A Light Through Tragedty

 Boo has decided to become an author.  One of the things that I've been trying to encourage is her creative writing process.  To that end, I use http://writingprompts.tumblr.com to get her juices flowing.  Today's prompt was this picture.  I loved her response so much that I wanted to share it here with you.  One small disclaimer:  All spelling mistakes are her own. 

The mother duck stared down the grate.  She could still hear the faint quacking of her hacthlings in it.

She hadn't relized that her babies feet could not span over the holes.

They had only just finished thier first walk over the black river!  She had paid no heed to the sqare with holes, as she had crossed it many times.  Now she was helpless to help her children.

The, suddenly a Big One came up behind her.  Big Ones were unique that they did not have a set color for thier fur.  This one's was orange on top and blue on bottom.

It was apparantly male, as females tended to wear paint and sparkely things.

The mother duck quacked in suprise.  She waddeled into a nearby allyway.  Close enogh to watch it, far enough to be safe. 

She thought it would pursue her, but it didn't.  Instead it kneeled down and lisened to her babies cries.

After awile it left.  The mother stayed where she was, uncertin what course of action to take.  When the Big One came back.

It was holding somthing long and sharp.  Of course, she thought, why chase me when easy bait was right there!  She raced out to ambush him, but stopped.

It was using the sharp thing to make the holes bigger.  A trap?  When the hole was big enough it reached in and gentley put down one of her hacthlings! 

The hatchling toddled over to her is exstasy.  One by one the Big One pulled her hatchlings out and set them down.  When they were all out, it simply left.  The mother duck follow suit.

However a thought lingerd in her head as she and her ducklings waddeld back to thier pond.  Perhaps not all Big Ones were so bad after all.

Candy Shop War

    Q:What happens when you give four kids magic candy? A: Adventure of course!

     When Nate moves into Colson, a small town with nothing big to offer, he finds a bit more than he ever thought he would. First off, he almost immediately meets Summer, Pigeon, and Trevor. He joins their club, The Blue Falcons, and they all become great friends. Later on they visit a candy shop called Sweet Tooth, run by a "sweet" old lady named Mrs. White. She asks them to do wild things, like steal from museums and rob graves, in exchange for magic candy. The candy varies from  making you float, to changing your appearance, even allowing you to electrocute someone!
     Summer and Pigeon quit when they are asked to give a Clean Slate, a candy that will completely wipe someone's memories, in the milk of a local ice cream truck driver. Trevor and Nate decide to talk to Mr. Scott, the ice cream driver, for help, as they've begun to believe Mrs. white is not giving the full story. Mr. Scott dose help them by giving them some of his own candy in order to steal one of the things they stole for Mrs. White. They succeed, but at a price, Mrs. White traps Trevor the mirror realm, where he becomes a living reflection.
      As Mrs. White now knows they are no longer on her side, she elects the help of the neighborhood bullies, leading to several magic candy battles. Knowing they are not going to get help from their parents, who are under the influence of Mrs. White's white fudge thus making them dull to magic, the children continue trying to foil Mrs. Whites plans to find a hidden cup of water from the fountain of youth. Nate tries to follow a lead with Mr. Scott, but one of Mrs. White's henchmen rams them and makes the car they were in crash.
     Nate uses a Time Turner candy to go forwards and backward in time, and duplicate himself. Back in the past he steals his car and  plants it near the site of his present crash. forwards in time, he plants the idea of giving him the Time Turner candy in the mind of  Mr. Scott's time-seeing friend, Flatman. Then he finds the magically aged Pigeon and gets the story of what will happen in the future without him. Just before being yanked to the present he manages to go to the Sweet Tooth, and get a glimpse of the now young Ms. White. Back in the present Nate sends one of his triplet selves to take Trevor's place in the mirror realm, one to help Pigeon keep Mrs. White's minions from getting the cup of the Fountain of Youth water. Pigeon and the Nate with him get caught and are forced to help retrieve the cup.
    Unfortunately the water is guarded by an age spell. Anyone who tries to get it is magically aged. First one of the henchmen try, but he is old enough that the spell kills him. Then one of the bullies tries but he loses all the strength in his legs. Finally Nate goes, and reaches it. He turns it over to one of the henchmen, but not before slipping the Clean Slate into it.

in other news

    OK everybody! Sorry it took so long for me to post. It is summer. And I tend to be a bit lazy during summer. I will try to post these next few closer together. Also, small ad, if  I get 15 comments on Circle of Life I will try to post more of it, and 15 from the same person doth not countith.
   
    So Momma found this new (to us) author called Brandon Mull. He's really good, and we love all his series. Yes I said series. he has written three book series; Candy Shop War, Beyonders, and (my favorite) Fablehaven. We are also listening to three book series on audio; Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and the Guardians of Ga'Hoole. This isn't it either. These are just my "ones in progress." I actually read a lot more than that. So, again, I'll try to be quicker. Yours in writing, Boo

The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel

    Boo here. Letting you know that not all my reading is for school. I LOVE fiction books. Books with sword fights, magic, little bit of true love, and dragons. It would not be awesome if dragons were in any other section of the library. Anyway, I just finished reading the series: Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel. It's this really cool book series about twins that meet the immortals Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel, and have their lives changed forever. WARNING: if you don't have an encyclopedia before you read this series you will by the end of it.

     It starts out with this boy, Josh, and his twin sister Sophie, getting jobs at a book store and a coffee shop across the street from each other. The book shop keeper has a run in with Dr. John Dee. The book store and coffee shop are destroyed, and the book shop keeper reveals he is the Immortal Nicolas Flamel, the Alchemist. Flamel and the twins escape, but Perenelle is kidnapped by Dee.

     They meet up with Scatty, a vampire who knows a lot about martial arts.

     Flamel and Scatty take the twins to Hecate, an Elder, to have their powers awakened. Sophie is awakened, but Dee attacks before Josh can be. Hecate is killed, but the twins,and Scatty escape with Flamel.

     I should mention that Perenelle was in a prison in a building owned by Dee's company, but at the end of the book she is moved to a prison island and guarded by a Sphinx.

     The twins, Scatty, and Flamel meet up with the witch of Endor, and she trains Sophie in the element of air, and also gives Sophie all her memories. then she sends them through a ley gate, a kind of invisible gate from place to place, to Paris, France.

     In Paris they meet up with Saint Germain, otherwise known as Francis, and Joan of Arc. Francis teaches Sophie the magic of fire. Then they fight a dinosaur, and Josh leaves with Dee to get Awakened by Mars. If you read Heroes of Olympus, you know who that is.

     Meanwhile Perenelle strikes up an alliance with Arop-Enap, a spider goddess.

     The second book ends with them making plans to go to London to get the twins trained in the magic of water, which is where the third book picks up.

     I should mention that Scatty had been dragged away to fight under water and got separated from the twins and Flamel. She and Joan try to get to the prison island to help Perenelle, using a ley gate,but are sent back in time to prehistoric times.

    Perenelle escapes without the help of anyone but Morrigann, the crow goddess. She meets the water educated twins at Mount Tam in San Francisco. End of book three.

    In book four basically immortals named Machiavelli and (wait for it) Billy the Kid go to the same island Perenelle was on and attempt to free all monsters trapped there as well, but they get stuck instead. Josh joins up with Dee and the mysterious Virginia Dare, and tries to summon an ancient god that wants to devour all worlds, under the pretense she will give him necromancy and make the world beautiful. before doing this he is taught fire by Prometheus.

    Back to Scatty. she and Joan were taken to a place that looked like prehistoric times. Francis, Shakespeare  and a knight named Plamedes follow them. They meet the one handed man that has been guiding their fates for their whole lives. He takes them back in time (for real this time) to the fall of Atlantis, to make sure it falls so the modern world can exist. Oh yeah, and Sophie and Josh find out their mom and dad aren't human. They are actually one of the leaders of Atlantis. Transition into book five.

    This one is the book that satisfies the gory people. Lots of fights.

     Sophie and Josh are introduced as the leaders for Atlantis, whose people are revolting.
    An immortal named Niten and an elder named Prometheus battle Sparta warriors on the Brooklyn Bridge.
    And Machellvei, Billy, Billy's Friend Black Hawk, the Flamels, three elders; Hel, Mars, and Odin battle monsters on Alcatraz (Perenelle's island) to keep them out of San Fransisco.
 
   Naturally, the good guys win, though not without prices. but that I can't reveal in case you want to read it yourself. But this I will say: there are casualties, surprises, and twists, including one that brought me to tears.

    I give this sieres a 8 out of 100. Imagine the Harry Potter series, only all of the books are like The Deathly Hallows. It's awesome. I'm not normally one to cry over books and movies, but this one brought tears to my eyes. I am sorry that I could not go more in depth. It's a review of a whole series instead of one book. I just could not fit it all in. Plus I would rather you read it yourself.

   

GOD

GOD
If we live for Heaven there is no reason we should be afraid of death. We are not afraid of death. We are scared of being sent to Hell.
I can do all things through Christ. Nothing, literally, nothing is impossible for Him. If you were to say to a mountain "In the name of the Lord God, move!" it would move, as long as you believe God can do it.
Last night this all came to me. I had always sort of known the verses, they were just kind of empty until last night. I realized the true significance of these words; GOD CAN DO ANY THING!

Boo

P.S: I apologize for the out of context words. I forgot to correct auto-correct. Any misspelled words it probably couldn't replace. I spell (really) bad.


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Huckleberry Finn

    Sorry, I know it's been awhile since my last post, but, to be fair, my latest book I read took me a while. After all, Mark Twain wrote some pretty big books. Yeah, you read it right (or would that be write?). I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn!

    It all starts out with Mrs.Watson trying to "civilize" Huck. When Huck hears about his "father" being drowned in the Mississippi, he knows that his father will be coming for him. So he gives all his money to the judge, so that his father can't have it.

    His father does, indeed, come for him. He claims his son, and tries to claim his son's money, only to find that he traded it all for a dollar.

    Huck hates living with his father. He doesn't want to go back to living with Mrs.Watson again, either, so he does the natural thing; he fakes his death and runs away. He meets up with Mrs.Watson's slave, Jim. They get a raft and head upriver.

   They finally stop when Jim is captured as an escaped slave, and Huck is mistaken for Tom Sawyer by Tom's aunt. Tom pretends to be his cousin Sid, and they try to help Jim escape. In the end, the truth comes out, and Tom reveals that Jim was free all long. Huck is adopted by Tom's aunt, and they all live happily ever after.

    I give this book a 20 out of 100. I know it's a classic, but some of the dialogue was hard to follow and I don't agree with all Huck's choices. But over all, it was a pretty good book.

Miracles on Maple Hill

    When a father comes back from war, he's normally hardened by the things he's seen. So when Marly's father comes home from World War II, they all go to Maple Hill in the hopes that it might lift their father's gloom. 

    They get there right around sugar season. This makes them meet Mr. Chris and Chrisse, their neighbors. Mr. Chris promises to give Marly a miracle everyday.

    Marly and Mr. Chris get along really well. In the spring, he shows her all the flowers and plants. He shows her how to make friends with cows. He shows her the wonders of the world.

    She and her brother, Joe, have a wonderful summer. They meet a hermit, rescue foxes, and learn the horrors of cooking.

    With fall comes beautiful colors and new schools for Joe and Marly.  Joe, thinking he will go to a small, one room schoolhouse, sulks til school starts, when he learns he's too big for the little school.

    Winter sets in on Maple Hill, and sickness sets in on Mr. Chris. As the sap season started soon after, Marly's family enlists the help of the children's schools for help with it. The book ends at the edge of winter with Mr. Chris coming home from the hospital,weak, but alive.

    I really enjoyed this book. I thought that it really described how true country would appear to a city girl. I give it a 10 out of 100, as it is very intriguing.

The Seventeenth Swap

    OK next book, The Seventeenth Swap. Sorry it's so short.
   
    The main character, Eric Greene, has a baby sitting job for a crippled little boy. The little boy, Jimmy, wants a pair of red cowboy boots. Eric goes all over town trying to swap enough stuff to get the money to buy them while they are on sale. He nearly gives up a couple of times, but he makes new friends that encourage him to keep at it.  He finally gets enough money to buy the boots, with not a second of the sale to spare.

    I give this book a 19 out of 100 because it was only vaguely interesting. Sorry again that this one was so short, not a lot really happened, and I didn't want to talk about the individual swaps. Overall I think this book had an important message on not giving up. I just think that it could have been made a bit more interesting.

Great Grandpa's story

    So my great grandfather, Momma's grandpa, wrote this book. It has no actual title so I just call it Great Grandpa's story. It's basically the story of his life. Momma told me to make it brief so here's my attempt at brief.

    George Woodruff was born in Paris, Texas on February 6, 1921 to George Nathanial Woodruff and Niece Viola Woodruff. He joined the Navy in 1941, got married in 1944 to Dorthy, had his first kid, Freddie Woodruff, in 1947, his second in 1949, Georgia, his third, my grandmother Cheri, in 1952, and his last child, Jill, in 1956. He traveled the world, went to Disneyland, had 14 grandchildren, my mom included, and never thought he did anything of interest. I would just like to say he was flat out wrong.

    Since this is part of my family history I give this book a 5 out of 100. But if it was not family history I'd say a 55. Though that was just an extremely short sum up, my  grandfather did a lot of cool things, he just never realized it.

In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson

    Boo here! So, newest book has a very long title. Here we go, In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson. Whew! Let's call it Year of the Boar for short. Loads easier to type. :) OK, not as long as I originally thought.

    Anyway, this book is about a young Chinese girl, Shirley Temple Wong, who moves to New York with her parents. Naturally the adjustment is hard. It would be as if you or I were stuck in the middle of China. She knows little English and is the only Chinese person at her school. At first all the children are quite welcoming, but they soon give up on her. In addition to all this her mother makes her take piano lessons!

    Shirley is convinced that it can't get any worse when she runs into an older girl named Mabel and they get into a fight, leaving Shirley with two black eyes. After refusing to tell her parents, she discovered Mabel had been watching her, and they struck up a friendship. So good a friendship that Mabel invites Shirley to play "stickball," otherwise known as baseball. All the children then started to call her Jackie Robinson. after that Shirley becomes the Dodgers #1 fan, following them on the radio every time their on.

    She also gets her piano teacher to let her parents take care of the building while she goes to Spain to visit her daughter.  Then she gets a job babysitting three toddlers in the building; which, if you're a babysitter yourself, you know that's harder then it first seems. She uses the money to buy them candy to "tame" them.
 
    School starts up again, and brings with it a new classmate and friend for Shirley, a girl named Emily. They become instant best friends, sharing secrets, playing at each other's houses, and basically doing everything together. So, when it's time to elect the student body president, who do you think Shirley nominates? Emily, naturally. When Emily wins, yea, their teacher announces that Jackie Robinson will be coming to their school and the student body president will give him the key to it. Emily refuses, as she does not like baseball, and instead asks Shirley to do it.
 
When the night is there, Shirley gets the news that her mother is "with expectant happiness," otherwise said as pregnant. Shirley presents the key to her hero and then sees her family from China is here and saw her! What a grand Christmas present.

    I give this book a 40 out of 100. The reason: while this book is good, well written and deals with many of the complications of being an immigrant, I am just used to action stories. But it was still a good book, don't get me wrong, it's just an opinion.

On Mom's list

For some reason, this book intrigues me. I'm going to attempt it.

Hugs,
Melinda

Creative Writing

One of the things we do occasionally for school is creative writing.  I stumbled across this website that has some great writing prompts.  The other day, we did one called ... well, Boo has it down as "Circle of Life," but I can't find that now.  I thought she did such a good job, that I want to share it with you.  And my hope is that she will continue the story.  Let her know what you think of it.

Circle of Life

"I'm not sure when I fell through the looking glass, but I seem to be getting closer to what I want to run away from."  Alexander told the woman.

The woman looked at him and smiled.  "It often is that way here.  You see, things run backwards here.  They also run upside down, sideways, any way, but the correct way.  I should know," she said.

"What was your name again?" Alexander asked.

"I don't believe I said.  It's Alice."

Alexander stared at her.  "THE Alice?  Alice in Wonderland Alice?  But you, why are you still here?"

Alice looked at him sadly.  "Once upon a time an author came through here.  He was looking for inspiration for a book.  Most people who come here are looking for something.  So I told him my story.  He said it was exactly what he needed, minus a happy ending.  So I assume he wrote one in his book, Alice in Wonderland?"

"Yes, it's a classic.  You're a classic!  But why couldn't you leave?"

"Everyone here is looking for something," she said.  "The author was looking for a story.  You are looking for parents that love you."

"You were looking for the white rabbit."

"What rabbit?"  She looked at him, bewildered.

"Well, you see, in the book, the whole reason you were in wonderland is because you were following the white rabbit down this hole and ... "  Seeing her expression he fell silent.

"Anyway," she continued, "I was looking for an escape.  From an arranged marriage.  This was the escape.  Unfortunately, I couldn't leave.  The world wouldn't allow it.  It made me stay here until I found the great escape, that is, death.  But the catch is, people are immortal here."

"So you can't die.  That means you're ..."

"122 years old."

Alexander let that sink in.  "But how do I get out?" he cried suddenly.  "There's no way I can find parents here, and even if I did, then I would leave as soon as they were found."  With this realized, he started to cry.

"Oh, don't cry," Alice said.

Plain Girl

    Right after finishing Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry, I finished reading Plain Girl. Plain Girl is the story of a young Amish girl who, by law, is forced to go to a non-Amish public school. It's a fun story about the struggle against sin.
   
     This is around the same time period as Roll of Thunder. The story starts out with the main character, Esther, in the chicken coop. She overhears her father talking to some men who are telling him that, according to the law, she has to go to public school.
  
    Now Esther has a traditional family, mother, father, and brother, but her brother ran away to get a taste of the world. Her father always blamed the school for it. Putting ideas in his head, that kind of thing. Well, her father soon realizes that there is no way around this, so Esther goes to public school.
   
    As you probably know it's hard to go through school without making even one friend, yet that's exactly what Easter's father asked her to do. "You can look at the teacher, but there's no reason to look at the students," he said. But it didn't help, for soon she was friends with a girl named Mary.

    After a while the unthinkable happens. Her brother, Dan, comes home! He comes to see Esther and his lover, but doesn't think Father should know he's home just yet. So they make plans for him to come home on Christmas Eve. But in the midst of all their planning, Esther is thinking of something else. Mary had asked her to switch clothes with her. She asked Dan about it, and he tells her he'll think about it. When she gets back, Mary asks her for an answer.  Esther says yes. Now you have to remember that she's Amish and therefore she wares drab clothes because rich clothing is thought to bring them closer to Vanity. So if she had asked her father instead of  Dan, he probably would have panicked and thought that she was taking "the first step away." They end up not switching, because Mary's mother wouldn't let her wear the right dress.

    By this time we reach Christmas Eve dinner. There comes a knock at the door. Dan steps in and they have a big, happy family reunion.

    I give this book an 8 out if 100. It's a very "engrossing tale," just full to bursting with fun lively characters. It definitely captures the view of things from a ten year old's perspective. I really enjoyed this book. It has that old, home style charm to it. Though thrilling it is not, I think people of every and all ages will enjoy this book.

Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry

    Recently I read Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry. While it may have been for school I still greatly enjoyed it.  It's about the author's great-grandmother Cassie Logan.

    Cassie and her family are black people in a time where blacks, though free, are still thought an inferior race. Trouble starts when their school gets new books, new-to-them books. The books are in terrible condition, and right there on the front page, it calls them Negros. Cassie and one of her younger brothers, Little Man, are insulted and insist that they will not use books with that word in them. Their mother, a teacher there, glues the front page to the cover so they don't fall behind.

   The next spot of trouble occurs when, on a trading trip, Cassie, her older brother Stacey, and his friend TJ are in a store that refuses to wait on them till all the white customers are taken care of. Cassie, not understanding, confronts the storekeeper and is thrown out of the shop. Then, while moodily walking down a sidewalk, she literally runs into a white girl, who in turn tries to make her get off the sidewalk and apologize. When Cassie refuses, the white girl's father comes behind her and forces her to. Cassie then tells her the awful truth; most Whites still think Blacks are inferior to them.

    After a while, the kids have a big test coming up. Now TJ, who is a terrible student and knows it, decides to cheat. Stacey called him out on it, and TJ gave him the cheat sheet just as their teacher (and Stacey's mom) reaches them. TJ says that it was Stacey trying to cheat, and Stacey was too loyal a friend to say anything against it. Stacey got whipped for cheating. TJ, knowing his friend would be out for blood, runs to the Wallace store, a place Stacey isn't allowed to go to. TJ complains about Miz Logan's bad teaching there, about how she glued the books, and how she often taught stuff that wasn't in them. White men went to the school and fired her for it. Needless to say Stacey stopped being TJ's friend.
   
    It doesn't take long for TJ to find new "friends," two white boys, who give him lots of stuff in return for stealing things they can't. One night they decided to steal a pearl-handled pistol and all the money in a store. The two white boys set it up so that they would get caught and TJ would take the fall, because they made themselves look black. When TJ tries to stop them from hurting the storekeeper they hurt him really bad. Naturally he runs to his true friend, Stacey, who helps him get home, but not without Cassie, Little Man, and their other brother Christoper-John. When the white men come for TJ, the others dash to the woods, where they watch TJ and his family be, basically, beaten.
   
    Everyone but Stacey runs home to get the adults. Their father and the hired hand, Mr. Morrison, run to TJ's aid. Then, suddenly, the fields are ablaze. The women go to put out the fire, ordering the children to stay in the house, as the flames were going the other way. Soon all the towns people come to help put out the flames, even TJ's assaulter. Fortunately rain started pouring, and it put the fire out.

    After everyone left  Cassie and her brothers went to bed. However, they cried themselves to sleep, because their parents told them TJ was going to be sent to the chain gang, where he probably would not last.
   
    I give this book a 10 out of 100. It is highly enjoyable and it is well written, the characters are colorful and it paints a beautiful, if sad, picture. I think that though this story is from the view of Cassie it seems to be TJ's story. TJ, a boy that didn't tell right from wrong soon enough.

A Place To Hide

    Hey, it's Boo. In case Momma didn't tell you this is going to be our way for me to do my book reports. Just to give you a heads up, most of the books I read for school are historical fiction. So here's one on A Place To Hide. 
   
   A Place To Hide takes place during the Holocaust. It's about a few attempts to help the Jews hide, and it's all true.

    The first story is about a woman named Miep Santrouschitz. She hid ten people, all Jewish, in a tiny apartment, inclueding Annie Frank. One of her main worries was that it would look suspicious if a newly married woman were to get food for all those people, plus her and her husband! Luckily it went off without a hitch for quite a while before the Jews and the men involved were arrested. After the Germans surrendered one of the people Miep helped came back. He was the only survivor.

    The next story is about Oskar Schindler. He saved more than 1,200 Jews by hiring them in his factory. The Germans used a lot of his products so they did not question his methods. He helped a lot of Jews escape that way. He even had his factory moved so it was more secluded and, maybe, closer to cites of refuge, which brings me to the next story.

    When Germany invaded Europe, I think it expected to be followed without much revolt. Well the city of LeChambon in France sure surprised them! Not only did they revolt, they were so attached to their Jews that they made the city a city of refuge. Apparently though, one of the Germans later confessed they had been turning a blind eye towards it. But speaking of refuge...

   The monks of Assisi, Italy could not bear to see so many Jews killed, so they decided to help. They hid Jews in monasteries disguised as monks until they could go somewhere safer. I believe they were able to have kept that up until the Germans surrendered.

    The people in Denmark were able to evacuate Jews by sneaking their tiny fishing boats past the big German warships. This was quite successful as 8,000 Jews were evacuated.

    There are also 6 short stories at the end about the people hidden. I've decided I'm not going to include them here, because the longest is only 2 pages.

    I give this book a 47 out of 100 pages. Mainly because I have little to no interest in World War II and the Holocaust. I think if you like history you will enjoy this book, I just did not particularly like it.
 
    This book was about the men and women who risked their lives to save the Jews. I think it's downright sad sometimes. If you're not careful this book will make you cry. I would just like to mention the over 6,000,000 other Jews that did not escape the Germans. If you do cry during this book think of them and cry for them.