First the colors

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

"I could introduce myself properly, but it's really not necessary.  You will know me well enough and soon enough, depending on a diverse range of variables.  It suffices to say that at some point in time, I will be standing over you, as genially as possible.  Your soul will be in my arms.  A color will be perched on my shoulder.  I will carry you gently away.  

At that moment, you will be lying there (I rarely find people standing up).  You will be caked in your own body.  There might be a discovery; a scream will dribble down the air.  The only sound I'll hear after that will be my own breathing, and the sound of the smell, of my footsteps." (4)

"Nothing like that could ever happen again. Not in this day and age."

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne

"Bruno thought about his question, wanting to phrase it exactly right this time, just in case it came out as being rude or unco-operative.  'Who are all those people outside?' he said finally.

Father tilted his head to the left, looking a little confused by the question.  'Soldiers, Bruno,' he said.  'And secretaries.  Staff workers.  You've seen them all before, of course.'

'No, not them,' said Bruno.  'The people I see from my window.  In the huts, in the distance.  They're all dressed the same.'

'Ah, those people,' said Father, nodding his head and smiling slightly.  'Those people...well, they're not people at all, Bruno.'

Bruno frowned.  'They're not?' he asked, unsure what Father meant by that.

'Well, at least not as we understand the term,' Father continued.  'But you shouldn't be worrying about them right now.  They're nothing to do with you.  You have nothing whatsoever in common with them.  Just settle into your new home and be good, that's all I ask.  Accept the situation in which you find yourself and everything will be so much easier.'

'Yes, Father,' said Bruno, unsatisfied by the response.

He opened the door and Father called him back for a moment, standing up and raising an eyebrow as if he'd forgotten something.  Bruno remembered the moment his father made the signal, and said the phrase and imitated him exactly.  

He pushed his two feet together and shot his right arm into the air before clicking his two heels together and saying in as deep and clear a voice as possible--as much like Father's as he could manage--the words he said every time he left a soldier's presence.

'Heil Hitler,' he said, which, he presumed, was another way of saying, 'Well, goodbye for now, have a pleasant afternoon.' (52-54)

Christopher John Francis Boone

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

"And Siobhan says people go on holidays to see new things and relax, but it wouldn't make me relaxed and you can see new things by looking at earth under a microscope or drawing the shape of the solid made when 3 circular rods of equal thickness intersect at right angles.  And I think that there are so many things just in one house that it would take years to think about all of them properly." (178)

Top 5 Most Requested/Read Books in Middle School

(This is not an official survey...just what I've noticed.)

5.  The Diary of Anne Frank (Anne Frank)

4.  I Know What You Did Last Summer (Lois Duncan)

3.  Twilight (Stephenie Meyer)

2.  The Hunger Games (Suzanne Collins)

1.  Joke books (I'm not kidding.  Kids love joke books, and the cornier the better.)

To be a littlie again...

"I'm Tally Youngblood...Make me pretty." (425)

In Tally's world, turning 16 is more than just an important birthday.  The day you turn 16, you turn from an "ugly" into a "pretty"--with the help of extensive plastic surgery.  But when Tally meets Shay a few months before her birthday and she begins to question the operation, her future seems uncertain.  What does turning "pretty" actually mean?  And is being an "ugly" really that bad?

(Isn't that one of the creepiest/most awesome book cover ever?  I love it.)

Kissing Cousins

"My name is Elizabeth but no one's ever called me that.  My father took one look at me when I was born and must of though I had the face of someone dignified and sad like an old-fashioned queen or a dead person, but what I turned out like is plain, not much there to notice.  Even my life so far has been plain.  More Daisy than Elizabeth from the word go." (1).

Daisy is 15.  She has what the shrinks call an "eating disorder."  She was sent by her father and step-mother to England.  Now it's World War III. 

Oh, and to make things more complicated, she's fallen in love.  With her cousin. 

If your reaction is "Whaa?," don't feel alone.  I was the same way.  I stuck through it, and although it's not the best dystopian novel I've ever read, it does have it's merits.  One of the better parts involves how Daisy overcomes her eating disorder despite the war ravaged countryside around her--or actually, maybe because of it.

YouTube and Twilight and Puppies

My reading has slowed down considerably, and one reason for this is that I now go to middle school every day. No, I'm not going undercover as a 14 year old to write a scathing expose on teens. Nor am I trying to relive my middle school years. I am doing my student teaching in the library, educating the youth of America on how to properly cite sources, pick out a book they might enjoy, and take effective notes. Oh, and to STOP PLAYING GAMES. THANK YOU.

One of the best parts of being in a middle school is witnessing all of the funny/embarrassing antics of 12-14 year olds. Here's a random sample of some of the more interesting anecdotes I've experienced.

-Isn't YouTube awesome? A kid came up to me and started telling me about how he posted a video of himself playing a video game on YouTube and how people are now commenting on his video. I expressed how cool that was, and that led to a 5 minute discussion about the video game and how you play it and why it is the best.

-Every morning a girl comes in to check out books about dogs. Her mom told her that if she passes all her classes she can get a puppy. After much consideration, she has decided that she wants a Burmese mountain dog. This conversation somehow ended up veering into a discussion about grammar and pizza. I don't know how.

-Twilight! Is! The! Best! Book! Ever! :
"Wait, did you just say you were 'Team Jacob? I can't believe that! She just said 'Team Jacob'! Get her!!" (Said as the girls thundered out of the library. I hope the girl on "Team Jacob" is okay...)

-Google Earth is perhaps the best creation in the history of the world, at least when games are not available. Because students aren't allowed to play games on the computers, they usually end up going to Google and messing around with satellite images of their towns. I can't count the number of blurry images of houses and streets I've been shown these last few weeks.

More to come on middle school later. Plus--have you ever wanted to read a book about World War 3 AND incest? Have I got the book for you!

Salmon, like the fish

The Lovely Bones

By Alice Sebold

I've read this particular book 3 times--and only the first time was by choice.  It's not my favorite book, but I have to admit that every time I read it I discover something new I never noticed before.  I also cry each time I read it, even though I know what happens almost by heart.  The writing is wonderful, so instead of trying to describe it, I'll just give you some quotes and set you on your way.  

Also, if you're looking for another good read, Sebold's first book, Lucky, is, in my opinion, much better than this one.  Her newest book, The Almost Moon, is not, but it's worth a read anyways.  

"These were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connections--sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at great cost, but often magnificent--that happened after I was gone.  And I began to see things in a way that let me hold the world without me in it.  The events that my death wrought were merely the bones of a body that would become whole at some unpredictable time in the future.  The price of what I came to see as this miraculous body had been my life." (320)

"Now I am in the place I call this wide wide Heaven because it includes all my simplest desires but also the most humble and grand.  The word my grandfather uses is comfort.

So there are cakes and pillows and colors galore, but underneath this more obvious patchwork quilt are places like a quiet room where you can go and hold someone's hand and not have to say anything.  Give no story.  Make no claim.  Where you can live at the edge of your skin as long as you wish.  This wide wide Heaven is about as flathead nails and the soft down of new leaves, wild roller coaster rides and escaped marbles that fall then hang then take you somewhere you could never have imagined in your small-heaven dreams." (325)

"And in a small house five miles away was a man who held my mud-encrusted charm bracelet out to his wife.  

'Look what I found at the old industrial park,' he said.  'A construction guy said they were bulldozing the whole lot.  They're afraid of sink holes like that one that swallowed the cars.'

His wife poured him some water from the sink as he fingered the tiny bike and the ballet shoe, the flower basket and the thimble.  He held out the muddy bracelet as she set down his glass. 

'This little girl's grown up by now,' she said.

Almost.  Not quite.

I wish you all a long and happy life." (328)