Month: October 2017

The Overview: 

Holes is a 1998 young adult mystery comedy written by Louis Sachar featuring Stanley Yelnats IV, a 14-year old, overweight boy with no friends and terrible luck. After being wrongfully accused of stealing a pair of famous baseball shoes, Stanley is sent to Camp Crystal Lake, a juvenile work camp where “bad boys go to dig a hole and be add good”. Throughout the story, there are flashbacks to Stanley’s great- great-grandfather, Elya Yelnats, supposedly the cause of the Yelnats’s family’s bad luck, and to the love story of Katherine Barlow and Sam the onion picker.

The Diction: 

Holes is a book of a sixth to eighth grade reading level, and although it is written with a more mature voice, it more or less comes off as such. The diction that is used is that of an average sixth grader, and the content deals with both teen-aged themes, such as bullying and obesity, and adult themes, like poverty.

A Potential Turn-off:

The book does tend to jump around and across three story lines: Stanley’s arc, Elya’s arc, and Katherine’s arc. The three arcs  eventually become one cohesive plot, but it takes quite a while. Now, for me, this was not especially a definite problem, so much as an irritation. For instance, while reading about Stanley, the story would jump back over fifty year to Elya’s story. Granted, none of the side-stories are boring, but it was a shock. I enjoyed Stanley’s arc the most, and thus, whenever the story arcs switched I found myself wishing I was back with Stanley.

Another small problem I had with the book is not the book’s fault. If the reader has seen the Disney adaptation of Holes, by the same name, it can become a little difficult separate the written word from the cinematic experience. This is because the movie is almost the book copied-pasted. Good for the movie, but bad for people who have some report to complete on  the book and have previously seen the movie.

An Appealing Factor:

Stanley Yelnats is one of the best protagonists to ever come out of a young adult’s book.  He is not the generic person who finds love with someone who would normally be out of his league. He is not a bombshell in appearance, and in fact, there isn’t even any indication that he is handsome at all. He is explicitly described as morbidly obese and very timid, due to past bullying encounters. On top of all of this, Stanley, and his entire father’s side of the family for that matter, have rotten luck. Therefore he get blamed for many things that aren’t his fault. Even better, Stanley works hard to improve his self-esteem, including dropping over 150 pounds with pure willpower. All of this makes Stanley a very relatable character to most teen ad he can easily gain sympathy and affection. Because he is such a three-dimensional character, the reader can easily slip into his skin and become him, become empathetic regarding his troubles, despise those who treat me unfair, love those he loves. I myself am very fond of Stanley and could see him as my younger brother.

My Rating:

I rate Holes nine of of ten stars. Find your nearest library. They should have it.

“The Story of an Hour” is a short story written by Kate Chopin. It was first published as “The Dream of an Hour” in 1985. I was first introduced to this short story during sophomore year. It was recommended to me by my English teacher; however, I never found the time to read it. The title of this story is literal, referring to the exact time the events prolong (which I find to be very interesting). The length of the story is roughly 1000 words. Before reading, I decided to do some research on the author. In her early years, she was strongly pro-Confederate, mainly because of the loss of her brother in the Civil War, and she was also quite the rebel. Her work exemplified societal issues through her own interests, but she wasn’t renowned during her time. It wasn’t until the 20^th century that her work gained recognition.

This short story revolves around a woman who has a heart condition and her emotions during this hour. Immediately, the conflict is introduced; Mrs. Mallard has been informed of her husband’s death. Her sister and another character try to break the news in the gentlest way because of her medical condition. Her husband’s death isn’t the only tension. In a way, Chopin uses descriptions and moments that hint towards the disturbing emotion of the now widow. That is, she feels free that her husband has died. At first, the wife is overwhelmed with grief and locks herself in her bedroom. Then, she reveals that her husband wasn’t so great of a man through small, subtle details. Eventually, Mrs. Mallard begins repeating the phrase “Free! Body and soul free!” This made the story controversial during the time of the 1890s. Many people argue over if people were shocked because of a woman speaking her mind or a woman being liberated by the death of her husband. In my opinion, I think it’s both.

My favorite thing about this piece is the descriptions. Chopin uses sensory details to make the reader feel as if they were Mrs. Mallard. The sentence structure and order was smooth and very understandable. Words such as elixir, elusive, exalted, and importunities coincide with the setting, time, and tone. It also gave me the opportunity to learn because I didn’t know the meaning of a lot of words in the story, but that didn’t hinder me from enjoying the read. Overall, I find this story interesting because of its background and the author. In a time where women were supposedly created for certain purposes, this fiction piece challenged the ideas of the 1890s. It spoke of things women were never supposed to or expected to think or say aloud. I admire this story’s complicated internal conflict, adding depth and reason to the tone. The ending is the best part to me and was worth waiting for. I just really appreciate the way conflict is in the beginning, middle, and end. There isn’t a dull moment in this story.

If you want to know the ironic event that happens at the end, give the story a read here.

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking is a factually powerful read.  The book itself is split into four parts. In this review, I will talk about the part entitled, “The Extrovert Ideal”.

“Strangers’ eyes, keen and critical.  Can you meet them- Confidently– without fear?” – Print Advertisement for Woodbury’s Soap, 1922

The section begins with a reflection on the creation of the ideal business man and the transition from a society based upon morals to a society based upon personality, or as historian Warren Susman put it a “Culture of Character to a Culture of Personality”.  It is pressed into the readers mind from the beginning a tone of biased among an introvert studying a simple fascination of the extroverted “ideals” and natural to learned traits and behaviors.

Quoted from Cane herself “In a Culture of Character, the ideal self was serious, disciplined, and honorable.  What counted was not so much the impression one made in public as how one behaved in private.  The word personality didn’t exist in English until the eighteenth century, and the idea of ‘having a good personality’ was not widespread until the twentieth.”

It was about the industrialistic new society that was being created that moved the discipline man out of the spotlight to platform a man meant for selling the spotlight.  The twentieth century brought on a less agricultural outlook and created today’s urban culture.  The extroverted businessman was a key part played in this development, because along with the big production belts came a need for someone to sell those products to ordinary people who didn’t simply leave their house with the intention to buy.  Thus the salesman was created.  Since business circulates business the best people to be in business was not the people who knew laws and philosophy and the real antics of things, but rather the people who knew how to talk and sway into other peoples wants.  They needed to be confident, loud, a natural improviser of charm, attractive, and an overall energetically open person.  The need for these people to sell and exist was what created the American idealistic personality/person.  Everyone wanted to be these people so that they could be something.

Since this bar in society was created, they noticed the difference in natural salesmen and their counterpart opposites.  The closed door operators were the people who simply were not this, and so they were not this “something” everyone wanted to be.  Introverts were not noticed out of praise, they were noticed to contrast the extroverted agenda society had created at the time.  Ads like the one that Cane began the book with, and I quoted to begin my article were used to entice sell factor from the need to become this type.

Parents taught haughtiness and over activity to perfect these introverted limps in the child’s personality.  This spiked the anxiety and insecurity in the average person, and continues to grow over time.  Ads and TV shows portray larger than life men and beautified perfect women.  No wonder the years that followed this transition created such a divide and objective to personify yourself as largely and widely as possible.

Crane does a wonderful job of telling the transition and the importance to stay in-tuned with your extroverted side as much as possible.  She does not leave the underlying pieces of opposition out though, as she sees and details the difference and the utmost importance that both extroverts and introverts are necessity to keep the ball rolling.

I found this book, or rather, this book found me at a bookstore in Seaside, FL.  I was staring at a book beside it when a man came up and pointed at it and told me, “I’m not an introvert, but my friends who’ve read it are telling me that it’s a great book.  Just thought I’d let you know.”  And I am a big believer in fate, so this book was mine the second that happened.  I find it reflective, a real penny for your thoughts kind of book.  Reflection to society and the society your grandparents grew up in and the similarities, showing the times aren’t that different after all.  Maybe a bit more or less extreme in some places, but the cracks and barriers in preferable personalities is a common strong suit that plays a roll in both.

This book was based around horse racing, where people place bets on which horse was most likely to win the race. We see several characters in this book that take a turn at betting in some form, regardless of how that betting may take place.  Deesh, who lives in Bronx, gets mixed up in a serious crime regarding a murder that he wasn’t really a part of.

This book was split off into two parts throughout. We start off with Deesh at first, who gets caught up in the murder from the start of the book which very quickly escalates as another murder takes place and then a suicide. All of these things make his fate against him because his guilt is increasing more and more throughout the book as no one believes he is innocent.  On the other side of the story Jan, who is a horse Jock, sees herself falling in love with a man who is addicted to betting on horse races. This addiction raises more conflict after Jans’ big win when it seems that everything is going great for her and her lover, he disappears. This later tied in to the murder case for Deesh and we learn that the case could most likely be going better for Deesh because of the history of Jan’s family.

I found that the character’s in this story were really easy to compare myself to. I was able to relate most things that were happening to the characters to myself in some way. With Jan, her helplessness was relatable to myself and she seemed to always be longing for something- or someone. This longing was able to be seen throughout her half of the story through her own thoughts in her perspective. She seems childlike and she is very overwhelmed with the ways that people regard her as “too big” to Jock. She finds comfort in riding equis Mini, which is a horse that she races on in her first match. She feels closer to her father that is no longer a part of her life because he committed suicide when she was younger. She also finds comfort in running late at night, where she can’t see anything and is forced to face whatever is in the dark that she cannot see.

This book itself was written well. It was significantly formal, but not too formal that I wasn’t able to read it. The time period that he chose was accurately represented through the book when Deesh refers to people as “brothers” and “sisters” when he finds people the same skin color as himself. We also see much of the racism of the world in this time period when we see disrespect by other people just by acknowledgment of his skin color as a  bad thing. Most of the words in this story really struck me as important and evoked emotion.

I find this book really helpful in understanding the time period, and have knowledge about horse races and betting as an addiction.

The book Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief is one of those books that most likely read in eighth grade or freshman year. I think one of the reasons it became so popular in schools is because it’s relatively new and it’s a very refreshing book. I have read this book around four or five times and every time I read it, I get another perspective on it, learn something new, or just have a good experience of a fresh breather. This book is such a good example of being a great book fro pretty much all ages. I enjoyed reading at a younger age, and I still enjoy reading it now.

The book is about a kid named Percy Jackson who is kind of like an outsider. He is a half-blood, a half mortal, half god. He gets chased down by monsters that kind of don’t like him and it kinda turns out to be inconvenient most of the time, like it would any time you’re on a school field trip and some teacher actually turns out to have bat wings and is trying to kill you. In literally the first chapter, we manage to get so much information, like his crippled teacher has a powerful sword inside of a fountain pen, Percy kind of has powers related to water, Percy is a half-blood. This book just jumps into this awesome world and manages to scoop up the reader and bring the reader on a crazy ride. I find myself being severely emotionally attached to many of the characters and I also managed to be at the edge of my seat several times during the book.

After the kid defeats a monster in a museum, he is then taken to a special camp for kids who are half-bloods. The camp is known as Camp Half-Blood. This camp allows Percy to learn who his dad is, since his mom is Sally Jackson. The camp also allows him to train in combat and enhance his skills. He then goes on to do a quest and that is basically where the book’s main plot kicks off.

I think this is an awesome book for young kids. I learned a lot about mythology because of this book, and I think that it can be beneficial for children to read it, and if anyone else knows nothing about mythology, they should read the book as well. The book is a well-written book that brings you on one adventure, but has so much put into it. You can always expect an encounter with a crazy monster attacking the kids, or some very interesting dialogue. The author does a really good job at introducing new characters and aspects of them at the perfect time. It brings up background details at the correct timing and it brings in so many different aspects of the same characters.

Some of the main characters include Grover Underwood, Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase, Clarissa La Rue, Luke Castellan, Sally Jackson, Chiron, and Silena Beauregard. Every character has a very clever background and interesting plot.

The first book branched into a larger series, which is extremely understandable. Mythology is a very large concept and there was so much that wasn’t explained in the first book. The first book got many people into the characters that they just constantly wanted to learn more about the characters and the story in general.