blog post:
  

      Some details in the blog that provide evidence that this blog meets the standards and expectations of character according to the rubric is the few sentences that state "Hannah gets in trouble and it shows you how sensitive she is. She's afraid of messing up and every time she does something wrong, she feels terrible. This pushes her to work harder and strive to be the best that she can be." This shows the character's personality, how she reacts to certain situations, and what she does because of it.

My goal for next trimester for reading is to slow down and actually read the books while also paying attention to more of the details. I usually just rush through books and I miss a lot of little things. I might also go back and reread some books that I’ve read before, just to see if I would enjoy them more if I paid attention to detail. My goal for writing next trimester is to try and do more of it. I don’t think I’m a very good writer but I believe I could change this but just writing whenever I can, on my own time, just for practice. This should not only allow me to become a better writer but it may also give me more confidence in my work. One area in reading that I need to work on is slowing down and paying more attention to small, but important details. An area in writing where I could use improvement is that I need to make my different ideas connect. I tend to write whatever randomly comes to mind and I could try to make my ideas make more sense, I could add a little more and it could exceptionally change my writing.

Life of Pi by Yann Martel (Setting)

The setting in Life of Pi is very important. Pi is on the ocean, in a boat, with a tiger, for most of the book. This makes the story very interesting and differant than most other books. At one point in the novel, Pi comes across a strange island. The island is very strange and its undiscovered. Pi mentions that without the island, he would have never had survived, but people who hear his story usually don't believe that the island exists.

The imagery within the text is good at showing what exactly is happening to Pi on his journey. The storms that he survives are described amazingly and show just how difficult they were. During the days and nights with calm water, the beauty of the scenery is described with incredible detail. I believe that imagery could be used a little bit more during some parts, but overall, I enjoyed the setting in this novel and it definitely improved the story.

Life of Pi by Yann Martel (Summary)

Over winter break I got the movie "Life of Pi". I really enjoyed this movie and discovered that its based on a book. I decided to try and find a copy of the book and to read it, because I enjoyed the story. I found a copy of "Life of Pi" and began reading it. It starts oout when a small indian boy is born and a family friend teaches him how to swim at a very young age. Then, Pi's father gets a job running a zoo in india.

So far I really enjoy this book. I already know the story, and that interests me, but I also find the author's writing style very unique. The author develops the story very well and uses excelent vocabulary. The way that the book is introduced is very different compared to other books I've read. the author starts off with Pi telling his story about college and Canada and he says somthing about ending up in a hospital in Mexico. He also mentions someone named Richard Parker. Pi doesnt explain who Richard Parker is, why he's in the hospital, or even many details about his college life. He then goes into his childhood and starts telling about his life as a boy.

Thats as far as I've gotten in this book, I can't wait to see how the author explains the great trials that Pi goes through and how he comes out of them.

Trafficked

Trafficked is a novel about a girl named Hannah. Hanna lives in Moldova, a small country near Russia. When Hannah’s parents die and her uncle goes missing, she is left to support her family. Her family is running out of money and her grandmother needs eye surgery. To help make more money, she agrees to go to America and be a nanny for a Russian family while she goes to school at night to become a doctor.

At first, the new family seems very sweet and Hannah fits right in. But after a month in America, Hannah starts to realize that everything isn’t as it seems. She hasn’t been paid, she’s not allowed to leave the house, and she can’t go to school because she has to work 16 hour days cleaning and taking care of the two small children.

That’s as far as I’ve gotten in the book.

A moment in the book that shows the personality of the main character is on the first day that Hannah cares for one of the two small children. Hannah knew she wasn’t supposed to give the little girl an ice cream bar, but somehow the little girl had convinced Hannah to give her one anyway. They were both in the kitchen enjoying the ice cream when the parents and other little kid come home. Hannah rushed to hide what she’d done; she snatched the ice cream from the little girl and threw both ice creams into the garbage. As the parents walked in, the noticed the chocolate on their daughter’s face. Everyone instantly knew what Hannah had done and she felt terrible. The mother of the children tells her daughter to hand over the chocolate, thinking that she still has it. The small girl then tells her mother that Hannah snatched it up and threw it away. Hannah gets in trouble and it shows you how sensative she is. She's afraid of messing up and everytime she does somthing wrong, she feels terrible. This pushes her to work harder and strive to be the best that she can be.