Close Reading Blog Post

I read the book Dork Diaries: Tales From a Not So Graceful Ice Princess by Rachel Renee Russell. This book is about Niki Maxwell, a girl who attends a private school on her dad’s exterminator contract. She decides to enroll in the school’s ice skating competition with her best friends Zoe and Chloe. The only downside is that she doesn't know how to ice skate. In the middle of the book, Niki and her family attend the Nutcracker performance. Her little sister Brianna hops onto the stage and attacks the land of sweets costumes and props, thinking they’re real. After closely reading this part of the book, I noticed that everyone is looking at her physical actions, but not why Brianna did them. I think that this section of the book is about growing up and facing reality.

To organize my thinking, I put this situation into layers of a cake, since Brianna had really wanted one. During the performance, Brianna hopped onto the stage and wreaked havoc. She bit into all of the props and costumes for the Land of Sweets, thinking they were real. All the adults payed attention to the layer they could physically see because they were too upset to look into why she did so. This layer would be the top layer. This is the layer that people immediatly look over to, because it is the one that is easiest to see. It is the most decorated and least questioned.

After analyzation, I have realized the reason why Brianna did what she did. All kids go through a stage when they’re little where they believe that things such as fairies or magical creatures exist. Anything that sounds good is real to them. Brianna is only seven, and I believe that this is why she attempted to eat the props and costumes from the Land of Sweets set. While everyone else knew that everything was fake, Brianna’s mind was completely fooled, and she was quickly lured onto the stage by the sweets. Also, when Brianna bit into the items and realized into they were fake, it was the universe’s way of letting her know that it wasn’t true.That those fantasies and fairy tales were fake. She was growing up and facing reality. This would be the bottom layer of the cake. This is the most important layer of the cake. It holds up the rest of the layers, yet it is least payed attention to or appreciated.

To conclude my thoughts, Brianna’s actions showed her growing up and facing reality versus her kiddy fantasies. This connects to the world because this happens to every little kid. Not every kid jumps onto the stage and attacks props during a performance of the Nutcracker, but every kid has beliefs on fairies or makes imaginary friends. Also, every kid has to face reality somehow. For some, maybe their imaginary friend passes on, or they experience something similar to Brianna, where they figure it out through a certain event.

Fox blog post

              I read the book Fox, by Margaret Wild and Ron Brooks. This is about two friends named Dog and Magpie, who meet Fox who tries to break them up. After reading the book, the first impression you get of Fox is that he is cold hearted and mean. But after analyzing Fox's actions and words, I noticed that there was something more to him. I think a few words that describe Fox are envious, desperate, and lonely. This characteristics can be found in all of his actions, descriptive words, and dialogue.

            
             One descriptive word I came up with was desperate. I do think this is a word to describe Fox because in the end of the book, Fox takes Magpie to the desert and leaves her there. Before he leaves, he tells Magpie that he did it so that Dog and Magpie would feel what it was like to be "truly alone." Fox had been alone for a really long time. The definition of desperation is to be feel hopeless and to have no satisfactory options. I think Fox felt that someone else feeling his pain would make it go away. This happens to many people around us. The common bully. Bullies are usually people who have gone through tough times and take their emotions out on others to make themselves feel better, which is exactly what Fox has done to Magpie and Dog.

              Another descriptive word for Fox is envious. This is because he had been alone for a long period of time And then all of a sudden he meets Dog and Magpie, who have an extremely important bond. They both depend on each other for happiness, Dog as Magpie's wings and Magpie as Dog's other eye. Fox saw that they depended on each other like that, and how they always had each other and got envious. He had never experienced anything like that and it pushed him off the edge of semi sanity. His envy made him attempt to break up Dog and Magpie, so he wouldn't have anything to be envious of.


               My last descriptive word is lonely. I think this because there was one thing that set off his envy and desperation. And that is loneliness. If he had others around him for his entire life, he wouldn't have ever been lonely. He would have met Dog and Magpie, and just became their friend. Magpie wouldn't be in the desert and Dog wouldn't be alone.


          In conclusion, Fox is very envious, desperate, and lonely. The evidence for this is in all of his descriptions, dialogue, and actions. After thinking a little about these words, I realized that I don't feel disgusted by Fox, or feel he is a horrible character. I do actually feel sorry for him. It's not his fault that he was alone for such a long time. Imagine yourself in the city, with just a bunch of strangers. You didn't know where you were, and didn't know anybody there. You had nothing and you had to live through this. Nobody should feel that lonely. But unfortunately for Fox, that was his life.

Best of 2013

I have read many amazing books in 2013. But there were three books that stood out the most to me. These books are Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver, City of Bones by Cassandra Clare, and Dauntless by Veronica Roth. They are all fiction books, and involve a type of sci-fi.

Before I Fall is about a sixteen year old girl named Samantha Kingston who dies in a car crash and relives the last day of her life seven times. Each time she relives a day, she realizes how cruel she had been to other people and how her friends were all bullies. I love this book because its funny and meaningful. Every day, Samantha tries to fix her mistakes and be kind to others. The author is also constantly promoting the message "your actions can have a big impact on someone else's life." One example of this is that Samantha and her friends had bullied a girl named Juliet Sykes for a really long time. Juliet committed suicide because of her frustration. This is a good example because if Samantha had been nicer to Juliet, Juliet wouldn't be pushed to the point where she couldn't live anymore.    

City of Bones is about a girl named Clary Fray, who finds out she is a Shadow hunter, a race of humans with a little angel blood who are dedicated to killing demons. She is sucked into the Shadow hunter world when her mom is kidnapped by Valentine, a villain dedicated to destroying Downworlders(warlocks, werewolves, faeries, and vampires). I love this book because it includes the three characteristics I enjoy in a book and has a very captivating plot line. The author does an amazing job with mixing humor, romance, and action in only four hundred eighty five pages. I was never bored  and immediately got the urge to not put the book down until it was finished.

Dauntless is about a girl named Beatrice who moves to a faction(group) named Dauntless and has to survive their initiation. This book, like City of Bones, contained romance, humor, and a truck load of action. This book had me and the edge of my seat, even when the characters were just conversationing. The author did a marvelous job with keeping the reader entertained, but also asking sure the reader could connect with the characters. For example, in the beginning of the book, Beatrice had to chose if she was going to stay in her home, or to move to another faction. She had her parents pressuring her to stay, just like most kids have their parents pressuring them to do good in school.

I read lots of books in 2013, and there were many that I loved a lot. It was hard to narrow it down to one, so I tried to figure out my top three favorites. I would recommend these books to everyone who hasn't read them. And if they have, then I recommend the rest of the series. They were all inspiring reads, and I hope that others can enjoy them just as much as I do in the future.