Catching Fire

I actually finished the second book in the Hunger Games trilogy a while ago, but I was traveling a little bit and then with it being Christmas, I didn't get a chance to write my response right away. As it turns out, I'm about 3/4 of the way through Mockingjay at the moment, but I'm hoping I can keep the plots and events separate enough in my mind to have this be strictly Catching Fire. That being said, these are my thoughts: there was so much about this book that completely surprised me. I honestly didn't see so many of the twists and turns coming (spoiler alert: making the victors go back into the Games? Wow. I was literally blown away.) I loved the surprises and I loved the plot of this one; I became even more endeared to the characters and couldn't wait to keep reading and see what would happen to them in this new, elevated in government-control Panem. The "spark" created by Katniss at the end of The Hunger Games grows into a full-fledged Capitol problem that becomes an even bigger problem for Katniss, Peeta, and the residents of District 12. I think I can say that I loved this book just as much as the first one, despite the fact that it ends with a cliffhanger that stopped my heart momentarily....but more on that when I finish Mockingjay and write about that one.

Historical Fiction Challenge Books

I wanted to get a jumpstart on this Historical Fiction Challenge by beginning my list for this year. I'm sure it will change and I'll add to it as I think of more, but these are my candidates so far:

1. The Boy Who Dared - Susan Campbell Bartoletti
2. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry - Mildred Taylor
3. Out of the Dust - Karen Hesse
4. Night - Elie Wiesel
5. Maus I - Art Spiegelman
6. Maus II - Art Spiegelman
7. Number the Stars - Lois Lowry
8. Newes from the Dead - Mary Hooper
9. Sarah's Key - Tatiana de Rosnay
10. Stepping on the Cracks - Mary Downing Hahn
11. Chains - Laurie Halse Anderson
12. Caddie Woodlawn - Carol Ryrie Brink
13. What I Saw and How I Lied - Judy Blundell
14. Redeeming Love - Francine Rivers
15. Bright Young Things - Anna Godbersen

YA Historical Fiction Challenge

I was catching up on my blogs this afternoon and stumbled across this challenge for 2011. Since I have an interest in both English and History, I'm pretty intrigued. There are three options for this challenge (5 books, 10 books, or 15 books) and even though 15 Historical Fiction books seems a little daunting, I've got an entire year and I feel like I can do it. So, I choose Level 3. Considering the fact that I have several Historical Fiction books in my possession that I need to read and plenty more on my list, I don't think it will be hard. And I'm excited!

Soldier's Heart

We just finished this book as a read-aloud in my Honors classes during a unit on the Civil War. I'd never heard of it - although I have always loved Gary Paulsen's books - but I really loved this book. More importantly, my students loved this book. From the very first chapter, they were fully engrossed and involved in the plot and the fate of the main character. Even my girls, who I wouldn't typically think of as being interested in a book about a war, were hanging on every word and became just as attached to the main character, Charley, as my boys. The history teachers were doing a unit on the Civil War at the same time, and they came to us one day after school to say that their students who are reading the book with us couldn't stop talking about it, and were constantly making connections between the content they were learning in history class and what they had already learned from this novel. I highly recommend this one, although I do have a few words of warning/caution: there are a couple of swear words sprinkled throughout the book, which only becomes a problem if you're reading it aloud to your class first thing in the morning and you haven't previewed it beforehand (oops). There's also a lot of pretty shocking violence and bloody parts...certainly no more than they've seen before on TV but again, it becomes more of an issue when you're reading it aloud. It's just one of those where you may need to preview the kids beforehand to lessen the emotional blow. But overall, really great book.

The Hunger Games

Well...I finished it. And it took me hardly any time at all because, let's be serious, it's one of best books I've ever read. It also helped that I had benchmark testing all day Monday and my only job was to literally sit and watch my kids take a test. All day long. So, clearly, I got a lot of reading done. Honestly though, this book is incredible. One of my friends described it as being the perfect book for a middle schooler - boy or girl - because it has the extreme action and disbelief of teenagers fighting to the death, but there's also a romance. I have to admit that I was completely engrossed in the romance, and I plan to start the catchphrase/clothing line of "Team Peeta" and "Team Gale," since I'm not much of a vampire/Twilight fan and I'm tired of their slogans. I would also like to take this moment to say that I'm Team Peeta all the way.

My heartfelt and serious evaluation of this book is that it's great for several reasons: it sucks you in immediately, it's different from basically anything else out there right now, it appeals to both middle school - and adult - boys AND girls, and it's extremely timely. That last reason is just my own personal opinion, but I have to say that I think it's interesting that this series seems to be a commentary and why you shouldn't have big government...but we'll save the political discussion for Book 3 I suppose. For now, let me just say that you should definitely stop whatever you're doing and right now go find a copy of The Hunger Games. And start reading.

Finally!

Just wanted to announce that I'm finally reading The Hunger Games! This has probably been over a year of waiting...waiting for a break in my school schedule and then waiting for the last book to come out so I can buy the boxed set and just read them straight through, and then waiting to finish my master's thesis project so I won't be distracted by literature, and then waiting to finish Percy Jackson because I didn't follow my own rules and started an addicting series while working on my master's thesis project. But, the time has come and all of those things are done, my boxed set has been staring at me expectantly since August, and I'm almost 200 pages in. So far, I love it. For those of you who have read it, Katniss just went through her first individual meeting with the Gamemakers. For those of you who haven't...oops. Spoiler alert. Find a copy and start reading it yourself.

Christmas Book Ideas

One of the blogs I keep up with, Hope is the Word, recommended these Christmas books. I'm not sure when I'll have a chance to look at them myself, but even if it's to just file them away in my mind/reading list so I can have them for the future, I'm kind of excited. I like Christmas books :)

-The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas - Madeleine L'Engle
-The Light at Turn Rock - Julia L. Sauer
-Voices of Christmas - Nikki L. Grimes
-Christmas Day in the Morning - Pearl S. Buck

Percy Jackson: The Last Olympian

Well, ladies and gentlemen, the time has finally come. I've finished the Percy books. One of my students informed me this morning, after I announced this wonderful news, that there's a whole other Percy series now. Well to that I say, "bah humbug," and I'm taking a break from Olympus. I'm sure I'll read them at some point, but not now. Anyway...I'm sure you'll be happy to know that I got everything I wanted out of this one - oops...minor spoiler. I really enjoyed this book, despite the fact that it's mostly battle scenes. Honestly, I'm typically one of those girls who loves watching battle scenes in movies and miniseries, but not so much reading them. I have a hard time picturing it, I think. I did enjoy these though, and felt like Riordan broke a lot of the action up with plenty of commentary, Percy thoughts, and enough description that you could feel like you know what's going on. There were also plenty of battle sequences in which I had no idea what was going on, but it didn't really matter. I still got the gist, and I think most YA readers would too. I have to be a teeny bit honest and say that there were moments when I felt like things wrapped up a little too easily, leaving semi-cheesy moments - just my own opinion - but it's the fifth book of the series and the poor guy was just trying to come up with some closure so I guess I'll let it slide. All in all: great conclusion, great series, and great characters. I love these characters. I refer to Percy as if he's a real person in my life, and my students get a little weirded out I think. Hey, I'm just modeling what engaged reading looks like.

Smiles to Go

Smiles to Go, by Jerry Spinelli, was one of my book fair purchases. As has become the routine, I finished the fourth Percy book and didn't have the fifth at home with me, so I grabbed this one off the shelf. I bought it on a whim that day at the book fair; I hadn't ever heard about it but the name of Jerry Spinelli caught my attention - I've heard so much about him but never read any of his books - and the summary on the back of the book intrigued me. Despite what I thought was a slowish start, I really loved this book. The characters were sincere and relateable, and I laughed out loud all throughout the story as topics such as friendship, sibling fighting and the woes of unreturned crushes pester the main character. A tragic but realistic surprise towards the end of the book endears you to the characters even more (even in the face of somewhat predictable responses to the tragedy) and the final pages even made me cry. As my first Jerry Spinelli book, I was thoroughly impressed, and am now extremely interested in reading some more of his work. Any suggestions?

Percy Jackson: The Battle of the Labyrinth

This is the fourth and second-to-last book in the Percy Jackson series, and Percy continues to battle monsters, halfblood friends turned evil, and the rise of a falled Titan lord trying to destroy the world alongside his best friends Annabeth, Tyson, and Grover. I shared in my last Percy post that I thought the third book lacked some of the umph that I loved so much in the first two books, and just as I predicted the umph is back. To be honest, I found that there were points throughout the plot that could have been a little bit faster or more interesting, and there were also moments where I questioned the success of the sheer number of scrapes and difficult situations Percy is presented with - the monsters are neverending in the labryinth - but I was pleased overall. To be honest about something a little bit more petty...I'm slightly worried about the presence of this Rachel Elizabeth Dare character and how she may affect the romance I've been waiting for between Percy and Annabeth. I like Rachel and all...but if she ruins the story line I've been waiting like an eleven year old girl for since Book 1, I'll be pretty put out.

I also want to take this moment to point out that THREE of my male students are now reading The Lightening Thief. After reading Percy in front of them for the last four weeks, using Percy passages as examples during my lessons, and shamelessly advertising Percy, I'm choosing to take full responsibility. And I'm basking in this proud teacher momma moment, thank you.

Shooting the Moon

This is another of the books that I picked up from the Book Fair last week simply because I had written it on my list at some point, but I couldn't really remember why I had been interested in it. When I left the next Percy book at school instead of taking it home over the weekend and I needed something to read, I figured that this one was short and would do the trick. And honestly...it took me a little bit to get into. Not because it wasn't interesting or engaging, and not because I didn't bond with the characters, because it is and I did. It took me a little bit to get into it because it isn't really filled with adventure or far-fetched plot devices that surprise and twist and turn, and while I thought that was a shortcoming at first I now disagree. The characters in this book are real, and feel real. Readers get to spend 163 short pages watching a 12-year-old girl deal with the complexities of her brother going away to a controversial war (Vietnam). She watches as her father contradicts so many things that she has spent her whole life believing about him. She finds an escape in a new hobby that also gives her the opportunity to feel much closer to her brother who is so far away. And even though there aren't the complexities of some adventure novels or the latest mind-bending movie, Shooting the Moon is simplistically true, and wholesome in its illustration of the bond of family. By the time I reached the concluding chapter, I had turned from feeling bored and fairly uninterested in the plot to feeling as if I am a part of this fictional family.

Smile

I finally got the opportunity to dive into my very first graphic novel this weekend. After hearing lots and seeing the interest that kids have in them as a genre, I've been pretty interested in trying them out for a while but hadn't really made the time. A kid in one of my classes read this one last week and loved it; he would bring it to me every day and tell me what was happening and show me all the bloody pictures that he thought were awesome. He had my interest level pretty high, but then when the Book Fair came and I saw it there, I figured it was probably fate and I should get it. Despite the fact that it's about 215 pages long, I managed to read this entire book on Saturday night in about an hour and a half or so (yes, I know that it's a graphic novel written for pre-teens and I am a grown adult, but let me savor this accomplishment). I am officially a fan of graphic novels, and of this one in particular. It's an autobiography, which is pretty cool, and follows the author through her middle school years as she battles the normal issues and turmoils of those ages while also dealing with repeated and prolonged dental surgeries that come as a result of an accident that happens towards the beginning of the book. Middle schoolers should find this book really interesting because A.) it's a graphic novel, and they're pretty much all about them these days, B.) it's got a lot of blood and graphic dental trauma (makes it much more interesting and cool for boys who typically wouldn't choose a story about a girl), and C.) it's a true story that describes someone's real life struggles and issues and horrors that came with being in middle school. There's something very comforting about reading about other people discovering that their friends are cruel and switching crushes from day to day and realizing their crush doesn't know they exist and dealing with the trauma of awkward phases that inevitably happen in middle school. All of that is extremely relevant to kids this age, and this book provides a realistic and comforting view of all of it. I highly recommend this one.

Percy Jackson: The Titan's Curse

I'm cruising right along with my Percy obsession, but this third book in the series actually disappointed me a little bit. It wasn't bad and I didn't hate it, but I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as the preceding two. Adventure and excitement was still there, and it wasn't really lacking in plot, and there were plenty of new characters and twists and turns to keep me interested...but for whatever reason, I just wasn't. I think a lot of this reason actually had to do with Annabeth - one of my favorites - being M.I.A. for almost the entire book. I also just honestly think this one might be that necessary and unavoidable transition book, right smack dab in the middle of a five-book series. The plot has to mellow at some point so it can climb back up again and end with a bang. My opinion is that this is where that happened, and that's okay. I've got a lot of faith in Book 4.

Book Fairs are Pretty Swell

Nope. Haven't finished the book I'm reading yet and I don't have a new one to review yet, but I wanted to share that I spent a small fortune at my middle school's book fair today. Apparently that's the problem with being a teacher: you get take your kids to the book fair three different times, and you get to stare at all those books you want all day long. So regardless of how strong I felt during 1st block this morning...I was a goner by 4th block. I didn't resist the book fair's power, but I am pretty darn excited about these books (besides, my boyfriend said I was allowed to buy books. So there.)

Here's what I got:
-Tears of a Tiger - Sharon Draper
-Shooting the Moon - Frances O'Roark Dowell
-Antsy Does Time - Neal Shusterman
-Smile - Raina Telgemeier
-The Wednesday Wars - Gary Schmidt
-Smiles to Go - Jerry Spinelli

Percy Jackson: The Sea of Monsters

As promised, I read the next Percy Jackson book, The Sea of Monsters, next. And I loved it just as much as the first one. Honestly, I laugh out loud when I read these books. They're so clever and witty and...hilarious. Even for me, someone quite a bit older than the target audience. This one launches right into a new plot, finding Percy at the end of the following school year at a new private school. It's his last day of school and he's gone completely accident and expulsion free for a whole school year (a first for him), until he goes to P.E. and....weird things start happening. And that's all I'll say about that, because it's a fun opening scene and I don't want to spoil it. Just like the first book, Sea of Monsters has a lot of twists and turns and fun new mythological stories to keep you guessing and appropriately confused. Fun new monsters come into the mix, and some interesting and problematic issues from the first book carry over into this one. New developments between Percy and Annabeth are hinted at throughout the book, which made the middle school girl in me pretty excited. We'll see what happens there, though, because a surprise cliffhanger of an ending may mess with that a little bit...which would make the middle school girl in me fairly put out. Despite being slightly shorter, Book 2 is just as exciting, fun, and engaging as Book 1, and I can't wait for the developments that take place in Book 3. (Yep. I'm continuing in this Percy rut 'till the bitter end. Diary of a Wimpy Kid will just have to keep waiting.)

Percy Jackson: The Lightening Thief

Before this book became a movie, I had never heard of it. After it became a movie, I felt like it was all I heard about. To be honest, Fantasy/Science Fiction has never really been a genre that interested me, but I saw so many kids reading these books and saw them on so many classroom bookshelves that I figured it would be smart to have an opinion about them if I'm ever asked. And honestly, my opinion is that I love this book. It's immediately interesting and confusing in a way that you can't put it down because you'll be bugged as you go throughout the rest of the day wondering why the toilet exploded or how the bully ended up in the fountain. It is very well written...clever and catchy and it sucks you right in. I also really appreciated that it's not obvious. I'm not a young adult or a middle school student, and sometimes when adults read books written for younger people the twists and turns don't really seem too twisty or turny. This book, though, kept me guessing and thinking and trying so hard to remember something about Greek mythology or put together a piece of the puzzle before Riordan revealed it...but I usually wasn't able to and ended up being as surprised as he had intended. This book is good. So good that I have abandoned the plan and am not reading Diary of a Wimpy kid next. I'm sure that that book is great too and I'll have all kinds of encouraging and interesting things to say about that series...but for now, I'm starting Percy Jackson: The Sea of Monsters.

Teach With Your Heart

Simply put: this book is awesome. I feel like it goes without saying - or it should, anyway - that I'm a huge fan of the movie Freedom Writers, and am also therefore a huge fan of the book, The Freedom Writers' Diary - which I should probably add on here... - but I hadn't gotten a chance to read this one, Erin's memoirs, until this fall. That's partially because I didn't even know that it existed until this summer. But I bought it and started reading it at the beginning of fall, when I also started my student teaching semester, and it was a great choice. In those first couple of weeks before I took over the classroom and it was a little bit more laidback, I ate this book up. It's so good and so inspiring and so...interesting. I loved reading about everything she did and every struggle she had - and finding that I was having many of the same - and every extra effort she went through to go above and beyond for her students in order to help them learn. I think this is where I would like to soapbox a little bit and say that it's been extremely frustrating to be around some teachers who grumble and complain and talk about their students in ways that no parent or administrator should ever overhear, and this book is a refreshing change of pace, showing that caring about your students is possible. And maintaining that spirit even if you happen to get a job where you're surrounded by people who don't share your spunk is possible. And working a little bit - or a lot - more than the typical teacher so that your struggling students who have nothing going for them is worth it. Because, let's be serious, there are a whole lot of teachers who don't even put the minimum amount of effort or heart into it. So yes, this book is awesome. And yes, I highly recommend it. And yes, I believe that the things that she accomplishes in her career are possible if you actually try to make it happen. It's amazing how much students respond to you when they know you genuinely care about them.

The Outsiders

After hearing about this book for what felt like my whole life, I finally got to read it this summer. (I know...I've gotten a little behind in posting these.) Despite the fact that the dialog is, honestly, a little dated, this book is pretty great and I really enjoyed it. This book explores the cliques and gangs that exist amongst high school kids, and in this plot - and, often, in real life as well - it's the haves versus the have-nots. The story is told from the point of view of Ponyboy Curtis, a young member of the Greasers who is being raised by his two older brothers and under the leadership and example of several rowdy boys who are less than perfect. When disaster strikes, though, the gang bonds together and fights for each other against some incredibly overwhelming odds. This book would be a great instrument for teaching friendship, loyalty, and character development. It's also excellent for appealing to middle school students who may come from adverse backgrounds and be exposed to gangs. Gangs are an integral and primary part of the plot of The Outsiders, but Hinton writes it in such a way that it's not extremely controversial or inappropriate for young students. There is some mild language and there is a murder in the beginning of the book, but if you are concerned about exposing your students to the controversies of Gangsterz or other books similar, then this would be a great second option. I actually had the priviledge of observing a 7th grade English classroom today that is currently reading this book, and the kids were thoroughly engaged and interested in this book. And these were students that I have had the priviledge of teaching before, and who are extremely difficult to engage; they also unfortunately all have lives somewhat similar to the characters in this book, which made it easily and instantly relateable. I highly recommend this book (and the movie, which is basically the word for word script of the book...and which has some extremely amusing footage of teenage Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Emilio Estevez, etc.)

Boy

Boy, Roald Dahl's autobiography focusing on his childhood, is a humorous story that describes many isolated events and stories from his memories that are eerily similar to the stories that have become the plots of his novels. People who are huge fans of Dahl's work - like me - will enjoy this book and find the ways his life inspired so many of his plots amusing...but I honestly wasn't as swept away by this one as I was anticipating. My expectations may have been too high because of my love for his other books, but I just didn't find it to be at the same level as his novels. I did, though, still enjoy this one, and think it would be an excellent choice for a middle school student, especially if you are assigning or teaching a unit on autobiographies or nonfiction. Regardless of my slight disappointment, this is still a good book and would be interesting and engaging for middle school students, especially rambunctious and adventurous boys.

The Lovely Bones

I'm a little delayed in posting this, but I read The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold over the summer, and was pretty disappointed. This was one of those books that I'd heard about for years and always been intrigued by, and finally had the opportunity to actually read. It was a very interesting plot and it definitely kept me interested, but there was too much content that I found inappopriate and unnecessary for middle school students. The plot of the novel is by nature fairly advanced and inappropriate for young students, but I thought this Sebold took the content to places that were unneccessary (quite a bit of teenage sex, pedophilic fantasies, strange depictions of life after death, etc.). It's an interesting book, but I would definitely not recommend it for middle school students.

Durango Street

The book Durango Street, written by Frank Bonham, focuses on the struggles of a teenage boy who leaves juvenile detention and immediately faces the danger of gangs in his neighborhood. When members of a gang attack Rufus on his first night home, he is faced with the impossible decision of whether to join a rival gang in order to gain the protection it would provide, or attempt to survive on his own.

I first heard of this book through the movie Freeedom Writers, in which the teacher gives this book to her students in order to draw them into the literature and give them a plot they could relate to on a personal level. For that reason, and the fact that I saw this plot as one that would be more interesting to male students, I was very interested in reading this book myself. Although there were some dry-ish spots throughout the book in which I had a difficult time engaging with the content, I really enjoyed it overall. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that the entire book remains almost entirely clean from inappropriate content, which is always appreciated. I also see male students being completely interested and engaged with this plot.

Bone by Bone by Bone

Bone by Bone by Bone, written by Tony Johnston, is a tale exploring the horrors of racism in the South during the 1950s. The young boy who narrates the book, David, lives with an oppressively racist father who wants nothing more than for his son to follow in his ideological footsteps. When befriends a black boy, Malcolm, his father forbids the boys from ever coming near the house, and puts a rule in place that Malcolm is specifically not allowed to enter their house. A rifle sits by the door of David's house so his father can shoot homeless cats that take refuge under the porch, and his father announces that if Malcolm enters the house he will be shot as well. The boys find ways to work around these rules, however, but with the constant fear that David's father will hurt Malcolm. Johnston specifically says in an introduction that her own father was the inspiration for this novel, and that his racism "haunts her." Although there are several points that allude to the possibility that something horrific is about to happen, this book remains appropriate for middle school students, and would ignite interesting and engaging moral discussions.

After Tupac and D-Foster

After Tupac and D-Foster, written by Jacqueline Woodson, is about three middle school girls and their adventures together as they struggle through the unexpected events of life. Neeka and her best friend - the cleverly unnamed narrator - have lived across the street from each other and been best friends their entire lives, and when an elusive and unique girl who refers to herself as "D" appears one day on their street, she becomes and instant and revolutionary member of their clique. D is a foster child and has already experienced things that the other two girls never imagined were possible from their sheltered and protected life in their neighborhood. As the story progresses, the girls all learn from each others' vastly different perspectives and form incredible friendships. A unique and fun side-story that brilliantly parallels the girls' story is that of Tupac, the popular rapper and his tumultuous and controversial life. The plot is engaging and unique and the characters are endearing and easily relateable; I highly recommend this book for middle school instruction.

Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down

I found this book as part of a project I did for a class last semester. I went to Barnes and Noble looking for a different book (Freedom Summer, written by Deborah Wiles, which is excellent and I highly recommend it) but when it wasn't available in the store, I had to improvise and found this one instead. Sit-In describes the large-scale boycott of certain lunch counters during the Civil Rights Movement. One of my favorite things about this book, even though it's pretty trivial, is the unique style of illustrations. Another extremely valuable aspect of this book is the two-page factual timeline of events in the Civil Rights Movement, which is a great supplement to the historical fiction feel of the story itself.

Hello!

I am currently a graduate student at James Madison University, completing my Masters in Teaching. This time next year, I will be a certified teacher of both Middle School Social Studies and Language Arts. The purpose of this blog is to explore and find literature that I can use in my classroom someday. As I find and read this literature, I'll provide short reviews and my thoughts on the books as they prove to be either helpful or not helpful for me.

Specifically, I'm going to be looking for Young Adult fiction, related to all concentrations. I don't feel as though I really have a firm grasp of the Young Adult realm of literature, so I want this to be a way for me to really dig deep into it and find helpful resources I can pull from in the future. I would love any suggestions that people may have! Share!