Weekend Book Review

I love reading, and I LOVE sharing what I read.  I find so many good books, since I am in a library around 12 hours a week, and I thought that doing a review of the books I read every once in awhile would be a good way to spread some good (and sometimes not so good) literature around.  So, I am going to start doing a Weekend Book Review every couple of weekends...or however long it takes me to finish the book in the side bar to the right!

 

Title: The Unfinished Angel

Author: Sharon Creech

I have liked previous books written by Sharon Creech, such as Love That Dog, and this one is entertaining too.  It is a young adult book (I kind of have a habit of reading those...) but it is a great, short, easy read for an adult as well.  :)

It is about an angel (or so s/he thinks) that lives in a tower in a small Swiss village.  This angel does not seem to know his purpose...yet.  A new family from America moves into town and the daughter, Zola, can see the angel. And so begins their friendship, with lots of acts of kindness along the way.

I recommend you read this book if you are looking for a light read that is creatively written and funny.  Here is an excerpt from the author's website:

I am a little hesitant to admit it, but many scenes in this book make me laugh and laugh. Here are three of my favorites:

From the chapter, 'My Territory,' when Zola asks the angel if the angel has wings.

From the chapter, 'Lizards,' when Rosetta confesses to eating a lizard's tail.

From the chapter, 'Pigeons,' when the angel reacts to Zola's pigeon story.

I have to agree! 

Let me know what you think if you choose to read this book!

L-M-N-O-P

For those of you who are looking for an easy, funny and quick book to read...I have the PERFECT suggestion. I just read a book called Ella Minnow Pea and it was one of the funiest books I have read in awhile, and it only took me 2 days to read the whole thing.

The book takes place on a fictional island off the coast of the Carolinas. The island is founded around this guy named Mr. Nollop who invented the sentence,

"The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog."

Some of you may have no idea what significance that sentence has, but it uses all of the 26 letters of the alphabet using only 36 letters altogether. Which I am led to believe is a pretty hard task. They use the sentence to show what fonts look like.

So, anyway, the island has a statue built in his honor and they become an island that loves the use of language and its' letters. But, the letters of the sentence start to fall off the statue and as they do, the leaders of the island decide that those letters can't be used as part of the language anymore. The people are not allowed to speak or write any words that have the letters that fall off the statue.

The book is written in the form of letters written back and forth to different islanders, and as each letter falls, the letters and the rules of the island become more and more funny. It is a silly book, but it is one worth reading just for fun.

RIF! (Reading is Fun!) :)

So here I am sitting at work…typing up some stories. I feel kind of guilty, BUT it is a really slow day AND I only have 30 more minutes left here anyway. I wanted to write while I had some ideas fresh on my mind. I just checked in the Movie Dan in Real Life, which makes me really want to go home and watch it because Ted and I LOVE that movie.

I then started wishing I could go home and start reading my book right away because I LOVE that too. It is called The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I am only on page 80, but I can already tell it is more than worth the read. It sounds like one of those old lady books that get mixed up in the jumble of the other 5 books she is reading (trust me that really happens, I see it all the time). But, this is not a book just for old ladies!! It takes place right after WWII in England and on the Channel Islands. It is written in letter format. So you get to read all of the letters one particular lady is sending out to various people and what they write back to her. The premise is that this lady (Juliet) is an author and TIME magazine wants her to do a piece about the war in relation to literature. She finds a group of people that live on one of the Channel Islands that formed a book club during the German occupation. I know it sounds like it is iffy…but you should give it a chance.

Another book you should read: The Mysterious Benedict Society. It is for young adults, but it is good writing, just like how Harry Potter is for young adults but adults love them. I have read The Mysterious Benedict Society and I got the second book in the series, The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey, as an early Christmas present (Izabella opened it yesterday, convinced that she must have another present to open…she is 2 J ). These books are about 4 kids who were orphans and then were recruited for a secret mission. Lame sounding? Maybe… Super entertaining and a fun, relaxing read? YES!

Sorry to Amazon for copying and pasting the pics. I really hope that isn't illegal. :)

and now....it is time to go home! Yay for multitasking!

Penny from Heaven

I recently decided that I am going to read (or attempt to read) all of the Newbery Award and Newbery Honor books. Not just for 2008, but for 2007, 2006, 2005...all the way to the beginning. I decided to start with 2008 because the first book that won the award, frankly, did not sound that appealing.

The beginning is 1922! Yikes! I know this is a great task, but I believe I will experience so many great types of stories and that excites me. The Newbery acknowledges great children's literature (not to be confused with the Caldecott Award for illustrations).

I know I should have started sooner in the summer because this fall I will be so busy. But, I will make time to read whether at night or on the weekends. So far I have read: Elijah of Buxton, The Wednesday Wars, and Feathers. The best one (in my beginner's opinion) out of these three is Elijah of Buxton. This book takes place during the slavery era in Canada and it will have you laughing at many points, pondering at others, and even crying toward the end. It is very well done. Christopher Paul Curtis is such an amazing writer, and he is from Michigan! The other two books take place in middle schools during the 1960's and 1970's and are also very good.

So three books down, many, many, many to go. It is going to be a fun literary journey. Let me now of any you have read and your opinion on them.

Enjoy the Labor Day weekend! (Currently I am reading Penny from Heaven.)