Meet the Author: Tony Abbot--Firegirl

Tony Abbot depicts how mean, fearful, and unaccepting of differences are when face with the unknown. He allows the reader to go through a roller coaster of emotions that Tom’s experiences as he gradually accepts and understands what Jessica has gone through. The author clearly wanted the readers to empathize with Tom’s struggle as he is torn between adoring Courtney, pleasing his best friend, Jeff, and becoming friends with Jessica. 

Firegirl by Tony Abbot

Firegirl by Tony Abbot explores an unexpected budding friendship between Tom and Jessica Feenay fostered by overcoming fears of differences, acceptance of disabilities, and understanding that being the better person can be hard, but achievable. When Jessica Feenay entered her new middle school, St. Catherine nothing could prepare Tom and his 7^th grade classmates for the severe burn scars they see on Jessica’s entire body.

Even the teacher is shocked when she sees her; with Jessica being part of the class nothing seems the same because she looks different. Tom struggles with wanting to ask Jessica what happened, yet he feels fearful that he may say or do the wrong thing when around her. Tom surprises himself when he gradually accepts, defends, and overcomes his fears by getting to know Jessica.

As his classmates and best friend mocks her, some like Courtney recognizes Tom’s generosity and compassion toward Jessica. Just when things seem to be heading in the right direction despite possibly losing his best friend, Jessica breaks the news that she must leave because her treatments are not working. Tom realizes that he was not the best he could have been to Jessica, but soon finds out that she was most appreciative of Tom’s willingness to become friends even as others feared the unknown.

Tony Abbot depicts how mean, fearful, and unaccepting of differences are when face with the unknown. He allows the reader to go through a roller coaster of emotions that Tom’s experiences as he gradually accepts and understands what Jessica has gone through. The author clearly wanted the readers to empathize with Tom’s struggle as he is torn between adoring Courtney, pleasing his best friend, Jeff, and becoming friends with Jessica.

This book is a perfect way to introduce students to acceptance of other’s disabilities and challenges in their lives. This is a must read and have in a classroom library. Students will truly connect to text, self, & world especially since the character’s development and turning points are well done. Firegirl by Tony Abbot is an outstanding book—“5.”  

http://www.tonyabbottbooks.com/

Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward captures a poverty stricken families’ life as they prepare for Hurricane Katrina. Esch, 15 years old finds out that she is pregnant at such a young age, lives a life of promiscuous behavior by giving herself away to too many young boys in her brother’s circle of friends. She attempts to keep her pregnancy a secret despite the signs of pregnancy—morning sickness, sensitivity to smells and taste. With no true guidance, parenting, and role modeling, Esch reminisces when her mother was still alive. Her mother is dead; her father an alcoholic, Skeetah, her brother places all his nurturing attention to his pitbull, China, as she gives birth to puppies.

Jesmyn Ward entices the reader with her descriptive detail and use of imagery as she depicts the flaws of a family, and illustrates the struggle of a family living the day to day hardships of poverty, and the wake of Hurricane Katrina’s path of destruction.

Ward allows the readers to connect with the overarching theme of how all walks of life are similar; we struggle with love, loyalty, fear and loneliness. There were parts that I found pretty intense, brutal, and painful to read; however, I was spellbound…I couldn't stop. As Katrina came closer, the intensity of the character’s experiences increased.

 
Jasmyn Ward surely did not sugar coat her book. Because of the content, rawness, and brutality of the book I personally would not have this book as part of my class library. Although it is geared more to high school, I would still be very cautious in freely allowing students to read it. For me personally, this is more for 11^th-12^th grade and college student good reads.

Meet the Author Jesmyn Ward: Salvage the Bones

Jesmyn Ward an incredible young author shares her passion of writing by providing readers the opportunity to understand the hardships of living in a community of poverty. She crafts her fiction by using a wealth of imagery, descriptive language, and realistic fiction that demonstrates a families experiences before Hurricane Katrina hit, and its aftermath of destruction.  

Meet the Author: Maya Angelou--Poetry for Young People

Maya Angelou: The Official Website http://mayaangelou.com/

Meet the Author: Emily Dickinson--Poetry for Young

Meet the Author: Walt Whitman--Poetry for Young People

Walt Whitman: The National Poet portrays his life's influences and passion.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yjzl9yTNtk&feature=BFa&list=LP9nXgKg16Ji8

Meet the Author: Carl Sandburg--Poetry for Young People: "The Fog"

Carl Sandburg: His Life, His Poetry, His Cause

Carl Sandburg Website known as "The poet of the people." http://www.carlsandburg.net/index.html

The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore depicts writings of Poe and more background information on his life.  http://www.eapoe.org/

The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

If I Stay by Gayle Forman-Favorite Good Read

 

 

If I Stay by Gayle Forman demonstrates the devastating impact of losing your loved ones in the blink of an eye. Like a typical All-American loving family, talented Mia-17yrs with her cello destined to attend Julliard, her brother Teddy-8yrs, budding drummer, and her parents decides to take a trip to visit life-long friends, Willow and Henry because school is closed for a snow day. As they look forward to a family day, nothing prepares Mia or for that matter anyone who would walk in her footsteps of completely losing everything, and her whole family from an unexpected and unforeseen car accident. When Mia wakes in a dream-state, she witnesses how her parents are killed as she walks in bewilderment searching frantically for her brother Teddy. Just when she believes she’s spotted Teddy, she recognizes her bracelet, and like a freight train she sees herself lying on the side of the road. No movement, absolutely life-less—yelling and screaming for help she realizes that no one can hear or see her standing right there. Then she understands that she has lost both of her parents, maybe even her brother. She follows the paramedics to the hospital, and now she has to struggle to determine if she should stay in the world of the living, or moving on with her family as they have passed on. As Mia lies in a coma, she experiences an out-of-body state of consciousness, and witnesses the grieving periods of her grandparents, her boyfriend Adam, and her best friend Kim as they attempt to comfort and talk to her. Mia questions if she is dead and needs to decide what to do—because she knows that everything in her life would never be the same again.

Gayle Forman crafts her story with descriptive and captivating plot as she allows the readers to feel every emotion of lost and grief. The author is an exceptional writer who clearly wanted to illustrate the power of family, sacrifices, choices, grieving period, and the intense struggle to decide on the will to live. She carefully shows how important it is to spend every precious moment with those who are dear to you and those you love. If I Stay is a tear-jerkier that truly is an outstanding book—“5”. It is well written and immensely thought provoking. Looking forward to reading the next book: Where She Went.

The Nerdy Book Club

http://nerdybookclub.wordpress.com/2012/11/10/ten-ways-to-raise-readers-by-julie-falatko/

When My Name Was Keoko by Linda Sue Park--Worthy Text

"They cannot have my thoughts. I will not allow it. She held up her hand. ...Five fingers of thought --that is all I will give them. Not one more finger" (Park, Linda Sue. 58).

 "If I could choose to be anything, I would choose Wind. I would blow my way swiftly to wherever you are and hide myself among the leaves of the nearest trees" (94).

"You burn the paper but not the words. You silence the words but not the thoughts. You kill the thoughts only if you kill the man. And you will find that his thoughts arise again in the minds of others--twice as strong as before" (106).  

When My Name Was Keoko by Linda Sue Park

When My Name Was Keoko by Linda Sue Park depicts the life experience of a family’s perseverance of the Japanese occupation of Korea as two siblings, Sun-hee, older brother and Tae-yul, sister struggle to maintain each other’s secret of their family’s Korean culture and values. Sun-hee and Tae-yul along with their mother, father, and uncle and all Korean families are stripped of their identity. Sun-hee and Tae-yul slowly unravel their parents and uncles’ courage as they witness their lives being taken apart by Japanese soldiers. Having to change their Korean names to Japanese names and prohibited to speak or write in their Korean language and engage in their religious ceremonies, or show patriotism of their homeland, they show their enduring spirit of heroism, understanding and acceptance of how things are, and the willingness to sacrifice their life for the betterment of family.

Linda Sue Park demonstrates her craft of writing as she tells the accounts and point of view of Tae-yul and Sun-hee’s detailed journey of their individual internal and external conflicts by allowing the reader to be within the moment of her characters. She shows the tenacious personalities of both Sun-hee and Tae-yul as they develop into strong individuals even though their world was turned upside down by the order of the Imperial Emperor of Japan. 

Linda Sue Park is indeed a master in her craft because she allows the reader to witness and feel the emotions of her characters. She exceptional crafts her writing like that of a point of view format giving each character the “lime-light” so that readers can easily follow the thoughts, actions, and motivations behind what they do. With certainty, this is an excellent book to feature experiences of a war-torn country and how children are majorly affected as innocent bystanders. It also shows how quickly the characters are ready to take on a more mature role within their family structure. When My Name Was Keoko deserve an outstanding score of a 5. Every classroom should have this as a Literature Circle selection or as an anchor book.

http://www.lindasuepark.com/books/books.html

If I Stay by Gayle Forman--Worthy Text

"The racism thing is kind of obvious. I think the bigger thing is people's goodness. Are they naturally good and turned bad by stuff like racism or are they naturally bad and need to work hard not to be?" (Forman, Gayle. 69).

"People called Mom that a lot, probably because she had a hard time holding her tongue and could be brutally blunt when she disagreed with you. She exploded like a thunderstorm, and then be fine again. Anyhow, she didn't care that people called her a b****. "Its's just another word for feminist, she told me with pride"" (70).

"I am not her only sick person. She has been shuttling back and forth between patients and families all afternoon. She's the bridge between the doctors and the people, and you can see the strain of balancing between those two worlds" (77).

"Mom always said that it was because Teddy saw me first, and because I cut his cord, that somewhere deep down he thought I was his mother. "It's like those goslings, Mom joked. "Imprinting on a zoologist, not the mama goose because he was the first one they saw when they hatched"" (158). 

"...but there were certain things that only I could do for him. When he was a baby and going through his nightly fussy period, he'd only calm down after I played him a lullaby on my cello"(159).

" And when he'd skin a knee or bump his head if I was around he would not sop crying until I bestowed a magic kiss on the injury, after which he'd miraculously recover. I know that all the magic kisses in the world probably couldn't help him today. But I would do anything to have been able to give him one" (159).

"I picture myself nuzzling his head one last time, and I can't imagine it without seeing myself crying, my tears turning his blond curlicues straight" (160).  

"Gramps is there. He's crying. He's not making any noise, but tears are cascading down his cheeks, wetting his entire face. I've never seen anyone cry like this. Quiet but gushing, a faucet behind his eyes mysteriously turned on" (181).