Post 10: Reading Wishlist

From the library (in no particular order):
1. Cash by Johnny Cash
2. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
3. The Spectacular Now by Tim Tharp
4. Panic by Lauren Oliver
5. Poison by Bridget Zinn
6. Just One Day by Gayle Forman
7. The Fault in our Stars by John Green
8. Still Star Crossed by Melinda Taub
9. The Museum of Intangible Things by Wendy Wunder
10. (Reread) The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
11. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger



From Amazon/Barnes and Noble/Goodreads:
1. Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard
2. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
3. The Heir by Kiera Cass

Post 9: Book 2 Trailer

Post 8: Book Talk Presentation

Post 7: Book 4 Review

Cassia Reyes (ordinary girl from The Society) vs. Kate Winters (Goddess; Queen of the Underworld)

Who are they?

-        Cassia Reyes, the main character in Matched, is just an ordinary girl from a borough in The Society.  Her life has been laid out for her the moment she was born.  She’ll go to First School, Second School, be Matched and then be assigned to her permanent sorting job.  Everything is on track, she’s just been Matched with her best friend, Xander Carrow; then she puts his microcard in the port to see if there’s anything she DIDN’T know about him when his face isn’t the one that shows up on the port.  It’s her friend from Second School, Ky Markham.  In this perfect world, everything is calculated and percentages are what they by; when Ky’s face shows up, Cassia has no choice but to question what she was always supposed to trust, her match.  She struggles internally after her grandfather dies on his 80^th birthday and he gives her a piece of paper with a poem on it – but this poem is illegal.  Her struggles continue when she has to decide if she should stay with kind, reliable Xander or be with mysterious, average Ky.  She chooses Ky and has to fight to go against The Society to be with him.

-        Kate Winters, the main character in The Goddess Test and Goddess Interrupted, was an ordinary girl who took her mom to her hometown to die.  Until she met Henry.  Henry claims to be Hades, God of the Underworld.  He proves his power by reviving Kate’s recently dead friend, Ava.  With eyes the color of moonlight, he intrigues her. She agrees to spend the fall and winter with him so long as she gets to be with her mother every night (in her dreams).  Kate becomes aware of Henry’s intentions to make her his new Queen of the Underworld by passing 7 tests set by the other members of the Council.  11 other girls have died trying to pass.  Kate passes due to the high security and help from her mother, Demeter; Henry; Ava, Aphrodite; and best friend, James, Hermes.  After Kate passes, Henry and she became married.  Now Kate has returned from her summer away and can’t wait to see Henry and officially become Queen of the Underworld.  Except during her coronation, Cronos, the King of Titans attacks.  The entirety of the book is in Kate’s point of view and she feels that Henry is distant. They fight often because she feels he doesn’t want her there. When Henry is captured by Cronos, Kate does everything in her power to find him. Kate’s struggles are both internal and external. Her internal struggles focus on how she thinks Henry feels about her; if she can trust her sister, Persephone; and how to get her husband back and stop the inevitable war between the Gods and Cronos.   Her external struggles are centered on controlling her newfound powers (that come along with being a goddess and Queen of the Underworld); stopping Calliope (Hera, who wants her dead because Kate gets to be with Henry) from helping Cronos escape and destroy the world. 

Comparison:

They may seem like very different people, but they’re quite similar in their struggles.  Both must fight and possibly give up everything they’ve known and love in order to find/keep their man (heroine).  While Kate has the advantage of powers that Cassia doesn’t have, Cassia is able to achieve her goal by gaining the help of the people who love her.  Xander opts to help Cassia, even though she’s going to find Ky to be with him instead of Xander.  Similarly, Kate is also blessed to have great friends who help her find Henry.  She enlists the help of Ava, James and oddly enough, Persephone to help rescue Henry.  The way each goes about saving their man is slightly different, they are able to attain their goal through determination and perseverance.  Kate must trek through the Underworld to find Tartarus, sucking up her animosity toward her sister who broke Henry’s heart to ask Persephone for help and saving Henry by helping Calliope free Cronos.  Cassia, on the other hand, must trek through The Outer Provinces in order to find and rescue her Abberation boyfriend before he’s killed by the rebels who want to destroy The Society.

 

Post 6: Listicle

4 Reasons Why The Maze Runner Is The Best Book Ever

Thomas is the main character of “The Maze Runner.”  The whole book is about him finding out who he is and then helping the other “Gladers” find their way out of the maze.  He is the outsider so he’s challenged with acquiring the help of the others in order to leave.  Here are just some of the reasons why The Maze Runner is the best book ever…

1 – Dashner gives great descriptions

·         The way in which Dashner describes not only the Glade, but the people in it are incredible! He gives great descriptions of even the little details (probably because he’s narrating the story and if he didn’t then the reader would have no idea what to imagine what people and things look like… Well, until the movie came out)

·         For example, when Thomas is first introduced to the Glade, instead of saying it was a large square with tall walls that split and many boys in it, he describes it as “a vast courtyard several times the size of a football field, surrounded by four enormous walls made of gray stone and covered in spots with thick ivy. The walls had to be hundreds of feet high and formed a perfect square around them, each side split in the exact middle by an opening as tall as the walls themselves…”

2 – Develops New Language

·         Dashner develops his own language for the boys in the Glade to use.  Instead of having the boys say cuss words that people use today (in real life), he seems to alter words just enough so that the reader has an idea of what’s being said but the boys aren’t actually swearing.  There are other words that the boys seem to have made up since they’re secluded from any influence.

·         For example, when Thomas first enters the Glade, he’s called “Greenie” or “Greenbean” which can be inferred is slang for someone who is new, similar to our: “newbie.”  As for slang swear words that the boys use, there are only a few in the book.  When Thomas is first introduced to the Glade, he’s in an elevator. “He heard noises above—voices—and fear squeezed his chest. ‘Look at that shank’…’Looks like a klunk in a T-shirt.’ ‘You’re the klunk, shuck-face.’ Hope you enjoyed the one-way trip, Greenie.” These are just some of the words that are adapted by the boys in the Glade. 

 

3 – Interesting Plot Twists

·         I don't know about everyone else, but I was NOT expecting the ending that actually happened! I was expecting the boys to just escape into the real world... I wasn’t expecting their “escape” to be another scheme perfectly orchestrated by Ava Page, Chancellor of WICKED.  And then BOOM! As it turns out, the boys from the Glade are actually only Group A! And we find out that the subjects from Group B also did well in their little social experiment.  We’re left knowing that the boys will have 1 night of peace and quiet until WICKED’s mischiefs begin again.  Dashner really knows how to drop bombs in his books!

4 – Not Too Long

The book isn’t very long.  Its mere 372 pages are like child’s play compared to other books similar to The Maze Runner (according to Amazon).  Other, similar books like Divergent (487 pages), Harry Potter (avg. 600) and Before I Fall (496) have a comparatively high number of pages!  There’s a lot of description and finding out what this new world that Dashner creates is like but once the action starts, the book is hard to put down.  The brevity of the book along with the action and relatability of the characters’ actions is what makes the book awesome!

 

Post 5: Fiction vs. Non-Fiction

Aimee Bender agrees with David Shields when she says that "I think what's always most interesting to me is the work itself and if the work is interesting, I really don't care that much," I disagree with them because I think that you should care. The line between fiction and non-fiction is there for a reason, people who love to read/learn about true, factual events read non-fiction. For those who love the thrill and escape of fantasy and adrenaline-packed novels read fiction. The reason these 2 genres are separate is to accommodate both types of readers.

I agree with James Frey, a book should be 95% true to the event(s) that occurred for the piece to be considered "non-fiction." Obviously, as we've discussed in class, people can't always remember the EXACT conversation they had when they were 16 years old and they're now re-telling it at 55. I understand the use of creative license in those times, but changing 35% of a story to make it a good story should be labeled "based on a true story" because it is. It's BASED on a true event, but it's not as close to exactly as I would like in order for it to be labeled non-fiction. 

For me, half-truths are never okay. That would mean that 50% of the story is real and 50% is made up. If you want to make it a good story, make it fiction and you have all the room in the world to mix up events, times and people, but if your intentions are to make people aware of your story/situation, DON'T CHANGE THINGS. If it was truly meant to be a good story, you don't need to embellish details (throughout the entire book) in order for people to think it's a good book.

"Bending the truth" is a tough line to draw.  Where is too much? Back to what I said earlier, 95% is the minimum a book should be factual in order for memoirists to be able to call their books memoirs. I think that any more and you should just say that your book is based on a true story because while it is the recounting of a part of your life, it not as true as would meet the standards of memoirs.

Post 4: Adaptation of Big Fish (<-- italicized)

I think Big Fish would best be adapted in the form of a TV series, where each new story that is retold by Edward Bloom's son is a new episode.  

Each story (as well as a few additions) would need to be kept for obvious reasons: The continuity of the TV show.  

Going off that: characters, new stories, and a few sub-plots (including a romance) would also need to be added for the duration of the show.  

In the movie Big Fish, Ewan McGregor was a fantastic Edward Bloom, he captured everything Edward is portrayed as: "strong" (pg. 9) with a "special charm..." (pg. 28).  I would cast him as Edward Bloom everyday of the week.  As for his wife, she's not described (as of page 53) so her image could be anything I wanted it to be (someone a few years younger than Ewan but every bit as lovely).  Perhaps Yvonne Strahovski who'd be perfect with some red lipstick and short, beautiful blonde curls to match the time period.  

It'd have to have a theme song that played right before a commercial break (like every TV show ever).  As for music, there would be a lot of happy-go-lucky stuff happening because all of the stories are so legendary that you wouldn't believe them! So something with a light feeling would be a good tone setter.  


Something unique about Big Fish is that each episode builds off the last, only in the sense of Edward Bloom.  The show would follow his life as it happened chronologically - then when things got boring and as Edward is about to die, he can recount all of his stories as they ACTUALLY happened instead of over exaggerating all of them.