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Showing posts from October, 2022
  Book Review:     Bibliography: Sepetys, R. (2012). Between shades of gray . Philomel Books. ISBN 014242059X   Plot Summary: Fifteen-year-old Lina is a Lithuanian girl living an ordinary life -- until Soviet officers invade her home and tear her family apart. Separated from her father and forced onto a crowded train, Lina, her mother, and her young brother make their way to a Siberian work camp, where they are forced to fight for their lives. Lina finds solace in her art, documenting these events by drawing. Risking everything, she imbeds clues in her drawings of their location and secretly passes them along, hoping her drawings will make their way to her father's prison camp. But will strength, love, and hope be enough for Lina and her family to survive?     Critical Analysis: In the Author's Note, Ruta Sepetys gives background information of the time period and countries involved. Her style of writing is simple yet powerful and c...
  Book Review:     Bibliography: Markus, Z. (2016). The book thief . Random House UK . ISBN 9781909531611   Plot Summary: It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier and will be busier still. By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordian-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library, wherever there are books to be found. But these are dangerous times. When Liesel's foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel's world is both opened, and closed down.   Critical Analysis: In this book, the story is told mostly from the non-human perspective of Death, w...
Book Review:     Bibliography: Lee, S. (2021). The downstairs girl . G.P Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers. ISBN 1524740977     Plot Summary: By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, "Dear Miss Sweetie." When her column becomes wildly popular, she uses the power of the pen to address some of society's ills, but she's not prepared for the backlash that follows when her column challenges fixed ideas about race and gender. While her opponents clamor to uncover the secret identity of Miss Sweetie, a mysterious letter sets Jo off on a search for her own past and the parents who abandoned her as a baby. But when her efforts put her in the crosshairs of Atlanta's most notorious criminal, Jo must decide whether she, a girl used to living in the shad...
  Book Review-     Bibliography- Yoon, N. (2017).  Everything everything . Ember Publishing.   Plot Summary- My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla. But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He's tall, lean, and wearing all black, black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly. Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.   Critical Analysis- The book is written like a diary, which flowed easily and made it a quick read without being taxing on your emotions. The characters of Mad...
  Book Review:     Bibliography- Thomas, A. (2022). The hate u give (A. Stenberg, Narr.). Balzer + Bray . ISBN 0062498541   Plot Summary- Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed. Soon afterward, his death is a national headline. Some are calling him a thug, maybe even a drug dealer and a gangbanger. Protesters are taking to the streets in Khalil’s name. Some cops and the local drug lord try to intimidate Starr and her family. What everyone wants to know is: what  really  went down that night? And the only person alive who can answer that is Starr. But what Starr does or does not say could upend her community. It could also endanger her life.   Criti...
  Book Review:   Bibliography- Jackson, T. D. (2018).  Allegedly . Katherine Tegen Books.   Plot Summary- Mary B. Addison killed a baby. Allegedly. She didn’t say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: a white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it? There wasn’t a point to setting the record straight before, but now she’s got Ted, and their unborn child to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary’s fate now lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most, her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But does anyone know the real Mary?   Critical Analysis- The story was written in a very straightforward style, without feeling emotionally manipulative, complete with urban slang. I think this kind of narration is even more powerful...