Best Sellers post #12: Book Wish List

This is my book wish list (they are in no particular order)…
• House of Hades by Rick Riordan
• Enders Game by Orson Scott Card
• Hollow City by Ransom Riggs
• DaVinci Code by Dan Brown
• I am Number Four by Pittacus Lore
• Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple
• The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
• Looking for Alaska by John Green
• The Longest Ride by Nicholas Sparks
• Maximum Ride by James Patterson

Best Sellers post #11: Book Talk

Best Sellers post #4: Book 1 Reflection

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children was a good book. However, I thought that it moved slowly in the middle. The beginning and end were very exciting. But, in the middle when he was just visiting the island, in was a little boring. Though it was a little boring, it was still very descriptive. I also think that the pictures helped move the story along. They added the feeling of only a few more pages then I get to see a picture. They were a break from reading. I am looking forward to reading Hollow City, the second book in the series. So far I have heard good things about it.

Best Sellers post #10: The Mark of Athena Book Review

The Mark of Athena is the third book in the Heroes of Olympus Series. The Lost Hero and Son of Neptune both set the scene for the seven demigods that are entwined in a prophecy. But after several visits from different Gods, they realize that the Prophecy of Seven and the Mark of Athena are combined in some way. The Mark of Athena goes into detail about the demigod’s journey to Rome and Annabeth’s journey to finding out what her mother’s mark is.

Rick Riordan is the author of this book. He decided to write the book in a different style. Each chapter is narrated by a different character. For example, the chapter called ANNABETH is about what she is currently doing during that time. It goes into her thoughts, actions, discoveries, and decisions. How Riordan did this is interesting because it gives the reader an opportunity to get to see the story from multiple people’s point of view. It gives the reader the chance to pick which character they think is a hero, villain, back up character, non-important character, etc.

Piper is a well-developed character because her personality is relatable. When a chapter is labeled PIPER, there are always times when you compare yourself to her. She does not have any major powers like Percy or Jason, but she still is an important part to the team. Piper always says things like, “Piper had a new entry in her top-ten list of Times Piper Felt Useless” (Riordan 302). This sentence has a quality that none of the other sentences have… compatibility. Her character is compatible with regular people, with the reader. This quality makes her character well-developed in the story. The reader relates to how she thinks and feels.  

Percy Jackson can be a very bitter character because of how he holds the grudge against the wine god. Lord Bacchus is the wine god. In his Greek form at Camp Half-Blood, he was always very rude to Percy. However, this was a year ago and it was in the god’s other form (Gods have two forms Greek and Roman). In a scene of the book where Percy, Piper, and Jason go to see the Roman form of the wine god, Lord Bacchus, Percy is very rude. Lord Bacchus asks Percy why he has not changed him into a dolphin yet because he was so rude. Percy replies, “’It was discussed,’ Percy assured him. ‘I think you were just too lazy to do it’” (Riordan 122). Percy is being very rude to the god in this passage. He is still bitter towards the god for being mean and annoying during Percy’s Camp Half-Blood years. Even though it has been over a year and the Roman form of the god has a different personality than the Greek form.

Opinions that are heard about Percy Jackson are that he is the “best hero”. Many people have awarded him the best hero award when writing a class assignment. Most people say this because he is a young boy, who has given up a normal life to help save others. He never backs down from a fight and he is always trying to save everyone. Also it helps that he can control water. That is his “super power”. In the Mark of Athena, there are several parts where Percy steps out to defend the members of his team, especially, Annabeth. Also, he did not hesitate to get on the ship when the Greek demigods first arrived at the Roman camp. They told him how dangerous the quest was going to be, yet he still volunteered.

The novels purpose is to entertain. Also, it is a feel-good book. It shows the power of friendship, hard work, and peace. The plot has several battles between the demigods and giants/monsters. These creatures are always defeated by the power of friendship. They always show more than one demigod fighting and the demigods helping and protecting each other during the battle. For example, when the Greek demigods showed up at the Roman camp, Percy (Greek demigod at Roman camp) immediately defended them. They were his friends, so he stood up to all the Romans.

            This book was a perfect balance between action, mystery, and imagination. Just the right ingredients of a good fantasy novel. The ending was a great gateway into the next book.

Blog Reflection

                One thing that I struggled with at the beginning of blogging was summarizing. I was over complicating my blog posts. I was focused on looking between the lines of my book, instead of just reading the lines right in front of me. I learned to overcome this struggle by just blogging about what was in my head. Instead of sitting there and thinking too much about what I was going to post, I would read until like 5 minutes before I had to go somewhere. Then in that 5 minutes I would be in a hurry, that caused me to just write about what was in my head at that time, the summary of what I just read. This also caused the book to be fresh on my mind. However, I still did do blog posts that were not just summaries. For example, in Best Sellers we would be given a topic about what was going on in the reading world. It would usually be about a debate that was going on. He would ask us to write a blog post about what we thought and why. I really enjoyed when we blogged about these debates. It was fun to voice my opinion and read what other people thought about the topic.

            I would say that I have definitely grown in my ability to analyze a text. My post about my summer reading book was okay, but not near as good as my more recent posts. In my summer reading post I do not really explain any part of the book except the beginning. The only thing I say about the end is, “However, further into the book when he meets Mr. Penumbra, they tam up to uncover a secret that will change the world.” This is the only sentence that I used to describe 2/3 of the book.

            In one of my more recent blog posts about Silver Lining’s Playbook I went into more detail. I also included things about the book that was not just the beginning of the book and theme. “I think this book is not very complicated to read, it just has a lot of swearing in it. But don't get me wrong, it is still a really funny book. I also really like how the plot of the story is not what you usually read. It is very unique.” This gives people more of an idea of the book. It helps them to decide more if they think it is their type of book. In my newer post I also give a good analysis of the book when I say, “Throughout the book you will discover that Pat and Tiffany have more things in common than you would think.” I think this is good because it helps give the reader an idea of the end of the book, but not really. It is broad enough so that the ending of the book is not set in stone.

            Overall, I would say that I have improved the most when analyzing by using more description and actually words used in the text. In my older blog post the most description I had was, “In the beginning of the book the main character, Clay Jannon, is a big fan of paper because he just recently got fired from a job at a company that only ever used computers.” In my newer post I used description like, “One thing you need to know about Pat is that he is mentally unstable. He has been in the ‘bad place’ ever since his ‘apart time’ with his wife Nikki has been going on. Pat truly believes his wife will come home to him soon.” This is better analyzing of the text because I used actual quotes from the text. Using the words like “apart time” and “bad place” helps people to get more of a feel on the personality of Pat.  

Best Sellers post #9: Character Reflection

 

Leo Valdez is one of the characters is my book, The Mark of Athena. Leo is the type of person to act without thinking. He is one of those characters that people would say, “Gosh Leo , I love ya, but good grief…” He is loveable but you are always wishing you could tell him when he should not have said something. He is also very funny. Leo is not like the characters Riordan usually portrays. He is more plucky and ridiculous, than heroic.

            The more I read my book the more I ask myself, why is Leo Valdez so wonderfully irritating? He is not a villain. Yet he is not quite a nice person. He tries, yet he says hateful things sometimes. I think that Riordan put his character in the book to make the book have a sort of comedy. His character personality goes with the comedy element of Playfulness. Meaning that even though the situation the characters are in is very serious, Leo does not really treat it that way. He is always making jokes about not funny things and not in a rush when the team needs him to be.  Also Leo’s character follows the comedy element of Forgiveness. Meaning that even when he does something that is not so good, he is always forgiven. This is shown when he started bombing Camp Jupiter. Even though he did not know what he was doing, he still did it and his team forgave him in a heartbeat.

The Worst and Best of The Mark of Athena

The best thing about my book so far is all the mystery that is going on. I don’t know what the Mark of Athena is. I don’t know if Leo is somehow related to Sammy. I don’t know which demigod is destined to die with Piper. All of the mystery makes the book makes me want to keep reading. Plus, there is a bunch of action. The demigods get into a fight scene with a giant or monster during every other chapter.

            The worst thing about my book so far is the fact that Hazel might have feelings for Leo. But, she is with Frank. This is not a very big issue, but this was the worst thing I could think of because it is a really good book. I just hope that the book does not go all Twilight. I want the book to stay the way it is with all the action and only some romantic type scenes.  However, I still think it is a really good book. I like this book because of the action and the fact that it makes me feel like I am in a totally different world.   

Best Sellers post #7: Silver Linings Playbook Trailer

Best Sellers post #8: Truth in a Memoir

Fiction vs. Non-Fiction

            I do think that they are two very different genres. However, when deciding if a book is non-fiction or not that all depends on what they lied about. It does not matter how much, it just matters what they lied about. If they changed the color of a girls shirt in the book, that is still a lie. But it is not an important lie. If they changed the fact that they murdered someone but actually did not, then that is taking the step from non-fiction over to fiction. It is okay to exaggerate some things, but if you change the whole story of something that happened, then that makes the story realistic fiction.  

The Mark of Athena: Setting

To start the book off the characters Annabeth, Leo, Piper, and Jason all arrived at Camp Jupiter. At this camp all the demigods are Roman and Jason and his crew are Greek. Camp Jupiter is base doff of the architectural styling of Rome. There are grand marble buildings and plenty of columns.

After they leave this "New Rome", as they call it, they begin their journey to actual Rome. They travel by this big floating war ship called the Argo II. During one part of the book Annabeth takes Percy Jackson to the ship's stable area. Here is how Percy describes it, "The room smelled of fresh hay and wool blankets. Lining the left wall were three empty horse stalls like the ones they used for pegasi back at camp. The right wall had two empty cages big enough for large zoo animals.

In the center of the floor was a twenty-foot-square see-through panel. Far below, the night landscape whisked by-miles of dark countryside crisscrossed with illuminated highways like the strands of a web" (Riordan 159). I feel like Riordan does an excellent job depicting this area of the boat. You can see the roads down below you and the empty, smelly stable. This helps you to set the mood of this part in the book. Since it is Percy and Annabeth, it is supposed to be romantic and beautiful. You can see them sitting together and watching the night pass under them.