I so wanted to write a post mid week, but with the funeral of my family friend and starting back to work it just didn't happen.
I did manage to do quite a bit of reading this week. I think part of it was an escape from reality.
When I posted last week I was only on page 78 of Same Sun Here by Silas House and Neela Vaswani. Well I finished it early in the week and I loved it! It was really great how the two characters found similarities even though they were so different. I really enjoyed the letter format of the book. I think that in this electronic age letter writing is becoming a lost art. I remember the joy I felt growing up when I went to the mailbox and found a piece of mail addressed to me. This past year, I had my fifth grade students write letters to different authors. It was great that some got a response. Even if I was emailing the author, I made sure they wrote a complete letter to attach.
Another book that I found on the library shelf was Threads and Flames by Esther Friesner. This book was about a 13 year old girl, Raisa, who leaves her Polish shtetl to come to America. There are many hardships that she encounters being new to America. Raisa goes to work at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory and is there during the tragic fire. I drawn to this book because I've always been interested in that time period and the tragedy. Sometimes this book dragged on with little events that didn't seem very important. While the fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory seemed to be over before it even began. I did enjoy the book, but was a little disappointed in the perfect happy ending. Many places said that this book was for 5th grade and above. I would not recommend this to anything less than 7th grade and above.
The other book that I just finished reading is The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen. Once again, I heard about this book from the wonderful people on Twitter. I started this book and I really wasn't sure I was going to like for about the first few chapters. But then the story took a hold of me and I could not put this book down. I knew I had to finish the book in one day because I had to know what happened next. I was excited to realize that this was book one of a trilogy. But then I realized there would be a wait for the next book, since this was published this year. :(
Not sure how much new reading I'll get done this week, since the kids start back on Wednesday. But I'll be sure to post about what I'm doing with them.
Happy Reading!!
Stacey (@libraryjo92)
Our students start Wednesday also. Oh boy! I loved Same Sun Here too. I bet students would love to get real letters. Aren't there still pen pals out there? Your other books sound good, too. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteHi Stacey, I know what you mean about the lost art of letter writing. We did have a "Message in a Bottle" bimonthly theme a year ago where we read and reviewed books that have an epistolary format to it. One of our greatest bimonthly themes yet and we discovered quite a number of new books in the process. How I wish I had known about Same Sun Here at the time. Thanks for sharing all these lovely books. :)
ReplyDeleteI felt exactly that same way about False Prince. It really grew on me the more I got into it and then I was so disappointed when I realized the next book would not be out for another year!
ReplyDeleteThese are great recommendations, Stacey! My school has a very high immigrant population, so I started reviewing books on my blog that reflect the immigrant experience in America. Someone recently recommended Same Sun Here, but I hadn't heard of Threads and Flames--will definitely add that one to my TBR list. I love Jennifer Nielsen's The False Prince--glad you stuck with it!
ReplyDeleteI so want to read The False Prince. I, too, have heard fabulous things, but I'm just so behind on my reading of 2012 published books!
ReplyDeleteGood to know that False Prince took a few chapters to get into it . . . I"m thinking about it as a family read aloud. And I'm excited to get to Same Sun Here. Good luck with the school year kick off! Have a great week!
ReplyDeleteLorna
Best of luck as the school year begins! We look forward to reading about what you and your students are enjoying :)
ReplyDeleteMaria @ novalibrarymom.com
Hmm thanks for mentioning The False Prince, I am off to check it out, maybe I can wait until they all come out, although if I didn't like this one then that's a risk.
ReplyDeleteKathryn
I have False Prince on my list... I really need to bump it up nearer to the top!
ReplyDeleteI adored Same Sun Here! I just loved it. I love Meena and River. They are such great friends. Colby and I discussed this for one of our book clubs on his blog and it was a great discussion!
ReplyDelete