Time For Another Week & Challenge Completed

Here it is, another weekend over. Tomorrow I actually start at my new school so I have those first day nerves all over again. Training is officially over. But I'm sure things will be fine, I'm really not too worried. I know I'll start the day in good spirits seeing as both LSU and The Saints came away victorious this weekend!! We also have another cool front coming through and we've been warned that we may actually need light jackets for this one in the afternoon! How cool (literally :p)

This weekend was tons of fun. It was such a blast following everyone's progress for Dewey's 24 hour reading challenge. Congratulations to all of the participants! Everyone blew me away with the amount of time spent reading and the amount of blogging that they did! I'm definitely in next year. I decided to have my own little readathon and got 3 books read this weekend. I read Because of Winn Dixie and The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane for the Four Legged Friends Challenge and started Bud, Not Buddy for the Newbery Challenge yesterday. I finished Bud, Not Buddy today which officially ends the Newbery Challenge for me!

Bud, Not Buddy was a great little book. It's the story of a young boy who's in foster care after his mother's death. All of his belongings fit into a suitcase wrapped in twine and include a picture of his mother, some rocks with dates written on them, a blanket, and a photo of a jazz band with a man that he believes to be his father in it. After having horrible luck in his new foster home, Bud runs away in the hopes of finding his father, hoping to finally find acceptance. It was a very endearing story and I was reminded of many of the kids that I've worked with while reading this one. A nice ending to the challenge.

I went hunting all over the place today for a copy of Ray Bradbury's The Halloween Tree after Debi suggested it during the 24 hour Challenge last night but came up empty handed. I'd really like to read that one on Halloween night. So I ordered it on Amazon today in the hopes that it will get here on time. I also got Kate DiCamillo's new picture book, Great Joy and Jan Siegel's Prospero's Children. So I have a new package of books to look forward to sometime soon ;)

Hope everyone has a great week!

A Couple Of Newbery Reviews

I've been falling behind on a couple of reviews, so here are two quick ones for two books that I loved reading for the Newbery challenge.

The first was Lois Lowry's, The Giver. The Giver is a dystopian novel about a brave new world that cherishes "sameness" There is no color in the world, there are no true feelings, there is no true love. Families are manufactured and every aspect of life is planned from the day you are born, in fact, from the moment you are conceived; seeing as each member of the community is assigned a job at the age of 12, and one of those jobs is "birth mother," a position that is looked poorly upon.

Jonas is assigned the title of Receiver of Memories, a title that is given only once every few generations. The job of the receiver of memories is to be the only person who remembers humanity as we know it today. The receiver of memories is the only person in the community who will ever know what the word "snow" means, what the word "love" means, what the word "war" means. He is given these memories by The Giver, the former receiver of memories. Jonas actually experiences each memory when The Giver lays his hands on his back and transmits the memory. The training is often brutal and painful. Throughout his training, Jonas realizes how animalistic and cold humanity has actually become and he wishes to restore love and compassion back to society.

I absolutely loved The Giver and wish I would've read it earlier in life. I certainly plan on reading more of Lowry's work. My next book of her's may be Gossamer after reading Nicola's wonderful review of that book for the RIP challenge! Sounds like a great one.

I also finished Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson today. I had read this one ages ago when I was much younger, and I remember loving it then. I remember it being such a magical book to me and relating perfectly to Jess and Leslie's kingdom. It reminded me of me and my cousin when we used to build forts outside made out of whatever wood that we could find, and to us, it would be a real battle zone. Or me and my sister would make tents in the house with the kitchen chairs and a sheet and it would be a little magical place.

So, I read this book today, years later, and what do you know, I fell right back into that place. I suspect that this will always be a special book to me. It's a comfort book. A book that I can fall into and relate to. But it's such a tragic book. No matter how many times I read it, this book will always choke me up. I won't talk about why, but for those who have read the book, I'm sure you understand.

I've yet to see the movie, because I wanted to refresh myself on the book first, but now that I've reread it, I think I'm just going to go out and buy it! I've heard nothing but good stuff about it and am really looking forward to seeing this book as a film. And I'm just thinking, this is also my first read for the Cardathon Challenge...cool!

OK, all caught up! Now, on to the RIP Challenge with Dracula!!! Yay!

And guess what?! Megan's coming in town!!! But only for a day :( But that's better than nothing. A friend of hers is coming to pick up another friend and bring him back to Texas, so he asked her if she wanted to take a ride. So I get to see her for a day. So I'll probably disappear from blogging for the next couple of days. Might be here tomorrow, but Sunday will most probably be a no show ;) Enjoy your weekend everyone!

The Higher Power Of Lucky by Susan Patron

The Higher Power of Lucky is a small little book with an enormous amount of power. It's the most recent recipient of the Newbery Medal and I read it for the Newbery challenge.

Lucky is a 10-year old girl living in the town of Hard Pan, California, population of 43. Her mother passed away two years ago while admiring the rain and accidentally stepping on a down power line. She is left in the care of her father's previous wife Brigitte, who has flown from Paris to take care of her. Lucky never knew her father as her father never wanted children and had no desire to meet her. Lucky and Brigitte get along well enough, but Lucky is left with the fear that Brigitte will surely leave her one day to go back to Paris leaving Lucky to an orphanage.

Lucky has one of the few jobs available in the small town. She sweeps up cigarette butts and picks up candy wrappers outside of the wind-chime museum where the alcoholics/smokers/overeaters/gamblers anonymous groups meet. While the groups are meeting, she listens from a crack on the outside of the building and here's stories of people reaching "rock bottom" and then finding their "higher power" and redeeming theirselves...finding hope in their lives. Lucky is on a search for her own higher power, her own hope.

Lucky's best friend is Lincoln, a boy who is misunderstood and is seen as a "special" child. Lincoln is a member of the International Guild of Knot Tyers and always has a piece of rope or string in his hand and is tying intricate knots. He sees the world through a different filter and offers a fresh perspective. Lincoln's mother wants him to be the perfect son...he's named after a president because she wants him to be president one day.

Miles is another boy that is somewhat annoying, but looks up to Lucky in an almost mother type way. Miles is 5 years old and doesn't know his mother. His favorite book is one of my childhood favorites: Are You My Mother by P.D. Eastman. Miles is raised by his grandmother and is always looking for cookies and a story from Lucky.

Patron has crafted a beautiful, heartbreaking, and heartwarming story of coming to terms with the cards that life deals and finding hope in dark situations. There's a message of community in this tale...it's so easy for us to fall into the mindset of "I have to do this on my own" when in reality there is help all around us if we only take a second to accept it, for most of the time it's freely offered.

The story is wonderfully illustrated throughout by Matt Phelan who I was unfamiliar with. The drawings go very well with the story and the whole book is very nicely packaged. I highly recommend this book for readers young and old. I certainly enjoyed it.

A Couple Of So-So Reviews

My blog came up for review today over at the Review My Blog website and Diva Dee's review just cracked me up! She gave me an 8 out of 10, which is fine by me, but really didn't do much of a review, which I understand. She admitted that she wasn't very familiar with the subject matter of my blog and it didn't appeal to her so she couldn't give it an honest review, and I thought that was fair. I love the fact that my Dave McKean header scared the hell out of her! Her main criticisms were that she didn't find my blog visually appealing...I feel that's all in the eye of the beholder...personally I like the look of my blog, though I know it's nothing flashy. I've always been a fan of black and a fan of less is more. So she wasn't a fan....that's fine with me...you can't please 'em all!

Back to books! I finished Crispin: The Cross of Lead by Avi for the Newbery challenge and I really just didn't like it. Not that it was a bad book, I just couldn't connect with it and it didn't do much for me. I know there are lots of Avi fans out there, but I'm not sure if I would be one of them. I'll give him another shot though...maybe this just wasn't the right one for a first read. It's basically about a boy who lives in a very small town in the 14th century who doesn't know who his father was and who's mother has recently died and has left him a cross made of lead. The cross has writing on it which he cannot read since he can't read or write. But what's written on the cross is a clue to his true identity. He lives the life of a servant and suddenly has his life at risk as he has been declared a wolf's head (a person less than human who should be killed) after his mother's death. He doesn't know why someone wants him dead. He meets a jester by the name of Bear who helps protect him and takes him on as an apprentice and the book reads as Crispin's account of all of this. The religious aspect of the book was a bit overkill. I have no problems at all with religious themes, it was just way overdone here. I also wasn't a fan of the writing style and the story just didn't captivate me. Oh well.

This year started out so good for me with books. Now I seem to be running into a couple of duds here and there. Lets hope that I get back into a good streak again soon!