Choice book: Seven Dials

                                                      Characterization

One of the main characters in my book was “Bundle”. Bundle’s real name is Lady Eileen.  Bundle is very brave and curious. During the book even when there were many warnings and it was obvious people didn’t want Bundle investigating the crime, Bundle still investigated. During the story someone Bundle new was framed for suicide by overdose and in another scene while she was driving a man who was shot stumbled out on to the road and was barely avoided by Bundle. Both left indications that the murder had to do with a group called “Seven Dials” but Bundle still investigated and eventually uncovered the culprit. She also is hardworking. Even when it seemed like no one would ever help her out (like when she visits superintendent Battle and it is clear he is holding back) she stills try’s to discover the killer. Or when she is waiting for the Seven Dials meeting to commence and she waits in a cupboard for several hours. One this that seemed odd about the book though was that it felt like all the actual police investigators were idiots. Several times Bundle would find a key piece of information or find a key clue that no competent police investigators would have missed.

                                                               Summary

The book starts off with a group of old millionaires renting out a place called Chimneys with a group of young people. One of the young people has a reputation for sleeping in extra late. The other group of young people decides to prank him. Their plan is to set 8 alarm clocks of at 6:30 in the morning. The alarms go of as planed but without the reaction they were looking for. Time passes and all the alarms go off and Gerry still doesn’t come down. So eventually they discover them Gerry supposedly died by overdosing on chloral. But Bundle isn’t sure. After spending some time in the room he died in she discovers an unfinished letter that talks about a Seven Dials group and being so tired he can barely open his eyes. Bundle is suspicious. Later while driving a apparently drunk man stumbles out on to the road and Bundle has to swerve off to avoid him. Looking back he is lying face down on the road and her immediate reaction is she hit him. She walks up to him and as he dies he mutters about seven Dials and telling her to tell Jimmy Thesiger. But upon a further look by a doctor she finds out he was shot. The book is very interesting and a very good mystery.

book report

Alec Syvrud

Language Arts

Miss. Clear

The Book Thief

The Book Thief is a book that takes place during WWII in Germany. It is told from the perspective of death, which I think is an interesting addition on the book. It’s about a little girl named Liesel Meminger. In the beginning of the book Liesel is being taken to live with her foster parents along with her brother. During the trip Liesels brother dies, giving her much heartache. Later Liesel arrives at her foster parent’s home; her new parents are named the Hubermens. Rosa Hubermen curses constantly and rules the house with an iron fist, she helps the provide an income for the family by doing other peoples washing and ironing, but as the book goes on she starts to lose costumers one by one. Hans Hubermen is Liesels foster father and is very kind and caring much unlike his wife and also addicted to cigarettes. He plays the accordion at pubs and bars to bring in some money, he is also a painter. Liesel often has nightmares about her family, but Hans always wakes her up and calms her down. He helps Liesel learn to read and write using the books that Liesel has stolen. There first book being a book called The Gravediggers Handbook, a book that Liesel stole at her brothers burial, half buried in snow. Liesel quickly becomes friends with the neighboring kids and often joins them in soccer games. Her best friend is a boy named Rudy Steiner. They quickly become good friends and Rudy eventually falls in love with her, and always asks her for kisses. They often hang out and run errands for Liesels mom, or go on trips with other neighborhood boys to steal from local farmers. Liesel secretly is in love with him too, but never really show it at all until the ending. Later Hans Huberman is convinced to hide one of his friends sons, hide a Jewish fighter in their house, his name is Max, Liesel and Max become good friends because they each love words and have nightmares. He writes two books for Liesel and gives her his life story. “The Book Thief” has a very sad ending, but it seems to fit the book perfectly and no questions are left unanswered, also the final line of the book is very interesting and quite odd.

Recommendation:

I really like “The book Thief”. It was very well written and original; It is also very interesting and complex. It the kind of but that gives the reader a much greater appreciation of the topic. It shows you what it was like to live in Germany at the time, especially what it was like for the Jews   I liked how it was written from deaths point of view, it was very unique and almost funny at some points. It was very long but kept adding different elements to the story so that you were never board and always interested with the ever changing story. I liked how the author portrayed death not as a bleak merciless killer, but to actually have sympathy for mankind and actually not want them to die.   The beginning of the book was very thought provoking as it started out with this. Here is a small fact: You are going to die.  I think many people tend to not think about that and try to pretend that death is something that is going to happen to them, and that this is a very good way to get someone interested in the book quickly. All the characters are multi-dimensional and I think some of them could even have their own book based on them, and I think it’s pretty rare when you find a book with side characters in it that could have a book of their own based on their life.  I think a lot of people would find it very interesting, although I don’t think it’s for everyone. Even though the book is very interesting I don’t think some people

Choice book report.

For my choice book report I read the book “Elephant Run”

The main character’s name in my book is Nick Freestone. Nick is the son of Jackson Freestone.

In the beginning of the book Nick lives in London with his mother, but do to Frequent bombing runs Nick is moved to live in Burma with his father at his plantation, Hawks Nest. Not far into the book, while Nick is traveling with his father the Japanese invade Burma. Nick is captured and sent back to Hawks Nest to work for the Japanese, under Colonel Nagayoshi. Nick is very tough and at times stupid, and wants to please his father. On his second day of living in Burma Nick gets kicked by the largest timber elephant on the plantation, Hannibal. Hannibal bruises, and even cracks some of Nick’s ribs. Nick knows never to get to close to Elephant without the Elephants Mahout around ( Someone who takes care of Elephants) and is so embarrassed that he bandages his own ribs and tries to act like it never happened, even though he is in extreme pain. Nick is hardworking too, while he stays captive under the Japanese in Burma he is worked like a slave, with little food and drink, and is beaten regularly by Bukong, an older crippled Japanese man. In the book whenever Nick is asked to do less then pleasant things he willingly accepts, at one point to disguise himself Nick has to shave his head and eye browns completely bald to pretend to be a monks Novice. He is interested in many things and loves to learn.  He spends hours reading and learning about elephants and there Mahouts, and while captive at Hawks Hill one of the only things he likes to do is read through Srg. Sonji’s books and learn about Samurais. Nick risks his life by trying to escape Hawks hill and Save his father and friend’s brother from a P.O.W camp, when there is a good chance of getting caught and dying. While they go to save Nicks father they see him being buried, which Nicks doesn’t know that his father alive, he hardly makes a sound and keeps them all from getting caught and dying. Nick is very kind and understanding too, even when his father could potentially die he is still usually calm and keeps composure. He is very curious about things and this often gets him in trouble, the first thing he should of done when he saw Hannibal was run, but he stayed still and didn’t move and got kicked and cracked several ribs because of it.

 I though the Book was very interesting and was fun to read. It took place in Burma and has a lot of interesting things to learn about the Burmese Culture. Like Elephants and there Mahout riders, or how some people who live there believe nats control things, like crops and need sacrifices to be pleased and grant good weather, crops. The book wasn’t confusing and but still had enough going to keep it interesting. The book had a good length too; it was about 300 pages which seemed just right. It didn’t drag on and get boring, but I was still satisfied with the ending. I like how the book had lots of exciting moments were you were really interested with  what was going on and wondering what was going to happen to the characters.  I like how in the book seems kind of mysterious, at Hawks hill there is a secret passageway  which leads all around the building, with secret gun stashes rubber ear holes for listening in on any conversation. I also liked how the book was written because it was very descriptive and gave you a very good Idea of what it was like to be there and witness the events that went on.  I would recommend this book to people who wanted to learn about Burmese culture, and about elephants and mahouts, there also was some Japanese culture, it talked about Haiku, a form of Japanese poetry. The book was pretty long and had a few parts which were hard to understand so I would probably recommend this to someone in JR High or higher. This would be a good book to read for book group, because I think there are a lot of interesting things to talk and debate about.  I think this book would appeal more to a boy, then a girl because a lot painful things happen and it’s told from a boy’s perspective.  All in all I liked the book and would rate it 4.5/5

herrow

herrow im alec

Choice book report



For my choice book report I chose “The boy who saved baseball” by John H. ritter

The main character’s is Tom Gallagher. The book doesn’t really give a description on him but you can infer that he is an average twelve and a half year old boy who loves baseball. Although he isn’t the best player he works hard and practices every day with his friends to improve his skills. His room is covered in posters displaying his favorite baseball players. Tom is risk taking too, at one point in the story he breaks into his favorite baseball player, Dante Del Gato’s house to ask him if he will help coach their team. He is very brave, He is willing to stand up to the mayor and tell him what he believes and to leave their team alone, and in the final game with two outs tom steps up to the plate, and even though he’s shaking he doesn’t back down and helps his team win. He isn’t the most athletic player on the team, but he is one of the hardest working, he gives his best every day, taking hundreds of grounders in the infield, and swinging a countless number of cuts at the plate. He cares so much about baseball he will do whatever it takes to improve his skills and his teams. He is very quiet and shy, he never really talks very much in the book and spends hours by himself talking about his day and scribbling down drawings in his notebooks. At the end of the book he is standing alone with his crush, Maria and even though it is obvious she likes him he is very shy and has a hard time talking to her. During all the teams’ conversations Tom rarely says anything, and quietly sits listening. He likes myths and superstitions too; in the book there is a prophecy about a man with a secret he must pass on, and a double crosser, which happens to come true in the end. Tom is forgiving and understanding, in the book Del Gato and Cruz De La Cruz both leave there team and disappear in their team’s time of need, but eventually tom understands why and forgives them both for what they did, even though no one else would.

I liked the book. It had a fairly original plot and lots of detail, and there was always chaos and interesting things happening that kept you reading.  I liked that it was told in third person perspective because it really helped you see the big picture and not just see what one person thought of what was going on. I liked the plot because it was about baseball, a sport. I like that it wasn’t the same boring old plot just told in a different time with different characters, it seemed like I was reading something entirely new, with lots of side stories and interesting things going on that keep it interesting and fun to read. The book had very good character development too, in the beginning Del Gato seems angry and unwilling to help the boys but as you start to read more Del Gato turns out to be really nice and caring and works hard to help coach the team and make them a lot better I think the author did a very good job of describing and adding lots of detail too, which made it really feel like a story that could actually happen, ex: “Cruz running his hand along the jagged sections of the torn adobe, the interior of the wall now exposed along the edges of the break, had pieces of straw poking out of the brown clay.” My only critique would be that I think the book is rather short. The ending feels abrupt and I wish there was more, but maybe that’s just because I enjoyed reading it so much I didn’t want it to end. I would recommend this book, to anyone really. It isn’t hard to read and baseball fans would love it, but the central themes are so good so that you don’t have to like baseball to like this book, you just have to like an interesting story. I think that if you have free time you should give this book a try, even if you don’t like baseball. I think this book would also be a great book for little kids, it’s easy to read to read and very appropriate, and has a story I think most younger kids would like. Over all I really liked the book and would recommend it to anyone who likes baseball or wants to read something new with a good plot and good central themes you can learn from.

Memior 2

It was a hot 85 degree day and my friend Carter and I where thinking of things to do. In the woods by my house there was a huge pond and an awesome 3 story tree fort, so I suggested we go there. I put on some flipflops and we started biking over.

First we biked over to my other friend Josh's house and got nets so we could catch turtles and frogs. When we got there I looked across the pond and saw a huge turtle so jumped of my bike and started running over to catch it. Once it saw me it dove under water and started swimming away so lunged for it and got my foot stuck in a bunch of muck. I pulled my foot out as hard as I could and lost my flip flop in the muck. I stuck my foot back in to look for it but unstead I felt a sharp pain and yanked my foot out and saw a bloody peice of glass were I had stepped.

It was pouring out blood and the pain got worse. I quickly got back on my bike and took off for my house. when i got home and showed my mom she called my dad and had him come home, luckily, he works as a podiatrist. After giving me a shot of hydrogen peroxcide and bandeging it up he said I should be ok. It took a full week to heal.

A great vacation..

One day, I came home from school, my parents told me that our family was going to go on a cruise! So we packed our bags and were off. The first step was to get our bags checked and take a 4 hour flight to Florida. After that,we stayed overnight at a hotel and then boarded the ship.


The first day was confusing because the ship is 11 stories and finding everything on the ship takes a while, but after a while you get the ship mapped out. Our first stop was at Nassau, of the Bahamas. There me and my dad got to go snorkeling and see famous peoples houses like Oprah's and Michael Jordan's. Our second stop was at Ocho Rios, Jamaica. There our whole family got to go to Dunn's River Falls, which is a giant water fall you get to climb up.


Our third stop was at Grand Caiman. Me and my dad got to go snorkeling at a ship wreck and a giant reef with tons of beautiful fish. Our fourth and final stop was at Cozumel. All we did there was buy souvenirs. The next day are ship arrived back at Fort Lauderdale and it was time to go home.