Touch of Power

Hey everyone! This week I was reading Touch of Power. I have not yet finished, and this is what I read so far. Here is a summary.

Avry has a gift. She can heal the sick and injured by assuming the diseases into herself. Healers are hated amongst all town folks because they are rumored to have spread 'the plaque'. 'The plaque' is a sickness that can kill someone within a few months or years from when they got the sickness. If you catch a healer like Avry (with the special gift) and turn them in to jail, you get a lot of money. They kill the healer there. One day, Avry is caught and turned in. A band of rogues rescue her, but on one condition: she has to heal their friend. Later on, she finds out that their friend is the same prince who actually created 'the plaque'. He has caught it himself and they want Avry to heal him. She says no. This prince has not only created 'the plaque' but also destroyed many kingdoms. She does not want to heal someone like this.

That's all I read! Sorry. But I'll write about it next weekend. I won't promise, because I might finish it before that. :)

Kristina

Do I know enough about bees?

The Hive Detectives by Loree Griffin Burns

The topic of the book is very interesting. I had no idea that if there were no bees we, people, would not have any food. Bees are the main pollinators and the crop very much depends on them. I have learnt that bees like human can suffer with illnesses and diseases. Sometimes these diseases are easy to find and sometimes it is a hard job. The bees can be sick of viruses and bacteria. There are diseases of which the bees can also die, as it has been said in this book. The part what puzzled me the most was the part about the influence of chemicals that the farmers use very regularly. I still do not have an answer to a question: "If people need so badly the bees to pollinate the plants why do they still use chemicals which cause harm to them?" I do not think it is smart at all. I would like to learn more about bee-keeping because I would like to have my own hive and I do not want that my bees get sick.

Anne Frank: The diary of a young girl

Hello everyone!
 Almost done with my book, planning to finish it today.  I have read 268/283 pages. The author is Anne Frank and the book was edited by Otto Frank.

Now, first of all.  What is the topic.  In my opinion the topic of this book is about how a child has it in war.  I myself think that this is terrible that a child has to live through this.  It is very unfortunate that Anne dies in the end.  Her dad, Otto, is the only one in the Frank family that survived.  That is very sad.  I have learned that even though i can imagine what it is like i will never know how it feels to live like that, hearing gunshots outside sometimes.

-Per

YAY

The one that got away (Last)

This week I finished my book, The one that got away by Chris Ryan. In this book the topic was being stuck somewhere with no food or drinks and needing to walk. The theme was never give up no matter what. Chris Ryan represents that in this story by going 5 days without any food or drinks with no friends around or any hope to get to the friendly border/ territory. This shows that you should never give up no matter what. There were parts where I didn't understand like how did a random stranger appear behind him? Also there were these other times like he spoke in a really advanced level of English so I did not understand some parts. I wondered why he chose this topic instead of all those other things he could write about. I would want to learn more about why he was sent there and why only 4-5 people came with them.
Thank you for reading,
Kaan

Outliers ~ Malcolm Gladwell

Hello everyone! For my book report, I am reading "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell. I finished the book a few days ago, and I have to day it's really an interesting non-fiction book to read, and this book has 304 pages. This book is made up of series of stories about success and the characteristics or people who succeeded. The book mentions the 10,000 hours of practice that pay off. The book also mentions a lot of people like The Beatles, Bill Gates, Christopher Langan and many other people, and their characteristics, and what makes them so special that they succeeded in life. Most of the people mentioned, took their time, and practiced until they mastered their skill. The Beatles played a lot in different cities, Bill Gates took the opportunities he was given as a student and spent years on the computer and Christopher Langan had an IQ higher than Einstein's. There weren't any puzzling points in the book, so I have no questions about the book. A thing I would like to know more about is the people's childhoods and did their childhood have anything to do with who they became later on. I suggest you read this book, because it's very interesting and I recommend
this book to everyone! 

Bound Feet and Western Dress by Natasha Pang Mei

I have just finished Bound Feet and Western Dress and it was AMAZING.

The topic in this book (equality of women, life of a woman in Chinese traditions) is extremely important. The first topic, equality of women, is obviously extremely important, not only in this book but also because it used to be a world-wide problem and still is in some areas.  For some reason, women are not thought of as as important as men in some cultures. In 20th century China, this was a huge problem and the wife must always obey their husband in every situation, no matter how small. The second topic, life of a woman in Chinese traditions, is a huge part of the book I read. The main character has to suffer from not being able to do what she wants due to the fact that the daughter of the husbands family is expected to look after her inlaws. This prevented the main character from studying in the West, as she had to stay behind in China.

I was rather puzzled by the manner of the main character's husband. One moment he was abusive and ignorant and the next he was interested and gentile. At the beginning of the book the main character claims she 'hates' her husband and in the end of the book she claims, although divorced from him, that she loved him deeply. This was rather puzzling.

I would really like to learn more about women and their situation and 'struggle' they used to have in China. I would also like to learn more about the reason for this and why it didn't occur in the same way in the West.

I would really recommend this book.

Witches!

Hello!
For my book report I'm reading "Witches!" by Rosalyn Schanzer. I'm almost done with the book and I'm starting to think about the project. In the novel more and more people accuse others for being witches or signing the Devil's book. The two characters, mentioned in previous posts, are accusing hundreds of people, more villagers are getting 'fits', and everything is just a mess. Most of the people are just accusing others, not to be accused themselves. What leads to the importance of the topic. So one of the reasons the topic in this book is important, is because it teaches us not to judge people by their appearance. For example if a person didn't go to church every week, there were already rumors that that villager signed the book of Evil or something worse. The subject is also important, because it tells us how people can be closed-minded. In that time, if somebody chocked for a second or had some disability, it already meant that he is possessed. From that I learned that the world is not fair and that you should look for options and think the way you think, not others. The book really got me thinking about the topic. I found it important and useful. I think I will try going deeper into the subject. It's truly interesting.

A Diary of a Young Girl - Yoonji - Post 2

Hello all, as some of you may know, I am one of the few people who read/is reading 'The Diary of a Young Girl', written by Anne Frank. Currently I am trying to quickly finish the book, and I read 268 pages out of 283.
I think this book's topic is basically about the persecution of Jews in World War 2 in general, but more specifically it is about Anne's life in hiding from the Nazis. Specifically, I don't think that the topic of this book is hugely important and impacting (although I believe the book is), because it is about a Jewish girl and her family hiding in a secret refuge, undiscovered by Nazis for about three years during World War 2, which some other Jews also did. I don't really know how this can really affect readers or impact other things hugely, and are only a number of detailed diary entries written by a 13-year-old girl. But I think that it is important in a more general way, because World War 2 was a major historic event that happened during 1939 to 1945, along with the persecution and death of many Jews, caused by the Nazis. I think that this topic and the book itself can show readers about how hiding for three years during a major war was like, and help them understand it better.
The parts in the book that I didn't understand were throughout the whole book, not really a specific diary entry, but just some small or big parts of some entries and the whole book. Those were the parts when Anne, who seems to be highly educated in literacy, considering the language and vocabulary, uses a lot of hard and high level words a number of times in paragraphs, often when she is writing about her personal life and feelings. I think it is pretty unusual for a thirteen-year-old who doesn't get educated for three years while hiding in a not-so-big house to be that literate while writing a diary. But well, most things are possible and there are special and talented people in history and the earth. Anyway, judging by the depressing/confusing diary entries about her emotions and thoughts, I think she usually got depressed, angry, and sad about her family and the way they act, and felt very unnecessary and not needed. Of course, the mortal mind is confusing, full of different thoughts, but I think this girl was more talented in that, along with her literacy skills, being very internal and bottling her emotions up, and forcing writing to a diary ("Kitty is always patient." maybe she's not). But I do understand that many great books use confusing/high level of vocabulary, and often use it in explanations about feelings, the human mind, society, etc. (Read the 'Tale of Two Cities'! You'll know (about the migraines)!)
I still do have some questions about the topic. For instance, 'what exactly is the topic? Because I didn't quite understand what it should really be, because it was both specific, personal, yet general.' So I am still having trouble figuring out the main and the most important topic of this book; personal feelings and life, or depression of the killing of Jews in World War 2?
I want to learn more about the topic, of course, what exactly happened after Anne's last entry, and how this book actually impacted different people in varying ways, because not everyone has the same opinion about something (in this case, the book). I think that I can find out about what happened after Anne's last entry if I read the afterword, (which some confusing or "great" books (like Newberry Honor books or others) have) in which it either explains and tries to resolve the remaining confusion of the poor readers, or just acknowledges different things related to this book. But I am not sure about the other information I want to know about.

(Please do not judge; I know this is a strongly opinionated post, and a horrible critique which is basically seeking death from Anne Frank lovers)

(Proper apology: I am very sorry for making this post very weird. And I hope you don't criticize me for writing all these unnecessary, unrelated things here.)

The Wisdom of Bees

The Wisdom of Bees is a book that tells about how do bees work when as a group or when they have problems. This book tells me lots of things about bees. The topic of the book is very important
Because this book is telling us to turn the bee's wisdom in to company. I almost finished everything in the book, I want to learn more about how do they do with the queen when it don't lay eggs anymore. 

Candyfreak!

The book I read for my book report is "Canyfreak" by Steve Almond. I finished the book this morning actually (264 pages), and it was kind of interesting.

The book basically contains stories about candy freaks and Steve Almond being a candy freak himself writing about his experiences and stories. He also talks about how he stopped being a candy freak which was one of the most interesting things you will read in this book. Although it is interesting, it doesn't keep me really excited throughout the whole book, there's just not enough tension.

Every chapter is a different story/stage and some of them are a bit ridiculous. Overall I think the book is okay, and I really liked how the author in one chapter (I'm not sure in which one exactly, it was before the middle of the book though) went through how his life looked like and what people thought of him while he was a candy freak, and then he explained how he overcame the candy obsession.That chapter especially is important because you realize how people judge others when it's really unnecessary, and for all the little things that make us who we are.. If you love something, do it: though only if it's safe and not bad for you. Yes, i know, candy is also bad for you, but his whole family was a candy freak family, and Steve was the one who kind of broke the tradition. (His grandpa was especially a huge candy freak) I think there's a really nice quote that fits this perfectly: "No one else's opinion should affect your appearance or your lifestyle". I don't know who wrote the quote, but it definitely teaches us something. Also, Steve stopped being a candy freak because of himself, not because of what other people were telling him. Real life example: "I hate your jeans", says a person in your school. What are you gonna do then? You're not gonna stop wearing those jeans just because somebody told you they're ugly. You're wearing them because you like them, and that's what's important.

Even though there were a lot of things explained in this book, I wish Steve Almond wrote more about his life as a candy freak. It's interesting to hear about his experiences. There wasn't exactly anything that puzzled me, the book was clear and to the point. Well, I kind of liked this book, but there were better. I guess I'm more of a science fiction fan. Thank you for reading!

The Nazi Hunters

The book I have chosen for my book report is called The Nazi Hunters by Neal Bascomb.
109/215

The topic in my book is World War 2. It's important because World War 2 was the event that killed many people and injured many others. World War 2 took place around the 1st of September, 1939, and ended the 2nd of September, 1945. The beginning starts with the journey of Adolf Eichmann, a German Nazi General SS (Schutzstaffel).
I learned that a German Nazi General Adolf Eichmann was captured by a team at a bus stop in Argentina and smuggled to Israel, resulting in one of the country's most important trials.
The only things that really puzzled me was the names. I had to ask a friend to understand how to read the German last names.
The questions I have about this topic are how do kidnap a high-ranked Nazi with only a couple people called the Nazi hunters. Like, how do you do it? Is the process complicated, because you need to know exactly where they are and what time they're going to be there. How do you get that information?
I want to learn more about WW2 in general.

How I Killed Pluto and Why it Has it Coming

The book I am reading for my project is called "How I Killed Pluto and Why it Had it coming" by Mike Brown and in this book there are 231 pages. I think that the topic of this book is about defining a planet and discussing how astronomy has changed throughout history. I think that this topic is important because throughout the book many things change in history and it affected people a lot. I learnt that to be an astronomer is a hard job but is a very important job as astronomers were the ones to discover that they are not the center of the universe but there are other planets and universes out there. One thing that confuses me is that there were/are many other planets before but then were forgotten and I don't understand why. What I really want to learn is what is the current definition of a planet as it seems throughout history the definition changed.

"THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER"

# Pages 167/223
Author: James Cross Giblin

Hello fellow blog readers! I have been reading the book called: "The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler". I am finished with roughly 2/3 of the book, and I am planning to finish by mid-next week, so that I can have time to do the actual book project. So far, I am very impressed with the content of the book, and I think it would have been a good selection even in my free time. Here are a series of questions to be answered:

Why is the topic of this book so important? Well, first we must be aware of the fact that Adolf Hitler is one of histories biggest characters. People need to find out how he became such a tyrant, and what lead him to make such murderous acts as he did. As well, the topic is important because it is of huge historical significance,

What did you learn about this topic? I already knew quite a bit about Hitlers life, but I have learned even more about him, mainly his early life as a poor man in the city of Linz, and Vienna. As well, I learned many historical details about troubling times, such as the first world war, and the international depression that even affected Germany. In all, I have learned truly found out more, and I have enriched my knowledge about this topic.

What did you not understand about the book? In terms of the actual book, all was very clear and maybe even at certain points overly-descriptive. The main question that is actually puzzling me is how Hitler, a son of a Austrian customs official, become the tyrant of the last century. I understand his route to what he became, but people will never know what happened in his mind and how he succeeded. It is one of histories greatest questions.

What questions do you still have about this topic? Well, as I previously mentioned, one of my main questions is how he became what he was. Another question is, though I have not read the whole book yet, but I know this, is did Hitler survive the war? Many theories suggest that he was not assassinated in his bunker by Soviet troops, but instead he escaped to south america. I am a bit skeptical about this theory, but I think that this may be mentioned later in the book, as this is a question that is un-solved. As well, I wonder why he came to hate Jews and Slavs, because they never endangered him in any way what so ever. At one point in the book, he starts hating these two groups of people. This is yet another un-solved question.

What would you like to learn about more? Well, I think that it is important to learn about who he was surrounded by. For example, in the book it is mentioned that Eva Braun, his future wife, was a worker at a restaurant, until she became Hitlers wife. I wish I could find out more about her, and people that he worked with everyday. As well, I wish to know what was in the minds of his followers. Where they brainwashed, or forced to be for him? We will never know, but this is one of the main questions I want to find out more about.

In general, this is a great book so far, and I recommend it to anyone with the will of reading.
NL   

TTYL

Hello everyone! This week I am reading a book called TTYL. There are three friends: Angela, Zoe, and Maddie. Angela is the one who loves makeup, falls for guys easily and picks good outfits. Zoe is the smart one, the one who gets good grades, and doesn't like makeup. Maddie is the rebellious kind, who will takes risks, and has a bit of a temper.

One day, Maddie gets angry at Angela and Zoe, and refuses to speak to them. They try to text her, but Maddie is a little bit of a drama queen and ignores them. When Zoes's 26-year-old teacher develops feelings for her and invites her to many events, she doesn't know how to say no. In the final event, Maddie agrees to help Zoe get out of it. They all become friends again, and everything is happy.

Thanks for reading.

Kristina

Chinese Cinderella

For my first book project this year I am reading Chinese Cinderella, which is a true story of the childhood of Yen Jun-Ling (Adeline Yen). Who was not wanted by the remainder of her family, after her mother had passed away several days following her birth. I have enjoyed reading all 205 pages of this moving book.

The moral of it is that persistence and determination will always be rewarded. Through her life's many hardships Adeline was still able to build a strong character, who never gives up. The moral in this novel is very important to me, because I feel as though if anyone lacks inspiration and is discouraged, in following their dreams they can read this story and realize that anything can be accomplished with hard work.

The only thing in this book that was on occasion hard to understand was the frequent use of Chinese symbols, it was quite confusing in the begging but as I go farther along in the story I started to understand them, what really helped with understanding those symbols though was the guide on the front page of the book, and that after every symbol that was used its meaning was put in parentheses following it.

After reading this novel I would really like to learn some if not most of the Chinese symbols because I found it so interesting to learn about them throughout this book. A question I had after reading the book was why is it that the spoken Chinese language has so little, if nothing, to do with the written one?

Wesley the Owl

Stacey O'Brien

Finished book

The topic of my book is an owl. As well as many other animals owls are also very important in our lives. This book teaches us new things about owls that Stacey discovered about Wesley. After reading this book, I have a pretty good idea what owls do, what they eat, and that it is quite hard living with and owl. Before Stacey adopted this owl, she though owls were just some other bird living in the woods. But then she grew up loving owls. She knew they were special in their own way. After reading the book, you could really see Stacey loves Wesley. I learned that owls are really smart and once they imprint on someone they don't leave them alone, or every leave them. Wesley imprinted on Stacey.

I was grossed out when Stacey explained all about her feeding Wesley mice. I was excited when Stacey said she could kind of understand Wesley's Chirps and Squeals. She knew what everyone mean. For Example, when Wesley wanted to get out of a room, he would make a certain squeal that Stacey would recognize and open the door for him. Wesley would also understand some words that Stacey said a lot. For example, when Wesley wanted to cuddle, Stacey would ask him "Do you want to cuddle?" and Wesley would took straight at her for yes, or if he didn't want to, he would look away. I find this really cool.

I wish Stacey had more time with Wesley before he died. I was so sad at the end of the story when he did pass away. He had a problem in his liver. I wish that Stacey had recognized that he had problems before, then maybe he could have lived longer. Its a really nice story of Wesley and Stacey.

HN

Apollo 13

Hi all,

The book that I have been reading for the last few weeks is Apollo 13, by Jim Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger. I have finally finished reading all of the 397 pages, which I finished yesterday evening.

Apollo 13 is about the 13th Apollo Mission - the third mission, which was to land on the moon. Some technical problems happened on the way to the moon, and the land in was aborted. The crew just had to get back to earth alive, with very limited resources, which were steadily decreasing each minute. 

The main topic of the book is space travel and exploration. To me, honestly, I don't believe that this is the most important mission that us as the human race, should be concentrating on. I think before we should go cavorting around the universe, the problems on earth should be resolved. It is good to gain knowledge, but to gain knowledge and using so many recourses and people to do that, I don't believe is necessary. On earth we are having problems with pollution and conserving our earth recourses. We are spending more money on space travel than our earth, and I am not convinced this is the best thing for us and our children and centuries decades beyond.

In this book I actually learned a lot about space travel and the actual procedure. It is a long grueling process to become an astronaut, and another long grueling process to train for a flight .You need to be prepared for anything, so the training is very strenuous and the crew needs to be prepared for everything. I also learned that when a mission goes to space, the ship has to be reinforced with surplus of everything – a lunar landing needs at least 3 full fuel tanks – even though you might not need it.

I found the whole idea of space exploration puzzling, and I was confused a few times about the machinery. The book uses a LOT of technical terms for parts of the spacecraft and the people in NASA and the operations and maneuvers they attempted. I sometimes had to go back a few pages to just make sure I knew what they were doing, or what they were attempting to do to save the mission.

I want to learn more about space exploration, and the other Apollo missions which were successful. I would love to find out how the mission was supposed to go, and how it would of worked. Since the book was quite scary considering the chance of failure, I would love to know if there was the same stress with all the other missions. Another question I have is about the past of the other two members of the mission – Jack Swigert and Fred Haise. We found out a lot about Jim Lovells past, but I don't know anything about the other crew member’s histories, and families and experiences which led up to the mission. I think it would help understanding their actions within the journey. 

Thank you for reading :)

The Life & Death of Adolf Hitler - Cosmo

Halla people!

This is another blog post involving the book, “The Life & Death of Adolf Hitler”, by James Cross Giblin, 226/226 pages into the book, and this time the topic for this blog assignment was actually a few questions, among them: Why is the topic of your book important, what did you learn about this topic, were there parts of the book you didn’t understand/what puzzled you, what questions do you have about this topic and what do you want to learn more about, or do you have any strong desires for further inquiry? I will answer all these questions paragraph by paragraph to come, so sit back, and enjoy.

First of all, the topic of this book is significant because Adolf Hitler was a man who impacted the 20th century enormously, by gaining support and actually performing some horrendous deeds, which followed his beliefs. Now his beliefs were negative, and according to them, there was a hierarchy of races, as I mentioned in one of my earlier blog posts, stretching from the Aryan appearance to the Jews and communists, and Hitler strongly encouraged the fact that they should be annihilated, for they were not worthy enough on Planet Earth. He showed the world what you can do with power and support, so brought awareness for having dictators in a country, to always have a wary eye, and taught us about equality and how racism shouldn’t exist in the world. In conclusion Hitler had great impact and really changed the world for those reasons above, and they provide at least a fair argument to why he was important and seriously influenced our way of thinking.

By spending some time to read this book I actually learned quite a lot about this topic, a life of Adolf Hitler. I was fascinated by his “moves” he made and all the actions that followed, from both the German empire and the allied forces, clearly against his mindset and ideas. With my eyebrows raised I read descriptions of Hitler's strategic movements,

like the flawless increase in the tension around borders in soldiers, and the casual

invasion of Austria and Czechoslovakia back then in the late 1930s and the early 1940s.   

Some things that puzzled me in the beginning of the book how Hitler ever gained support for his murderous deeds to the world, but this became clear to me as it was obvious how he did it. He had the natural talent of intriguing speech, which was very useful in his rise of power. He convinced people his beliefs were the best, etc., etc., etc., and how he could lead Germany to a position of absolute power... Another thing that puzzled me was that the allied forces struck when it was almost too late, but later the book provided an answer of them being to scared and everything. For the rest I understood the book pretty much clearly, and was fascinated too.

Here finally, a paragraph that will conclude my further questions and what I’d like to learn more about. So I have some further questions that I want to be answered, but I know aren’t really gonna be answered..., anyways, here they are: Why didn’t Hitler and Mussolini, (the italian dictator at the time directly join forces to be more stronger? Why did Hitler continue even though his determination was false hope, and he was aware of it? Many of these questions are just strategic battle planning, so let me just stop here. In general I just want to learn more about his life in more detail, which might seem a bit strange, but it is just so interesting to me, and I am sucked up in it now...

Thanks a million for the attention people, and see you later!

Cosmo :)

Nice To Meet You by Jessie J

A couple of days ago I have finished reading "Nice To Meet You", an autobiography by Jessie J, in which she talks about her life, starting out her career as a singer, how hard it was in the beginning, as well as getting to know her true self and then winning awards, getting recognized and just overall success. This book had a total of 214 pages which I have enjoyed reading very much. The moral of this book is to never give up, no matter how hard it can sometimes be to achieve your dreams.  I personally find it beneficial to be persistent because you never know, maybe you will find yourself in a position you never expected to be in, and really wanted to, and everything will then pay off. To someone who is discouraged, and someone who feels as though they cannot not pursue their dreams, I would recommend this book. After they read it I am certain, that they would be re encouraged to do something spectacular.  While reading this novel though it puzzled me how Jessie J wrote many songs for other famous artists and never once did she complain about it, also I was amazed how determined she was to make it in the music industry. One thing that I enjoyed in this book was that other people’s opinions of Jessie J were included in it. , I don’t have any questions regarding the moral of her autobiography other than when is her new album coming out, because I think that her songs talk about life, but also have a deeper meaning to it that affects everyone who hear it no matter what language it is in. 

Three cups of tea

Hi Guys,
For my book report I am reading a book called Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson. I have so far read 280 pages out 331 pages. Here is a picture of the book:
 
This book has an extremely important topic the topic of this book is if you think something is wrong go and change it don't just sit writing for someone else to do something about it. I learnt that even little things are much appreciated. Also Greg is going around building school because he thought that the education in Pakistan is very low and he has been able to make 23 school so far with very little money spent compared to the Pakistani government.
The one thing I don't understand is that Greg is a kind and caring person and he wants to help every body but he has a wife and two children and he always is 5 months in Pakistan and then he comes back for two months and while he is suppose to be with his family he is around America collecting money for his organization that will help build schools in Pakistan. This is not a bad thing but he leaves his wife and children in America by them self for 5 MONTHS and he is generally a really caring person.
I so far do not have any questions but i wish that he would about his family a bit more because even though its really interesting about his work and the villages he is helping but I would also like to know how was his wife coping with the two kids and how are their education going.

AG

"I am Malala" By Malala Yousafzai

I am Malala

Malala Yousafzai

183/291 # of pages read

Hey guys so today I will be doing another blog post about my book project book written by teen author and bullet survivor Malala Yousafzai. I will be writing about how the topic of the book and things that I might not understood.

The topic that Malala talked about in the book was important because this problem is still going on and hasn't been solved. Woman and girls education rights. So I think that this is important because everyone has the ability to learn and to explore about the world and about new things. I think that it isn't fair that girls would have to just clean the house and serve the men while men got to learn, but didn't really respect it. Malala is inspired and loves learning, she wouldn't even wanna leave her city because she still wanted to learn in her school, she wanted all of her books, she wanted to keep on making speeches and poems and be top in the class (which she was anyways).

What I learned about the topic of girl's education and rights of women and girls a lot. I learned also how the women live, they aren't allowed to get out of the house alone, only with a male which is from their family. I would have never know these rules that people have and that Fazlullah made up. I learned about the difficult life of others. My life contains of a great school and education, I have food on the table and girls education is encouraged. The Taliban bombed many girls' schools in order that the girls will not receive education. The Taliban also didn't want girls to go out in the street with their face not covered. I understood the life of other girls.

I did not understand some parts of the topic. I didn't understand why the Taliban (who also eventually shot Malala on 9th of October, 2012) would just go and shoot people and just didn't want education. They also destroyed boys' school which made no sense because they said that they wanted boys to become smarter because its already the 21st century. Knowledge is kind of a must. But the Taliban just destroyed what every person thought was important. The celebrations and killed loved ones, stole and destroyed the televisions. I really was puzzled that they just wanted to destroy everything. Doesn't the leader understand that its not really going to help him. Yes, in the end the Taliban destroyed half of Pakistan or even more and killed important people who were against them but finally Malala decided she has to stand up for this, with support from her dad.

I don't really have any questions about the main topic. I mean I pretty much understood the main point. I agree with the main point and really want Malala to succeed with her point of encouraging people to let girls learn. I want to learn more about how Malala wants to do this. So far, all I know is that she had interviews and got prizes for giving speeches but I want to see if she had invented a school for girls or has some kind of project to do this. Although she's young at only 18, she knows what she is doing. She is a smart, brave and strong girl.



Pic link: http://thediplomat.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/19348_5280a9e3dbd74.jpg

Thanks for reading!

Shelly

Alex Ferguson by Sir Alex Ferguson #4

     Hi guys! The fourth post about my book is here. If you still don't know for this book report project I choose to read a book called "Alex Ferguson" by Sir Alex Ferguson, for more details read my other posts. I finished all the 350 pages this week and I'm really happy that I chose to read this book.
     The main topic in this book is football (soccer). For me this topic is important because it's my favorite sport and I love this sport. For others might be important because it teaches them about this wonderful sport. Also I would say that another topic of this book is psychology. I would say that because in some parts of his book he talk a little bit about how he was able to make his players more focused and how he worked with missed behaved ones but it has very few parts like that. I didn't learn much about football as a game but I learned about how Sir Alex sees this sport and to learn and read about how the greatest manager of all times sees this sport is a really nice thing. I didn't have troubles understanding this amazing book and that's good. I honestly have no more questions about this topic and I learned a lot already so I don't consider asking more questions or learning more about it.
Hope you enjoyed reading this post! 

Long Walk to Freedom

Author: Nelson Mandela

625/625 pages



As this is probably my third or fourth post about this book, most will have a good understanding of my books topic; equality and fighting for what you believe in. Although this mainly is about African freedom, it focuses on how people should be treated not by their religion or race, but personality. Standing up for what you believe in is also a hard choice to make, but sometimes life needs sacrifice. I think that this is a really important topic because even now in the world, there is segregation, discrimination, injustice, and people fearing to make a stand. Nelson Mandela put a new light to this topic and writes of his struggle that all was worth in the end. I learned that much more to sticking with what you believe in and there will be times in life where you´ll look back and think, what if?
There were some parts in the book which I found slightly confusing because they spoke of the ANC, MK, SACPO, COD, and so on; they were basically the African National Congress and other organizations. These parts were particularly boring and I had to really push forwards to go on. They didn't last but three to four pages, but they were long indeed. I couldn't understand what exactly the SACPO and so on meant and what they were arguing about. However, it wasn't the main point of the book and I believe that I didn't miss any crucial information. I'm still very confused as to what politics is and I may never really understand, yet I am curious to learn and hope to read more autobiographies or biographies of political heroes and whatnot. I think that's it. Goodbye, and thank you for reading, I think. 

The hive detectives By: Loree Grifin Burns

LXIII/LXIII

I have finished reading this book. The book helped me understand what I will have to do to protect  my bees as I have them. In my last blog post you could have read that Dave has not found the COD(Cause of Death) of his his colonies. The American beekeepers have lost 38% of there colonies over the 2006-2007 winter. Because all three types of mites were not proved the beekeepers called in Diana Cox-Foster who is an expert on honey bee viruses. Diana was working to determine which of the known bee viruses could be found in the CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder). She found out that the bees were very sick and that in their dead bodies were huge numbers of viruses. The viruses spread very quickly (it is the same like a human flu virus). The bees bring the virus from the nature and leave it with their spits everywhere. Diana begun to suspect a fast-spreading and very powerful virus to cause the bee disaster. She concluded that it must have been a virus called Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus. To prove her theory she was obliged to build an airtight greenhouse not to endanger the healthy bee hives outside. In the greenhouse it was also easier to find the dead bodies and to make the experiments. It seems that many things have changed in agriculture and due to that also in bee life. The farmers grow the mono-cultures on the field for several years and to protect their yields they use huge quantities of fertilizers and also deadly pesticides that kill insects which harm their work. Now, imagine a bee coming to the field where the farmers grow only one type of plant which means only one type of nectar and pollen for the bee. It would be the same for YOU going every day three meals  a day to McDonald for Big Mac.. it s not healthy and you would lack the nutrients. Your immune would fail after some time. It is what has happened to Dave's bees.

After one year Dave Hackenberg and his son have started again and have built their beekeeping operation back up. They are trying to give the bees a rest so they can recover. They feed them with a high protein bee feed and they co-operate with farmers to use only pesticides that are proven safe for honey bees.

Anne Frank: A diary of a young girl

Hey everyone.
Today I will be writing about the main problems in my novel.  I have read 136/283 pages.  The author of the book is of course Anne Frank and her father, Otto Frank named the book A diary of a young girl.

Lets start with the main problem, War.  According to the Oxford dictionary, war is a conflict between two countries  that fight with armed weapons.  They take place in World War II which was when Germany declared war and wanted to take over the world.  Anne Frank's family lives in a small house in Amsterdan.  Anne's conflict is that she is constantly living in a community where there are gunshots outside.  I think that when a young girl like Anne, lives in a world like that, she gets bad influences and grow up with bad and terrible conditions just because she is a jew.

Thank you very much
Per Malmin

The Outliers - By Malcom Gladwell

Hello everyone! I am currently reading the book "The Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell. I is a very interesting book, and once I pick it up, its hard to put it down because there is always new ideas and morals or tips and explanations portrayed in the book. I am on the 254th page and the book has 304 pages, so I am close to finishing it. This book doesn't really have a main character, it's just many stories of people that tried to succeed and what makes the people who succeed so special. The problem that this book is portraying is the question: How do we succeed? and Do we need to meet certain standards to succeed? The characters in this book had to overcome problems that they cannot really change. Like what month were they born in. I know it may sound silly that the month you were born in, will determine your career, but research shows, that the people who were born in a certain month, tend to succeed more that the people who were born in another season or month. This may sound confusing, but once you read the book, it will all make sense. I recommend this book to people who are interested in seeing a different point of view, and to people who like reading non- fiction books.

Witches

Hello!
In the book I'm reading for my book report, pretty weird things are happening. As I went further into the book I realized that the main character (for now) is Reverend Parris (mentioned in previous post). The daughter and niece of Reverend are getting worse. More people in the Salem Town are getting fits (fits- teasing from the devil/witch; for example weird signs like swallowing your own tongue or weird/impossible body shapes, etc.). Tituba, Reverend's slave, was very "worried" for the two girls. While Reverend and his wife were away for a few days, Tituba decided to bake a 'dark magic' cake that might cure the souls of the witches. In Salem (in most places) dark magic was strictly forbidden. She got the recipe from a lady in the neighborhood. She followed the instructions, added some weird ingredients to it and gave it to the dog (what was supposed to "scare" the witches' souls). When Reverend came back, he found out about the dark magic cake. He was full of wrath, because that might had cursed the family even more. After, the girls decided to confess something to Reverend. They said that Tituba is the witch and she is giving them the fits. Reverend couldn't risk and believed them. One of the reasons he believed them is that Tituba was a Indian, and Indians were said to be the devils servants/slaves. The girls accused two more women, which got arrested afterwards. Dum dum dum duuum!

The Life & Death of Adolf Hitler - Cosmo

Halla everyone! 

Today I received another assignment to write a blog post about my book report, the book that I read, still "The Life & Death of Adolf Hitler", by James Cross Giblin, and I finished a long time ago, which indicates that I have read 226/226 pages. In this blog post I am to descriptively describe the main problem in my book, so lets begin!

The main problem in my story, which is a detailed biography of Adolf Hitler's life, the cause of a mass murder of millions of people is that he was a war leader, and of course he faced opponents to stop him throughout his mission, to give the empire of Germany more 'space', or territory and to exterminate the 'non worthy' people, the Jews and communists back then. Of course he faced trouble throughout this terrible journey to pursue his belief because there were many people from distant countries against his beliefs, and have them fight against his forces, creating war, so called 'trouble'. One battle that was vital to the second world war was the battle of Stalingrad, between Germany and the Soviet Union, now better known as Volgograd. This was the first defeat of the German forces, due to the army strength and bitter cold up there, and slapped some confidence into the other resisters such as Britain, France and the United States of America. Hitler faced a bitter defeat and loss of hundreds of thousands of soldiers in that fight, and the country was miserable due to the major loss of a large number of their soldiers. This is one of the many conflicts that he faced, though still determined to continue and thus resulting into a bitter end. After his successes He refaced wars between several countries such as Britain, resulting into similar fates, and finally becoming no more than a dead body, Hitler was still determined.

Thank you for your attention and time, and have a nice day :D
Cosmo

Wesley the owl

Stacey O'Brien

156/224

The main problem is that Wesley (the owl) is now learning in a different way than he would have if he were in the wild. It's a lot more interesting to read about this owl because he can do things many other owls can not do. Later in the book, Stacey explains that Wesley starts to understand some words and replies in a "yes" or "no" form with body language. He looks away for no and looks at her if yes. There isn't really a problem in the book,  but Stacey does have trouble with boys because of her Owl. Wesley doesn't like it when she isn't with him. Wesley doesn't like people he doesn't know, he gets into his warning zone when people he doesn't know is around, its very dangerous being close to an owl when he says no to you being there. Owls usually go for predators eyes when they are being annoyed in a way. 

HN

ALLEGIANT

By Sarah Vazzoler

Hey guys, it is Sarah and as I told you in my previous blog post I am describing Allegiant a 526 pages book by Veronica Roth.

The main problem in this novel is that when Beatrice and Tobias got out from the city and they find out that all they are is just an experiment and Tris is the one with the “pure blood” and Tobias is not they both want to rebel since they don’t believe on this but they both start to have different ideas on “rebellion”: Tobias wants to follow a group of people that is rebelling against a well and they are preparing a plan which the tell is for stealing the “deleted mind” serum and they ask to Beatrice and Tobias to help them. Tobias accept sure that that is the right path to follow but Beatrice is suspicious and decided to set the revenge in her own way so, she plan to become friend with the leader of the experiment in order to apprehend what he has in mind for Chicago, her old city.

Let it Snow

Hello everyone!

Yesterday I went to a book store, and bought Let it Snow by Maureen Johnson, John Green, and Lauren Myracle. Lauren Myracle is one of my favorite authors, so I just had to get it. I couldn't put it down, and read for 2 hours straight this morning. :)

The first part of Let it Snow is about a girl named Jubilee who is named after a Flobie Santa Village building called Jubilee Hall. Flobie Santa Village is a collector's item village that you can make by buying each of the collector's items. Her parents are obsessed with their Flobie Santa Village (which is fully completed) and her parents were held in custody in jail for getting in a fight about the spots in line at the Flobie showroom. Now Jubilee has to go to her grandparents and miss her boyfriend's party. Soon, a snow storm begins, and gets really bad. The train stops in Gracetown, and Jubilee gets off and meets a boy called Stuart, and she gets to stay at his house for Christmas. She breaks up with her boyfriend after realizing she doesn't really like her back, and starts to have feelings for Stuart (which he returns).

That's part one. This book is officially my new favorite.

Kristina

A Diary of a Young Girl - Yoonji

Hello everyone, for this book report I am (currently) reading 'A Diary of a Young Girl' by Anne Frank, which was a book originally written by Anne Frank (in Dutch), but translated into many different languages for reading. This book was written throughout World War 2, when the Nazis took control of Germany and persecuted the Jews (the actual duration of the diary is June 14th 1942 - August 1st 1944). The one I am reading is the English version. I read 25 pages out of 283 (pages in total including the afterword).

(picture source: www.goodreads.com)
Since I didn't read a lot and haven't gone through most of the book yet, other obstacles throughout the book is unknown to me. Anyway, there was one obstacle, which I believe is one of the main obstacles in the whole book, which was the reason why Anne Frank, the main protagonist of this first-person non-fiction diary (which had entries all addressed to Kitty, the name of the diary), had to go into hiding. Most of the diary is written and is during the time of her and her family's hiding, so this is a very important obstacle. So the cause of all this is World War 2 and the control of the Nazis in Germany, and more specifically because Anne's older sister, Margot, has received an official summons (writ) on July 5th 1942 from the Nazis to report to a Nazi work camp located in Germany. Her family knew that sending Margot to a Nazi work camp would be bad, and did not want her to be sent off to a work camp, so they decided to go into hiding from the Nazis. They moved straight away into their "Secret Annexe", which was a building where Anne's father had his office in, then. The building is described as 'a very peculiar boardinghouse', 'an ideal hiding place', 'leans to one side and is damp', but a 'comfortable hiding place' by Anne. She also added that 'you'd never find such a comfortable hiding place anywhere in Amsterdam, no, perhaps not even in the whole of Holland.' (These quotes where all from the same page: 20.) Judging by these descriptions, the new home (more like a place to stay than home) isn't much of a problem for Anne (no misery, nervousness, etc.), but she still stated that she will never really feel at home in it. So it isn't much of a problem, but I think it also adds to their loss of home and freedom, which is the main/big problem/obstacle.

"I am Malala" By Malala Yousafzai

I am Malala

Malala Yousafzai

123/291 # of pages read

Hey again! So this week the blog post will be about the main problem in my novel. I will discuss all the obstacles and all the different hard problem that they faced.

The main character, Malala is just a child who is fighting for women's freedoms and for girl's education. There aren't so many problems that Malala has faced so far but one big problem that was told in the book was of her getting shot by the Taliban. She got shot because of her thinking that education was important for girls and the Taliban actually took over with their leader, Maulana Fazlullah who was first very liked by all women and others but then hates and afraid of because of his mean ways of "following the Islamic rules and doing what the Holy Quran or Sharia says". The Sharia was the religion that Fazlullah wanted everyone to follow which had rules like women should cover their heads and never go outside and not receive education but Fazlullah has lost his purpose of following a religion and just caused terror and killed too many. He had many suicide bombers and had bombed many buildings, schools and government buildings. The Taliban was slowly starting to take over Pakistan which of course scared Malala.

Malala's "idol", a woman named Benazir Bhutto was one who stood up for woman's rights and girl's education. Benazir was unfortunately shot by the Taliban, and Malala said she felt terrible and her whole family cried. They thought that there was no more hope, but there was. 'If Benazir could stand up for women rights, I can too' Malala thought to herself. From that moment Malala knew that she just wants to make the world a better place for everyone, especially women who are treated inequality. Malala soon went to radio stations, like BBC and her father too was interested in ending this, he also owned a school and cared for these children to get education. Malala was always interested in politics and things like this but an obstacle that was not worrying her that much but was possible is that she could draw too much attention and the Taliban would find her and take her down which they did do.

Ziauddin (her father) wasn't afraid of anything and that did cause some trouble for her and his family. He also a main character in this book so some obstacles he went through so far is the big chance that his school will be bombed and destroyed, he protests against Taliban and also is putting his family into trouble although all he is trying to do is help. Ziauddin slept at a friend's house just in case the Taliban come to his house were his kids might see him die. Even Malala's mom thought of hiding a knife under her pillow and she put a ladder so that Ziaddin can climb up without being seen. So this was kind of a matter of life or death.

I am really enjoying this book, it is very interesting and inspiring. The book includes many things I didn't know about like so much inequality in Pakistan and so many other countries. It shows the big difference between my life and theirs.



Picture link: http://blogcdn.4tests.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Malala-Yousafzai-book.jpg

Shelly

Apollo 13 - main problem

Hey everyone!

This week, I was also reading the book, Apollo 13, by Jeffrey Kluger and Jim Lovell. I am 237/397 pages through, and currently, the book is very exciting! I am really enjoying it now that the action is actually happening, but I will describe more about it in my blog post, as I am going to talk about the problem in my book. This problem, is obvious.
So, you may wonder, what is the problem on Apollo 13?
Well, to be honest, they don't really know what caused the problem, or what made it so bad. All that they (the crew of Apollo 13, and the ground controllers in Houston) know is that all of a sudden the air and the fuel in the main ship of the Apollo 13 ships, is disappearing. It is rapidly decreasing, and there is nothing they can do about it. The ship is rocking, the supplies are limited and the temperature is plummeting. I also must remind you that they are currently on the other side of the moon. The ships moon landing is aborted - and the crew of three have to move into a two man ship, with enough rescources for two days. They have to make a four day journey and  find a way home. 
Back on earth, one of the news station reports that they have a one in ten chance of surviving, on the way back to earth. This statistic, is not a positive one, at all. 
On earth, the support crew are doing everything that they can do to rescue the mission. They are helping the crew plan a burn - where they use a lot of fuel to project themselves back. It is risky, and in no way garuantees safety for the crew. But, they have to keep trying and preparing. Lovell is trying to arrange everything and to stay in contact with  ground control. This is proving quite hard since the connection is failing - they cannot use too much power or the ship will run out of energy and then will die. Survival chances in that situation are basically non-existant. 
I think that this book has finally got interesting, and this week I actually read 110 pages, and I am very proud of myself. I will endavour to continue to read more, and finally finish it so I can get on with the book project. Bye for now!

Alex Ferguson by Sir Alex Ferguson #3

     Hi guys! This is my third post about this book and this post will be about the main problem of the book and the obstacles that Sir Alex faced. So far I read 318 pages out of 350 so I'm almost done with this book.
     There are a lot of different problems described in this book and it's really hard to tell which one is the main one. The first problem that he's talking about is when he was young and he had to take care of the pub he was working in. Although he had to fight sometimes to keep people calm and friendly and he had  to work from 6 am till late night he said he learned a lot about people's thinking and behavior while working there. Another problem was his retirement from managing. In 2001 he first thought about retirement but his wife told him that he's crazy if he's thinking about retiring at that time. He also had problems with player's behavior. Some of them weren't training as hard as he wished they did, some didn't behave well and some didn't bother to learn English at all. It was ahrder for Sir Alex to help the players that didn't speak English but he was lucky that those players were just great (e.x. Cristiano Ronaldo didn't speak English at all when he joined Manchester United and he still didn't speak much after he left but he's quality as a player helped him and also something that helped him was that the second coach was also Portuguese and he could translate him everything). An example of a bad behavior player was Roy Keane. In his last 2 years at United he turned into a beast. He was swearing at the players, saying bad stuff about them at interviews and just didn't behave as a football player should so Sir Alex finally fired him but he had a regret when he did it because before that happened Roy was an amazing player and he was the captain of the team and Roy Keane is still considered a football legend (if you don't know who he is just search him up). Carlos Tevez was a player that didn't train at the level that Sir Alex was expecting but he played amazingly well when he did. Tevez is still playing but now he's playing for Juventus Torino (go ahead and search him up too if you need).   Another problem in the life of a manager is having bad results with your club. Sir Alex had a period of his career when he had really bad results but he was lucky that the club owners believed in him and knew what he can do.
     This is my post today! I hop you enjoy it. I included the problems and the obstacles in the last paragraph and I think I did it well :)
     Have a nice weekend!
     

How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming

       The book I am reading for my book report is "How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming" by Mike Brown. This book has 231 pages. The main obstacle that the author (Mike) has to go through in this book is trying to define what a planet is and trying to see if Pluto and Xena (A "Planet" he found) fit the standards of the word planet.  Mike, is an astronomer and one night found an unusual object in the sky that was not a star, and he spent a lot of his life researching Xena, the planet that he found as it was as important as a child to him. Since Xena's properties are very similar to Pluto, if Pluto became a planet so would his little space object. Sadly Pluto is not voted as a planet, which means that Xena is not either, both would now be considered a "Planetoid".

Invincible Louisa by Cornelia Meiggs

 
        Hello again!

Right now I am on page 101 out of 194.So in this book, Invincible Louisa, they have moved so many times that it is hard to count. They have moved so far to Concord... a lot, and they have moved  (<<<Fruitlands, Massachusetts) to Massachusetts also. Louisa was very good at drama and she performed plays with her sisters and family. They performed plays in their barn, and they also had a club named the Pickwick Club. The only thing about it was that the sisters were the only members in their club.  (<<<Hillside, Concord)When Louisa turned fourteen, she finally went to school. Anna (her sister) found the new life interesting, and easy to get used to, but it wasn't the same for Louisa. She was a very tall girl for her age. Louisa and her sister did not go to school for a second year, though their father and Mr. Henry Thoreau taught them. One thing that is interesting about biographies are that they are written from peoples journals and diaries. It is also a little weird to read it because they only have what the people wrote, so they skip from place to place in the book. The harsh winter is coming up and no one knows what is going to happen, do you think that they will survive or something worse?
          Well thank's :)
       

Bound Feet and Western Dress by Pang-Mei Natasha Chang

I am currently on page 164 of 208.

The main problem in my book, and the main problem it is trying to portray and illustrate is women's rights and the problems they had to face to get even any where near the 'standards' of a male. They were expected, and not only in China, to stay at home, marry at a very young age, have children at a very young age and stay home and observe the household and sew from a very young age. When I say young age, I mean around 17 or even 16. One of the huge things that a woman would have to face in China in the early 20th century was the traditional feet-binding process. This is a painstaking process, wherewhich the woman is expected to have a feet 'crushed' and made about 3 times smaller. Of course, this is not only a painful process but affected the Chinese women for their whole life. Unfortunately, this process was mandatory since it was very unlikely for a man to wish to marry a woman who didn't have bound feet. It was considered 'elegant' and 'rich.'

For many Chinese woman, they didn't take the things I mentioned seriously, and just went with them, not really caring about the unfairness and inequity of them. The main character in the book I'm currently reading was not one of those women. She, unlike the majority, wished for a good education and an experience of the Western world. Unusually, her feet were not bound. She was forced to marry at the age of 16 or 17 (one of the two) and had her first child at the age of 18. The tradition after you had your first child was to stay with your in-laws. This may not seem that bad, but this meant enduring 5-hour long tea sessions talking about the progress of the baby and future plans for it. The rest of the day one was expected to sew shoes for the family with your mother - in -law. A lot of the time, the women were lucky and had fairly good relationships with their husbands. Unfortunately, for the main character in my book, she hardly every spoke or saw her husband since he spent the majority of his time in the West.

I think it is very unfair that the women in early 20th century China had to deal with these types of things, especially as they knew nothing else. 

Hi guys,

I am currently reading Three cups of tea by Greg Mortenson. I have so far read 43 pages out of 331. Here is a picture of the book:

The main character in my novel is Greg Mortenson who is the author of the book. He is quite tall around 6 feet which is around 1 meter 82. Also his skin color is white although most of his best friends are black. He is kind,you can see that here in this sentence from the book " If Mortenson had known how scarce and precious sugar was to the Balti, how rarely they used it themselves, he would have refused the second cup of tea." (Page 28). Also he is quite smart, he is also a risk taker because he kept on going on different paths than he was supposed to. He is also determined because when he got lost he did not lose hope and he was determined to get out of there alive. "He'd have to spend the night and search for the trail in the daylight." (page 11). 

AG