Book Review #1

Hanna, Daniella

October 31,2016

English, Period 4

Book Review #1

The Giver

Lois Lowry

Realistic Fiction

225 Pages 

John Newberry Medal

 

            The novel The Giver, by Lois Lowry, is a fictional book about an eleven year old boy, Jonas, who lives in a world where every little thing is organized to the maximum. There are different communities in this world but they all operate differently. There are rules where every single etiquette is required, from apologizing for the smallest things to eating at certain times and talking about certain things. There are many words in Jonas’ community that people don’t know, such as colors and shapes, which makes it a very simple place where not many descriptions are used. Jonas is getting ready for his ceremony of the Twelves where he will be assigned his job, while his little sister, Lily, is getting ready for the Eights. Jonas’ dad is a nurturer and is taking care of a child named Gabriel who is growing much slower than everyone else so his father decides to bring him home not knowing that him and Jonas would soon become very fond of each other. During Jonas’ ceremony his name is skipped when it approaches his turn. He believes it is a mistake but he soon finds out it was not. At the end of the Twelves’ ceremony the Chief Elder announces that Jonas was not assigned to a job but he has been selected for one of the most important roles in their community: The Receiver of Memory. This role gives Jonas new rules in life and during every one of his trainings, Jonas’ instructor, The Giver, transmitted new memories to him about things he never knew existed. Jonas had become something very important in his community because if any of his memories that he had received were to be released to the community every person would have memories of pain, violence, and things they wouldn’t be able to comprehend. As well as receiving many new memories, Jonas also learns many new things, such as what a release is in his community, and what happened to the last person chosen as The Receiver in their community, Rosemary. Jonas, growing very fond of the child Gabriel, has started to transmit some of his own calming memories to Gabe to  help him sleep at night. When Jonas finds out that Gabe may be subjected to a release, which Jonas now knows means his death, Jonas decides to include Gabe in his plan of releasing his memories to the community so that they are all aware of everything going on in this world whether good or bad. Jonas takes Gabe onto his bike as he rides far from the community until he is far enough to where the memories are no longer just his but now the whole communities. The book ends as Jonas is going through many adversities on journey but he feels it’s worth it to save Gabe and let everyone experience the things they never knew existed.

            This book includes many great things as well as bad things. Something I really liked was how the author made it seem so realistic even though there is no community like this in the real world. The author goes into every detail describing Jonas’ thoughts throughout every scene and it just makes the book much more appealing to read when you are able to imagine every setting and everything that is going on. Something I didn’t like about this book was the amount of suspension between each chapter or scene and the way everything was so perfectly set in this community. Some people may like the way the author suspends things and makes you want to keep going but I’ve never really liked that style of writing very much. I didn’t like that even though all the people were use to this type of life, they did not have the freedom they needed to live a great life. Many things that would’ve made their lives much more animated and full of description rather than simple and plain were kept from them and the rules made in their community were very strict and made it very hard to be any different or unique from the rest of the people in the community. I did not really like the ending of the book because it leaves you in suspense. Although the rest of the book is amazingly written, the ending made me mad because after going through all that reading about Jonas’ hardships through getting away from his community, the book ends when Jonas is going down a hill going further away as he starts to hear music and people singing but he thinks it may just be an echo. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys semi realistic fiction but with a big twist. Anyone who enjoys fictional books with much suspension and detail would like this book because it does keep you wanting more and it makes you feel like you are lost in another world where the details create a whole new setting for you and you feel like you are right there in the book experiencing it all. The book ends in suspension as Jonas is leaving and make you want to read the sequel right away: “Behind him, across vast distances of space and time, from the place he had left, he thought he heard music too. But perhaps it was only and echo.”

Book Review #1

Abagi, Karen

October 31, 2016

English, Period 4

The House of the Scorpion

Nancy Farmer

Science Fiction

380 pages

Newbery Award Winner, Newbery Honor, and National Book Award

         Matteo Alacrán is not like everyone else, he is a clone. He is a cell split and divided inside a Petri dish and put inside a cow from which he is born from. He is the clone of Matteo Alacrán, also known as El Pátron. El Pátron is the drug lord who lives in Opium, Mexico. Unlike most clones Matt was given a brain. Clones were usually born with brains, but after birth they were to be brain dead. The novel The House of the Scorpion talks about Matteo's life from birth to age fourteen. Little Matteo lived in the poppy fields with a cook/maid named Celia ever since he was born. Everyday Celia would go to work and lock him at home. He was taught to never ever to talk to people outside the house; she told him all the people were bad and cruel. Matt wakes up one morning thinking it's a normal day but little did he know his whole life was about to change. Three kids show up at his door, 6 year old Matt was hungry for company and decided to rebel against the rules. Since the door was locked he decided to break the window but while doing so he fell out the window and had glass shards in his skin. The three kids Steven, Emilia, and Maria took Matt to the Opium estate but to his surprise the maid Rosa threw him out. That was the moment he and everyone else had learned he's a clone. After that he was treated differently, he was treated like an animal. Since Celia didn't know where he was she could not rescue him. Rosa had kept him in an empty room with sawdust; it was like he lived in a chicken pen. Maria was his only friend and she rescued him. After several months Maria told Celia, who told El Pátron. Matt was in terrible shape and when El Pátron saw he had Rosa turned into an eejit, a brainless slave. After that day Matt lived in luxury. From that point on he was educated, fed, and was spoiled with presents on his birthdays. The only thing that wasn't smooth like butter in his life was the looks he got for being a clone, but he learned to deal with it. At age fourteen Matt finally learned why clones were made, he had learned the hard way. They were made to replace body parts especially the brain and heart. El Pátron had a heart attack and Matt knew what would happen, he would die if he couldn't help it.

           The House of the Scorpion was a great book! I didn't give out the ending of the book because I feel like you should read it yourself to find out whether he escaped his fate or not. It was a very creative unusual topic, the clone of a drug lord. I mean who would ever think of that topic without a reason behind it. I wonder what inspired the author, Nancy Farmer. I feel like it emphasizes the teaching of not judging. Everyone judged Matt for being a clone, they thought he was different, they thought he was an animal. In reality Matt was just as normal as everyone else. As much as I loved the book I felt like it was elongated. The book would have been perfect if the author had shortened the story a bit. There were so many details, characters, and settings it became like mush. Overall I would recommend this book. It was an amazing book and if you decide to read it I hope you like it.

Abrahamian, Peter

Book Review #1

 Period 4

31 October 2016

A Wrinkle in Time

Madeleine L’Engle

Science Fiction

232 pages

Newbery Award

            The novel, A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle is the story of Meg Murry, a teenager who is sent on an adventure through time and space with her younger brother Charles Wallace and her friend Calvin O’Keefe to rescue her father from a planet called Camazotz with the help of the three W’s. At the beginning of the book, Meg is an unattractive, weird, deliberate, but loving girl, troubled by lack of confidence and her worries about her father, who has been missing for over a year. The plot begins with an unexpected visit from a woman called Mrs. Whatsit. She frightens Meg’s mother, an attractive and intelligent woman, by encouraging her of the actuality of a tesseract- a “wrinkle” in space and time. On the next evening, Meg and Charles Wallace, an extraordinary and smart boy, walked over to Mrs. Whatsit’s cabin; on the way, they meet Calvin O’Keefe, a tall, handsome, and athletic boy that goes to Meg’s school.The three children learn from Mrs. Whatsit and her friends Mrs. Who and Mrs. Which about a great evil that is terrorizing space called the Dark Thing. The three Mrs. W’s transport the children to Camazotz to rescue Meg’s father and bring him back home. On Camazotz, the children realize that everything appears and moves in the same way because the whole planet is being controlled by IT, a giant bodiless brain. Charles Wallace tries to fight IT but is defeated by the evil and is in now control of IT; Charles Wallace leads Meg and Calvin to Mr. Murry and together they challenge IT. However, they, too, are not able to survive IT’s power; they escape when Mr. Murry appears and grasps Meg and Calvin, “tessering” away with them to a planet called Ixchel inhabited by tall beast who take care of travelers. During the transportation to Ixchel, Meg was caught in the Dark Thing and was paralyzed; one of the beasts cured Meg from paralysis and took care of  her until the three W’s showed up. Mrs. Which tells Meg that she has one ability that IT does not have but will have to figure it out on her own; when standing face-to-face with IT, Meg realizes that the ability that IT does not have is the ability to love. Therefore, by showing her love for Charles Wallace, she is able to bring him back to his normal self; Meg releases Charles from IT’s control and tessers with him through time and space, landing in her twin brother’s vegetable garden on Earth, where her father and Calvin stood waiting. The family joyfully reunites and gets an unexpected visit from the three W’s to congratulate them for their accomplishment.

      One of the things I liked about the book is its plot; it was interesting to see Meg and her companions traveling around space and time with the three W’s to save Meg’s father from the clutches of evil. What I also liked was the science involved in this book; learning about the different dimensions were very fascinating to learn about and some fun facts scattered around the book were also very compelling to learn about like the order of the elements according to its atomic number, square roots of unusual numbers such as five and seven, and the reciting of the Gettysburg Address. What I appreciate about the book was its magnificent use of vocabulary. I had to search up over twenty words just to understand what was going on. This book has extended my vast knowledge of vocabulary. Words like deliberate,  exclusive, and inadvertently were compulsive words that were unknown to me. What I didn't like about the book was its length and religious remarks. People who are atheist or another religion will be offended by the Christian remarks made in this book. This book could be improve if it was a little bit longer and if it didn't involve any form of any religion. The ending of the book was very satisfying to me. The whole family reunites after Meg saves Charles Wallace from the evil clutches of IT. Mr. Murry has finally returned from his prison and nobody is happier than Meg. I would recommend this book to people who love Science Fiction. The plot is amazing and the vocabulary is magnificent. The characters each have their own unique personality that makes the book more fascinating. 

Wasylyn, Nina
 Book Review #1
 Period 4
 31 October 2016                                    


                                          A Wrinkle in Time

Madeline L’engle

Fantasy

232 pages

John Newberry Medal 

The novel, A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeline L’engle, is about three children who travel throughout the universe trying to save their father. Meg, short for Megan, and Charles Wallace, her five year old baby brother, travel to find their father along with their friend Calvin, a tall, skinny boy with orange hair and blue eyes. Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which are the three magical old ladies who tesser the children through time, dimensions, and galaxies. To tesser is a way to travel using a fifth dimension. They travel to a new planet in a new galaxy called Camazotz. They believe that is where their father is being kept. Mrs Whatsit, Who, and Which leave the children to find their father on their own. On Camazotz, everything is perfect and in place and it doesn’t seem right. All the children out in front of their houses, which all look the same, are all bouncing a ball or jumping rope in the same exact rhythm. The children continue walking down the street until they see the CENTRAL Central Intelligence, which is the main center of the planet. They sneak inside but get caught. Charles Wallace tries to be brave but gets hypnotized and now is a part of this crazy, perfect city. They learn that the main control of the planet is called the IT. Meg and Calvin are still in search for the father, and find him in this glass cylinder which is dark inside so he cannot see. Meg realizes she has Mrs Who’s spectacles which allow her to walk through the glass and see her father in the darkness. Meg, Calvin, and Mr. Murry, her father, try to take control of Charles Wallace but he will be a part of IT forever if they do. They tesser out of Camazotz into this new, dark planet. They regain consciousness with the help of faceless beasts. Mrs Whatsit, Who, and Which come to give them support because they are going back to Camazotz, but they only allow Meg to. Once Meg is there, she gets to the IT and finds Charles Wallace. Mrs Which told her the only way to defeat the IT is with something that she has that the IT doesn’t. That’s love. Meg explains how much she loves Charles Wallace and he is freed from IT.  

This book did not appeal to me in any way. I didn’t like the fact that it is so fantasized because I had to go back and read something many times because it’s so confusing. The ending of the book to me was not exciting or interesting either. The end was kind of short and nothing special. Meg was thinking about what she had that the IT didn’t have, and the IT is just a giant computer that looks like a brain,  so I thought it was going to be something like friendship or love,  and it was. It wasn’t a surprise; nothing in the book was a surprise. There were no twists in the plot or characters which would have made the book interesting. I was bored and only reading because I had to not because I wanted to learn more about the story. If a friend wanted to read it, I would not recommend it. It was so annoying to me that I didn’t want to read it, and then I procrastinate and then I have to do it all the day or two before it’s due.