Summer reading project post 4- The Book Thief

8/9/2014
          Out of all the books within the Printz Award winners and honor books, I chose this book because it looked interesting, and also when I went to the store to look for a book from the list, the only books I could find were, this book, and 2 other books, which were both romance books that, and I have never read a romance book, i'm not a very romantic person (ask anyone) therefore I don't find any interest in reading romance books. Also I chose this book because I have a German friend who is very sensitive when it comes to the holocaust and I thought reading a book about it and how it was back then might help me understand why and how they feel.
         I would recommend this book to anybody out there who would like to see, or imagine, how life was during the holocaust, because this book has a good depiction of how life was back then, I don't know if it was true or not, but it sure is interesting and detailed. I would also recommend it to anyone who collects books and loves to read (you know who you are), because well, its a book, and on top of that, it's a GOOD book! Also to someone who wants to feel like they're reading a diary, because this is sort of like the grim reapers diary on accounts of events that have happened to a little girl named Liesel.

Summer reading project post 3- The Book Thief

8/9/2014
           "Everyone in his family was crowded together in their family room when he slipped our and made his way to the kitchen. He pulled some charcoal from the stove and gripped it in the smallness of his hands. 'Now.' There was a smile. He was ready. He smeared the charcoal on, nice and thick, till he was covered in black. Even his hair received a once-over.

          In the window, the boy grinned almost maniacally at his reflection, and in his shorts and tank top, he quietly abducted his older brother's bike and pedaled it up the street, heading for Hubert Oval. In one of his pockets, he'd hidden a few pieces of extra charcoal, in case some of it wore off later."

          I chose this small little selection from The Book Thief to try and convince some of you out there reading this blog post, to read the book. The reason I chose this little section of the book is because it seems to be a little interesting. I mean there's a boy who sneaks away from his family while they are in the family room and covers himself in charcoal, steals his brothers bike, and heads off to some place called Hubert Oval (read the book and you'll know what it is). I hope this gets some of you out there to at least consider this book.

Summer reading project post 2- The Book Thief

8/8/2014
          In this post i'll be talking about complex characters in this book, themes the book implies, and how the book is structured. Some complex characters in this book are, Liesel whos backstory is explained in the beginning with her brothers death, and her being dropped off at a foster home to live there, her mother being gone and leaving Liesel with no idea of where she might be or what could have happened to her. All she wants now is to live her life and learn to read and maybe find out where her mother is. Another complex character is Hans Hubermann, we dont know much about Hans Hubermann yet, and I dont know if I can consider him a complex character, he has a background, not that we know much about it except that he learned from some man to play the accordion and that later this man, or what he learned from this man would later save his life, but to me, the idea of not knowing much about him but knowing that all this will happen and we will find out later what it is that will save his life, is what makes him complex. Now onto the theme, I think the theme of this story would be, Always try your hardest no matter what obstacle lay ahead of you.
          I think this because Liesel has to overcome so many obstacles in her life but she never gives up, she had to overcome the inability to read, and being put into the lower grade kids where she stood out like a big giant, and overcoming the move, and maybe later in the story there will be more things that more characters have to overcome, like for instance right now we know that Hans Hubermann will have to avoid death some way. Lastly we'll talk about the structure of the book. It's written sort of like a diary, the grim reapers diary, recording every single important event that has happened in Liesels life, theres even little entries, and summaries of those entries throughout the entire book.

Summer reading project post 1-The Book Thief

8/8/2014
          For my 10th grade summer reading project, I chose to read The Book Thief by: Markus Zusak. This book takes place during the holocaust in Germany where a little girl named Liesel Meminger, and her brother are being given up to a foster family in Munich, on a street called Himmel Street, which is odd because Himmel means heaven in English, but the neighborhood (and Germany at the time) was anything but heaven! However, on the train ride to Munich, Liesels brother becomes very ill, and dies in front of her eyes, which would lead to a haunting memory that would reoccur every night for years in her nightmares. After her brothers death she and her mother make a small funeral for him but have to quickly move on after Liesels mother drags her away from his grave, after Liesel secretly picks up a book on the ground near them as a small memory of her brother, ironically the book is titled "The Grave Diggers Handbook". Finally Liesel arrives at the foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann, home, where she will be spending the next few years until she is off on her own.
          Hans is a very kind man who loves to play the accordion and helps Liesel a lot in adjusting to the new home, he loves to roll and smoke cigarettes and is a very caring person. Rosa is umm... well basically the exact opposite of Hans, she isnt very welcoming at all and has a very short temper, she yells at Liesel and Hans a lot and curses a lot. So far the only conflict I've managed to find in the book as far as I've read, is Liesel losing her brother and having to deal with those nightmares of his death every night, and her adjusting to a new home (mainly because of Rosa I would call this a conflict, read the book and you'll understand). Now after reading just this much of the book I have to ask a few questions, 1. Why is Rosa so mean? 2. Who is narrating the book? I'm sure the first question isn't that important but still, i'm curious about how someone can be like that. As for my second question i have a prediction on who it might be, i'm just assuming its the grim reaper because it says he has seen millions of people die, and more eclipses than he cares to remember.
          This book is pretty easy to connect to in the real world too, because of course the obvious one, the holocaust, and all the movies about the holocaust, and the families that have been affected by it.

The Wizard Heir-post 3

In this weeks reading Seph visits the Alumni house, which after this reading, makes me really hate the Alumni and some wizards. In this reading Seph and Trevor (a friend he made when he first moved in that i forgot to mention last post) decide to take a visit to the Alumni house. Seph is welcomed here because he is a wizard and Leicester wants him to join him. However Trevor is not welcomed here, because he is a non wizard and because of this, it results in him being cornered by all the Alumni until Seph manages to get them to back off. This is kind of like real life though, because when someone is being bullied by a group of people soemtimes it just takes one person to step up for that person to get them to stop. But in this case in the book, Trevor was already effected by something they did to him, estranging him from Seph and now Seph basically has no friends. Its a sad way to end this weeks reading but i havnt gone further yet so, see you all next post!

Blogging Assessment #1

http://andrewtransreadingblog.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-wizard-heir-post-2.html

1. I chose my most recent blog post titled “The Wizard Heir-post 2”. My writers voice is not really that expressed in my blogs, I am still new-ish to blogging but it is improving little by little. Some things that I put in there that do have somewhat of a voice is things like me saying how I like how the author puts a lot of suspense in her books. This doesn’t say a lot about my personality but I’m trying.

2. Some diction that I put into my blog post (I think there was only one) is where I said “in return Seph has to give in to Leicester’s every command.” The word command creates a stronger feeling than saying like; Seph has to do everything Leicester tells him. Command makes it feel like there’s more authority to it and less of an option to disobey. My sentence length is not very long, it ranges from short-medium length, and I just noticed I use a lot of commas. The way I order how I write is I explain a little bit of the story, put in my opinion of what I think she’s doing, explain a little bit more, and so on. It helps the reader understand what I’m talking about when I voice my opinion.

The Wizard Heir-post 2

In this weeks reading Seph is now in the school in the Havens. At first the author made the headmaster of the school (Leicester) seem very nice and welcoming, until of course they arrived at the school. When they arrive Seph soon finds out that he is feared all around the campus, but for reasons unknown. This is one of the things I love about Cinda Williams Chima's books. She always leaves some sort of suspense in everything she writes. It leaves you on the edge of your seat and always make you want to read more.

Anyways back to the story, Sephs first day at school is kind of rough, he is forced to swim in the coldest water imaginable. After a little while of swimming, Sephs powers start to go off and make the freezing water all around him boil and steam. After this all happens and everyone sees it, Leicester seems very pleased about this, and nobody at the school seems to want to talk about what happened. See this part right here where Leicester is all happy about Sephs powers going off and making the water steam and boil, thats some of the suspense she creates (not a good example but it's all I can find for now) it makes you want to read on and find out what he is thinking and why this would make him happy.

Later on like 10 more pages in we find out that Leicester is a wizard like Seph and he can teach him how to use his magic, but in return Seph has to give in to Leicesters every command. Thats as far as i've gotten so ill see you all next post!

P.S.: the havens is not the setting of the school in the first book, i made a mistake.
Book series(more still being written): http://cindachima.blogspot.com/

The Wizard Heir-post 1

In this book it starts off by giving us a little background information, or a recap to refresh our memories of what happened in the first book of this series "The Warrior Heir". So far in this book it has jumped around a lot in the first few pages, then it gets easier to understand. Right now where I am, Seth (main character) is a wizard and he has finally met another wizard and desperately tries to get her to teach him magic. However, there's a twist, and I've noticed Cinda Williams Chima (author) likes to put these in her books, the wizard Seth has met, is a trader for wizards and is kind of bad. She "drugs" him with a thing that causes his powers to go out of control, and he ends up killing all of his friends and burning down a club. After this he is forced to move to Maine and go to a small town school. If you have read the last book then you know that this is no coincidence that he is off to Maine. The city he is going to in Maine is a wizard safe haven, where Seth can learn wizardry without being hunted. Wizards at this time, and all branches of magic, like sorcerers and stuff, are all hunting each other. So far I love these books and I hope there is more after this one, i'm not quite sure if there is or not, and I hope you will love them too.
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/500743.The_Wizard_Heir

Krista Ramsey Column review

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/columnists/krista-ramsey/2014/03/22/krista-ramsey/6760681/
This column is about a newly wed couple who the husbands stepmother died recently after their marriage, and his father in jail, this leaves the twin 8 year old daughters of the late stepmother all alone, which is where this couple comes in and decides to adopt them. They used to live in horrible conditions and were isolated, so this causes many problems when they are first adopted, they are forced to have to be home schooled instead of going to public school, and they did not know how to deal with most things.

 

"In an instant, her twin 8-year-old daughters – Ryan's half-sisters, Isabel and Elizabeth Moore – needed not only love and understanding, but also a home." This is in my opinion the most important line of the column. This line provides a good understanding of what the girls are feeling and makes the reader feel empathetic towards them and want to continue to read on.

 I think that Krista Ramseys writing style uses a lot of logos and ethos. I think theres a lot of logos because in the first column about eyesight we read, it talks about statistics and research of how electronics can affect your eyesight and that going outside more and spending less time on electronics can help save your sight. I also think there is a lot of ethos because like in the second column about the dressing up, it talks about how people would feel if for a important ceremony or funeral or something like that, people would dress up casually in jeans and a t-shirt, and makes you realize how they would feel, making you want to dress up for those occasions next time. Also there is ethos in this third column about the adopting, because in this column it describes the details of the twin girls situations and tells of their age. The situation of the girls already makes you feel empathetic enough, but then she adds in that they are only 8 years old, making you realize that there is nothing they can do for themselves, and need help.

 

3 questions i would want to ask Krista are:

1. Did you go to college or did you start this column writing career straight out of highschool?

2. What inspires you to write about all this stuff?

3. Do you yourself ever get emotional when writing about things like the adoption column in the link at the top?

Fahrenheit 451-Montag

Montag is a dynamic character who is very curious and he's starting to change his opinions on how life is in the book. "Was-was it always like this? The firehouse, our work? I mean, well, once upon a time..." this quote is a good example of how he is curious and starting to think differently because he is questioning if things were always like the way they are. You can also tell that he is changing because at the beginning he is burning books and enjoying it but now he is starting his own little collection of books. Montag is also confused about himself, he doesnt know how he feels and you know this because in the book it says "'I am, very much in love!' He tried to conjure up a face to fit the workds, but there was no face. 'I am!'" and this is a good example of his confusion because in this part he is talking to his wife, yet he doesnt even know if he loves his wife, he says he does, but he cant even make an expression of his face to show it, on the inside he knows he doesnt love her so he cant show that he does.