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.