Tag Archives: 2014

Student Review: Julie M: The Lives We Lost by

Author Megan Crewe 

Published: February 12, 2013

Publisher: Disney Hyperion

10 Reasons You Should Read The Lives We Lost

1. The cover gives a great description of the setting of the book. In this book it is the middle of winter and most people have died from this rapidly spreading virus.

2. Surreal. Imagine that everyone you know is suddenly dying from this terrible disease and there is no cure and you can’t do anything about it. It would lead you to do some bizarre things in order to stay alive and save your loved ones.

3. Kaelyn and Gav. These two teens have been dating for about a year and their love for each other intensifies during the outbreak of the disease. They stick together and through out the story you can see how much they really care about each other. It keeps them together during the tough times they go through.  When Gav suddenly becomes sick with the disease Kaelyn loses all hope and there is nothing else she can do except watch her love die.

4. Kaelyn and Leo. They were best friends even before the disease broke out. They have a strong connection and they even kiss each other while Kaelyn is still dating Gav. Gav never finds out but through out the book Leo and Kaelyn have moments of connection and they truly do care about each other. Kaelyn becomes conflicted because Gav gets sick and she has feelings for Leo at the same time.

5. It makes you think. You never know, a disease could break out and kill millions of people. It really makes you think about what you would do in this situation if you were a survivor. The group or survivors in this book break into peoples houses and steal their cars, clothes, beds, and food. They even end up killing people.

6It leaves you hanging. They are trying to find someone who can help them duplicate the vaccine to help save people. They have traveled to many places and have had many false hopes. The book ends with them deciding to go to Atlanta and Gav barley hanging onto life.

7. The Wardens. Not all of the people left in the world are trying to help other people like Kaelyn and her friends are. The Wardens are a group of people who are only looking out for themselves and are hunting Kaelyn and her friends. They constantly have to be on the look out for the and it keeps the readers on their toes.

8. Adventure. Kaelyn, Gav, Leo, Tessa, and Meredith all once lived on an island. It became so infected with the disease that the military starts blowing it up in order to kill all of the sick people. In order to survive, they have to walk all the way to Ottawa in the middle of the winter with limited supplies.

9. The Fallen World Trilogy.  The Lives We Lost is just the second book in a trilogy of suspenseful books. The action continues once they reach Atlanta.

10. Anika. She used to be apart of The Wardens until Kaelyn and he friends decide to let her into their group. But the real question is if the can trust her or not.

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Student Review: Kiley D.: Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Wintergirls
Author: Laurie Halse Anderson
Genre: Fiction
Publishing Date: March 19, 2009 
Publishing CompanyPenguin Group (USA) Incorporated


Summary (Goodreads):

“Dead girl walking,” the boys say in the halls.
“Tell us your secrets,” the girls whisper, one toilet to another.
I am that girl.

I am the space between my thighs, daylight shining through.

I am the bones they want, wired on a porcelain frame.

Lia and Cassie were best friends, wintergirls frozen in matchstick bodies. But now Cassie is dead. Lia’s mother is busy saving other people’s lives. Her father is away on business. Her stepmother is clueless. And the voice inside Lia’s head keeps telling her to remain in control, stay strong, lose more, weigh less. If she keeps on going this way – thin, thinner, thinnest – maybe she’ll disappear altogether.

In her most emotionally wrenching, lyrically written book since the National Book Award finalist Speak, bestselling author Laurie Halse Anderson explores one girl’s chilling descent into the all-consuming vortex of anorexia.
 


Review: Wintergirls, by Laurie Halse Anderson, is an amazing book that just sucks the reader into the story. I really enjoyed it because many books have been written about anorexia, but never from the perspective of the person who actually has the eating disorder. The book really sheds a light on what people with eating disorders are actually thinking and going through. It doesn’t sugarcoat the problems that come along with anorexia, and Laurie Halse Anderson does a great job of showing the reality of eating disorders and how the family and the person with the disorder cope with the issues they are going through. I would definitely recommend this book to someone else as I really enjoyed reading it myself. But I would not recommend Wintergirls to a younger child to read as it is a very serious and covers a deep topic that a younger child might not understand.

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Student Review: Lauren L: Graceling by Kristen Cashore


Graceling by Kristen Cashore

Copyright © 2008 Harcourt. Fantasy.

This is the first of three books in the Graceling Realm Series, and precedes  Fire and Bitterblue

Summary (Back Cover): Katsa has been able to kill a man with her bare hands since she was eight- she’s a Graceling, one of the rare people in her land born with an extreme skill. As the niece of the king, she should be able to live a life of privilege, but Graced as she is with killing, she is forced to work as the king’s thug.

When she first meets Prince Po, Graced with combat skills, Katsa has no hint of how her life is about to change.
She never expects to become Po’s friend.
She never expects to learn a new truth about her own Grace- or about a terrible secret that lies hidden far away…

Review: I was lucky enough to find this book at Barnes and Noble at noon a few weeks ago, and I finished it by 6:30 pm that night. This book is rather lengthy (471 pages), but I didn’t finish it quickly because it was an easy read, I finished it in record time because I couldn’t put it down. Personally, I love reading fantasy books that include kingdoms, strategy and conspiracies, and Graceling was the perfect combination of the three. Kristin Cashore did a fantastic job of  filling her book to the brim with creativity from the names of the characters to the plot. I became a little too emotionally attached to the main characters, Katsa and Po, but that made the book that much more enjoyable for me. This novel is not written at a third grade level, but its non-threatening text allows for a wide variety of people to read it, and I highly recommend it to anybody that is intrigued by castles and fantasy.

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Student Review: Anna S.: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green.



Title: The Fault in Our Stars
Author: John Green

 

Publisher: Dutton Books
Published: January 1st 2012
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary
Summary (from the cover flap): Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis.  But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.  
Review:
          I am currently rereading The Fault in Our Stars for the third time and I don’t know if I’ll finish it.  Not because it is a bad book. Heaven knows that The Fault in Our Stars is not a bad book.  If fact, The Fault in Our Stars (let’s shorten it to TFIOS, shall we?) is likely one of the best books I will ever read in my life.  John Green managed to convey the story of Hazel Grace is such a beautiful way the strikes me right to the core.  This book makes me feel a array of emotions, but more than anything it makes me cry.  It makes me cry for a million different reasons.  While reading TFIOS I 1) cry because I am upset, 2) cry because this book makes me wish I was a better person, 3) cry because this book makes me wish other people were better people, but 4) mostly I cry because of how beautiful the story is, and how beautiful its theme’s are.  Can you guess why I might not finish this book again? It’s because it makes me cry so much.


        Sobbing Staab aside, this book is phenomenal.  Never, ever, has a book stuck with me as much as this book has.  I first read it ages ago, right around the time it was published (the beginning of 2012), but I live life the way I do because of this book.  As mentioned before, the theme’s throughout this novel are immense.  From acknowledging that sometimes life sucks but you have to make the best of it or from how people to often leave negative marks upon this world, the theme’s in this novel are not only thought provoking, but (at least to me) life changing.  I’ve spent countless days and nights thinking about quotes from this book and what they mean to me, and I know I will keep on doing this until the day I die.  Sometimes books do that.  They stay with you long after you’ve read the last word. TFIOS is one of those books.

        You might be thinking “I don’t want to cry” or “I don’t want to read a depressing book”, but this book is more than just a sad story. It’s not just a cancer story.  It’s a story of two teenagers living their life.  Hazel Grace is a funny and snarky narrator who feels like a long lost best friend, and Augustus Waters is the prince of this story.  And oh my goodness, what a prince he is.  If nothing else you should read this book so you can get to know Augustus Waters.   If you think that you will never have a crush on a fictional character then read TFIOS and let Augustus Waters prove you wrong.

Did I mention that this book is getting made into a movie? Yep.  And by the looks of the first trailer it is going to be a pretty amazing one too.  So what are you doing? Read this book. Laugh. Cry. Then watch the movie and laugh and cry a little more. Trust me, it’s good fun! 🙂


      

I’ll end this review with a fantastic quote from the book that basically sums up all of my feelings in one neat little sentence:

“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book.”
         -John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

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