Long Time No Blog

I welcome my classmates from EDU 566. I started this blog as a project for another class I took in our program. I used it for a while and have it linked to a page I have on my school library wiki.

It has been a while since I have added anything. I find myself thinking of things that I might say to an old friend I have not spoken with in a while. "Life has been busy, but all good." "I miss you." "I've read so many great books while I've been away." All of those things are true, but seem silly to put here. Yet, it's the best way I can think of to reconnect to this blog of mine. I write for myself, and for any past readers, or new readers who find they want to "talk" about good books you have read, want to read, want your children to read, or want to read to your children.

To start I will share a book I recently read for myself, but would recommend it to younger readers perhaps eighth grade and up. The Heretic's Daughter, by Kathleen Kent, is a novel based in Puritan New England around the time of the Salem Witch Trials. It is told from the point of view of a young girl, Sarah, who appears to have a distant relationship with her mother. She struggles to understand her mother during the story. However, through the accusations that are made against her mother and the ensuing events, Sarah comes to a deeper understanding and a stronger bond develops. I think this story is both beautiful and tragic. There is such love and respect between the mother and father that is an amazing lesson for all. Through the tragedy of what happens to Sarah's family she comes to learn the true love her mother and father have had for her always. After I read the book I rented the movie, The Crucible based on Arthur Miller's play. It shares the historical time frame setting with the book and I enjoyed watching it fresh off reading this book. I hope you can find some time to take both in at some point.

Another wonderful book I read recently was World's End, a novel for young readers co-authored by Jake Halpern and Peter Kujawinski. This book is second in a series, the first was Dormia. It describes the many adventures that Alfonso Perplexon has as a Dormian, a person who can do superhero type moves in his sleep. His mission is to save Dormia, the land where his father comes from. The catch is he finds all this out when he is just twelve years old and living a somewhat normal live in Minnesota. What I mean by somewhat normal is Alfonso goes to school, plays, has friends, but crazy things happen to Alfonso when he falls asleep in class! I met Jake when he visited my school last school year (fall 2009) to talk to students about being a writer and his books. He came back and visited us again in January 2011 to talk more about where his ideas come from. I found this video on YouTube of Jake and Peter talking to some kids. This is a pretty much the same type of event my students experienced with Jake last month.

Last year Jake and Peter offered up a contest called The Blank Page contest where kids were invited to fill a blank page with a story, an illustration, a movie or more that could have been a scene in the book but was not. The winning contestants would have their name put into Jake and Peter's second book that they were writing at that time, The World's End. Several students from my school entered and two won. Here is one of the students entries, a movie about a scene that could have happened in Dormia.

It was very exciting to see what could come from a student inspired from reading a good book and a little competition.

Keep reading your books and I'll try not to stay away so long. Thanks for reading my work.
Beth