Review of "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children"

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


AMAZING AMAZING AMAZING!!! I am an AVID reader, and I have to say, this is perhaps my favorite book of all time (and that's saying something)! You never know what will happen next!! DEFINITELY an edge-of-your-seat novel!! The first few chapters are sort of slow, but WOW it is great! Excellent read, I would recommend it to anyone!!!!



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Ignore the Quiet Beckoning

   

     It’s one of those days. A day when you think that all there is to do is sit in front of the television and eat as much junk food as your body can hold. You waste the whole day doing nothing, and then, an epiphany. What did people my age do on days like these back when there was no TV? When there was no television, teens had to find other ways to occupy their time. Some used their time to do other activities, such as sports or hobbies. Others used the time to improve their education, or spend time with their family and friends. No matter what, something they were doing was useful. Now, what would YOU be doing? It’s going to be hard to think, because many of us have never known a life without the tube. In his article, "The Argument against TV," Corbett Trubey writes, "People like to think that television is one of the best inventions of the 20th century, and it just might have been.  Unfortunately, our old friends greed and sloth entered the picture and transformed it into a 24-hour ad-plastered, brainwashing, individuality bleaching, stereotyping, couch-potato-making tool of society." This statement is 100% true. TV has consumed our time, and taken innocence away from most children.
    Again, we come back to the issue of time. Not enough time in the day, week, month, year. Now, sit back and think about how much time you spend watching TV, and subtract that from your everyday schedule. The average person watches 9 years of television in their entire life. That’s a lot of time that you could have back. What could have you been doing during those moments? Work on school assignments, learn another language, master tap dancing; the possibilities are endless. Whenever we have down time, we tend to gravitate towards plopping down in front of the television before thinking of doing anything productive. The allotment for doing whatever we please is limited for sure, but it should not be wasted.
    You most likely have seen all the advertisements for those video games, you know, the ones where you win by killing as many people as possible? It is hard to believe that now there are games that young ones play where you get a reward for doing something so horrible. Kids are being exposed to things that they shouldn’t be exposed to yet, if even at all, and at such a young age. Children all over the place are performing random acts of bestiality and destructiveness - both to themselves and others - because they think that it is normal. Television plays a huge role in influencing this type of behavior. You see an advertisement for a movie where someone is praised for killing everyone in sight, there is a music video where people are smoking or drinking alcohol, or a commercial for condoms. Does the person in charge of approving this type of media not understand that young people are watching this? Before TV exposed these obscenities, all kids had to worry about was who was going to be on their backyard baseball team for the upcoming weekend. Now they want to get fake guns and pretend to shoot each other, and little girls are saying that they are ugly because they aren’t as skinny as the Victoria’s Secret model on the commercial they just saw. The innocence of our generation’s children is at stake, and it is high time that we do something about it.
    Now there are some good things you might say came about from television. People are so much more exposed to the world now then they were before it existed, and are able to know current events almost right as they happen. But, thinking of all of the negatives, it outweighs the alternative. TV has absorbed the time spent doing anything productive in our day, and stripped children of their incorruptibility. The reasons could go on and on.
    Groucho Marx once said, “I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.” Let us all learn from his humorous yet wise remark. Ignore the quiet beckoning coming from the box in the corner the next time you are having “one of those days”, and always keep in mind the fact that going out and living your life to the fullest is much more important than sitting down and getting caught up in a fake on one thanks to our old friend, Television.

A Bit of Hope

I have recently been reading up on this web site almost every day, and I have been feeling so happy. Gives Me Hope is a website where people post the day to day things that give them a little hope for the future. Through the darkest days there is at least a little light. I highly recommend that if you are having a bad day, or just need a little reassurance that there are some good things going on, visit this website. You will not be disappointed. 


http://www.givesmehope.com/

Favorite song

Book Review-My Sister's Keeper

My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Have you ever been in a situation where you have to make a choice, a BIG choice? A choice maybe your moral thoughts are more important than the ethical ones, or what you believe to be “right”. Maybe it would effect your loved ones, your friends. Maybe if no matter what choice you made, you would still wonder, “what if”? This is what My Sister’s Keeper is all about. Making some of the hardest choices of your life. It follows the lives of Anna, a determined 13 year old that wants her voice to be heard about why she thinks it is wrong that she is the doner for all of her older sister’s ailments (her sister Kate has acute promyelocytic leukemia) Anna was conceived in a test tube, designed to be a positive doner for her sister; Jesse, the older brother of Anna and Kate, who everyone has basically given up on because of his amazingly horrible behavior and temperament; Sara, the mother of Anna, Kate, and Jesse, who is at her wits end and will do anything to save her daughter at all cost; Brian, the father of Anna, Kate, and Jesse and the husband of Sara, a firefighter who doesn’t like to think of the negatives in his life and loves looking at the stars; Campbell, the lawyer that Anna hires to sue her parents for medical emancipation, who is epileptic and has a seizure dog. He is caught up on the past, and cannot accept what has happened; and Julia, the guardian ad litem assigned to Anna’s case, who once dated Campbell in high school, only to have her heart broken by him when he left her standing alone at graduation with no explanation. This is a gripping story about love, loss, and finding who you truly are.
The book was written by Jodi Picoult, published in 2003 and has earned great praise such as being the Winner of The Gold Book Award from Nielsen Bookscan UK; Winner, Best Novel, Spanish or Biligual - 2009 Latino Book Awards; Winner of the 2007 Virginia Readers’ Choice Award; Winner of the 2006-2007 Maryland Black-Eyed Susan Book Award in the high school division.; The Abraham Lincoln Illinois High School Book Award (2007); Vermont Green Mountain Book Award Master List (2007); Winner of the Margaret Alexander Edwards Award (the Alex Award) given by the American Library Association; Best Book of the Year (2005); Nominated for an IMPAC Dublin Literary Award; Shortlisted for the Richard & Julie Best Read of the Year in the UK, and nominated for a British Book Award, 2005. It takes place in Providence, Rhode Island in about 2003, where it has flashbacks as far back as 1990 and there is an epilogue that takes place in 2010. My copy of the book has 423 pages and it took me about 3 weeks to read.
The plot of the story is that when Kate’s kidneys fail, her parents automatically assume that Anna will give Kate her kidney, but she knows that there will be long term effects if she does. Anna decides to sue her parents for medical emancipation with the help of the lawyer that agreed to be assigned to her case for free, Campbell Alexander. When her parents find out, they are livid. Her mother decides to represent herself and her husband, because she was a lawyer before she had any children. Julia Romano was assigned to be Anna’s guardian ad litem in the case, which is someone who gets to know a child in any court case and learn about what they want and what she thinks they deserve. When Julia finds out that Campbell is the lawyer in this case, she is uneasy. She and Campbell used to be in love, until the day that he left her, never to return. Throughout the story’s many twists and turns, Anna and her mother learn to set aside differences, and to cope with the fact that people need to make some hard choices, and Campbell and Julia fall back in love when they learn that the whole reason they were not together was because of one huge misunderstanding.
I think that three main themes in this book are family, individuality, and learning to let go. The whole book revolves around a family and their differences and hardships. Coming together as a family is the most important thing that can happen in this situation, and when they finally realize this, it is so much easier to cope with all of the terrible things in their lives. Individuality is also a huge theme. By the end of this book, every single person in this story learns about themselves. They realize about themselves, and see each other in new ways. The last theme in this story is learning to let go. There are so many things that happen in every one's lives that we just want to hold onto, but we have to realize that we are being selfish in some ways by doing so. We have to learn to accept what comes to us, and believe that we are doing the right thing. The characters in this story go through the same thing. I think that if I was in the situation that Anna was in, I would have given my kidney to my sister, but I can’t really disagree or say she is wrong, because I have never been in a situation like hers and I can understand where she is coming from. In the end, on the way to the hospital to visit Kate, Anna and Campbell get into a car accident, and Anna is so badly hurt that she is brain dead. Her organs are saved and her kidney, given to Kate. Even though Anna didn’t survive, Kate did, and she lived the rest of her life grateful to have the sister that she did.
I would recommend this book to anyone. This was one of the best books that I have ever read, and I think that I learned so much and grew not only as a person, but as an individual after reading this. I have to say, it is a very sad book, and I cried a few times while I was reading, but I felt so much during the book at the same time. It made me think of the future, and I think that when I eventually am working in the health care field, I can take some of the lessons that I have learned from this book and apply them to my job. I think that this a the sort of book that you have to read at least once in your life, and this goes for every single person.
See, as much as you want to hold on to the bitter sweet memory that someone has left this world, you are still in it. And the very act of living is a tide: at first it seems to make no difference at all, and then one day you look down and see how much pain has eroded.



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Current Events Narrative- Last Launching of the Space Shuttle Discovery

Nina Solis A Trip Like No Other 3/9/11

News Story:
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/space-shuttle-discovery-lands-148-million-miles-nasa/story?id=13089715
http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/lindsey.html
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/09/shuttle-landing-discovery-landing/

I sit down in my seat. The seat I worked so hard to get. The left front seat in this massive space shuttle. I am the commander of this mission. I am the one in charge. I have been trained and drilled again and again, and know all of the shuttle systems like the back of my hand. I am ready for this. Although this is not the first time that I am traveling somewhere literally out of this world, I can’t help but be in awe every time that I step foot in such a magnificent machine such as this. I have logged over 1,203 hours in space, and I still have butterflies in my stomach as we prepare to take off. I hear the countdown and prepare to leave this earth behind and head towards something better. The one thing that I am a bit sad about is the fact that this massive craft will be flying for the last time today. After over 20 years of dutiful service to NASA, the space shuttle Discovery will be retiring.

I feel like a kid again, pretending to be an astronaut in my bedroom, after watching men walk on the moon when I was nine. My eyes were glued to the television. Immediately after that, I knew that I wanted to be just like them. I wanted to take a step for mankind. I wanted to spear an American flag into the surface of the moon and laugh in the face of everyone who told me that I would never get there. Nobody was going to stop me.

The Discovery- what I believe to be a very appropriate name may I add- is just about ready to go. The searing hot engine starts to rumble. I can feel the whole thing shaking as it prepares to take off. Everything that I have learned starts to fall into place as I run through every gauge and button that is flashing and every noise that I hear. I feel like I am on an amusement park ride. I know that the ride will get smooth soon, but my adrenaline rushes as the walls around me shiver with excitement.

“Ready everyone?” call to the 5 other people that are just as eager as I am to take off. Some people’s eyes widen as the shuttle leaves, one person yells in excitement, I can’t tell who it was. I am focused on watching the window in front of me. I want to see every second of this.

We shoot higher and higher into the atmosphere, the pressure changing. We are going at what seems to be light speed. I imagine for a moment that this shuttle was alive. It is probably yawning right about now. Old Discovery has seen this a so many times before. 39 missions, 365 days in space, 5,830 orbits of the Earth, 148,221,665 miles traveled. It launched the Hubble Space Telescope, carried John Glenn on his sentimental return to space in 1998, assembled the first components of the International Space Station. This was just another day of work. Or would it be just the opposite? Savoring every precious second, because after this, there would be no more adventure. After this, it would be retired. This was the last time that this shuttle will every see space. For a moment I am saddened by the thought of this. I think I am losing it...

We exit Earth. Finally. Everyone exhales. Looks like I wasn’t the only one holding my breath. I look around, unbuckling my restraint. I float to the top of the ship, then towards someone else. I just push them away when they say, “Hey, watch it.” I am too busy gazing at the stars. When you are in space, nothing can compare to the view. Sure, you see pictures that you think are so amazing, and watch videos of Earth from space on the television, but absolutely nothing compares to really seeing it. It literally takes your breath away.

For the next 13 days, it is relatively quiet. No problems, thank heavens. This is no surprise considering that this shuttle has been in the business for so long - it has made more flights than any other shuttle. When it is finally time to return home, disappointment washes over me like a wave. Once I am up here next to the stars, I never want to leave. We begin the descent to Earth, and I say a quick and silent prayer that everything will run smoothly- although I have no doubt that it will.

As we are about to touch down, I speak into the radio.

“For the final time, wheels stop”

We screech on the pavement and everyone burst into applause. Everyone did an amazing job. This was a trip to remember.

As I walk away from the shuttle after the mission, I look back one last time. The shuttle is resting now, sleeping after the long journey. The time to sleep is now. It put up a great fight, and deserved all of the glory. This shuttle changed things. It made a difference. Without this, so many things would not be accomplished. I mouth the words thank you. I have been moved by a space shuttle. Hey, I told you I was losing it.

I can leave knowing that I made a part of history happen today, and can only hope that there will be more opportunities like this in the future. Life is so short. You might as well make the best of it while it lasts.

OPEN ENDED RESPONSE
In A Trip Like No Other, the author talks about his love for the universe. He also talks about the life changing event of being a part of history when he is assigned the role of the commander in the last launching of the space shuttle Discovery.

• Explain why the space shuttle is so celebrated. Do you think that this shuttle was one of the most important shuttle? Why or why not?
• What point of view do you think that the author has on this mission? Give examples from the text that help support what you think he feels like during the mission.

Communication

Communication

the act or process of communicating; the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs.

You wake up, say hello to your parents or siblings, or you're dog. You write a small reminder for someone to remember to pick up bread today, put it on a post-it and stick it to your fridge. You drive to school, and study with you're peers, and answer questions that your teacher asks you. When you get home, you text your best friend for a half hour, then watch the news before going to bed. 
This example would be one that would be used in my life. I communicate with everyone throughout the day, and I don't think that I could go a day without it. People also just assume sometimes that communication is all about talking, but I think that it can be used with just looks also. When I look at someone and smile, they can tell that I am happy with them. I use communication in everything I do.
When looking at this small example, you can see that so many ways of communication is used in just one day. Without communication, I'm not sure that any of us would be here today. Communication means different things fro different people. It could mean learning sign language to talk to you're new neighbor, who happens to be deaf. It could mean learning to speak another language to keep up with you're pen pal's letters. Communication can connect with everyone, because everyone uses it. 

Above is a video about communication through technology through the years. This is a huge type of communication that so many people use today.

Above is a picture of different signs for the alphabet. Sign language can be used for someone who can't hear you when you are talking. Many people around the world know sign language, and it has helped the deaf community to better cope with their challenges. 

Look alike?

A lot of people tell me I look like a lot of people. One of them would be Keira Knightly, and another, Nina Dobrev. What do you think?

              

<Keira Knightly>

  

<Nina Dobrev>

  

No Regrets

“Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die today.”

~James Dean

This quote is really the base of everyone's “American Dream” no matter what shape or form. It states that you have to dream big, take chances, and don’t regret anything. If people never reminisced about something greater and better, where would we be in life today? So many important things came from taking chances, and not looking back, and I think that is how everyone should see each moment-as their last. If you looked back on your life some day, would you be happy with what you saw? If you never think big or reach for the stars, you won’t accomplish anything. I think that this quote is so powerful in the fact that it describes what people’s lives are like, what people think, why people do what they do, and what brought us here today.


When comparing this quote to the media, I have to think of a few things, like songs and books. The song that I have stuck in my head from time to time is “Live Like You Were Dying” by Tim McGraw. This song is talking about when Tim’s father died, he had a whole new view of life, and realized how little time he really had to accomplish everything that he wanted to do. The song goes: “I went skydiving, I went rocky mountain climbing, I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu, and I loved deeper, and I spoke sweeter, and I gave forgiveness I'd been denyin'. And he said some day I hope you get the chance, to live like you were dyin'.” Obviously, this man had extraordinary dreams that he wanted to be made into reality, and he knew that if he didn’t live like every day was his last, he would never have accomplished any of it. Another thing that I can compare this quote to would be would be the book “A Child Called ‘It’”. This is a terrible, yet inspiring story of a young boy who was abused by his mother, and ignored by the rest of his family. He dreams of a life filled with love and hope, and every day he deals with his torment the best he can. Eventually he becomes free when his teacher becomes concerned and calls the police. The bravery of this little boy with the willingness to dream big, and make the best of every day was the thing that helped him to survive.


The greatest people in the world may not be the smartest, or the richest, or the most dangerous. The people who are the greatest are the ones that inspire us every day. The people who do good for others, and don’t complain about life. These are the ones that look at each day like another chance. Another opportunity to make their life better, to achieve more, or dream a better dream. Wonderful beings like this all over the world are the ones that show us what it is like to really have a great life. Tremendous things can come about when you take chances. People that think like this are the ones that have the biggest dreams. The dreamers in life are the ones that have fun and know how to live. The word impossible is simply not applied to their lives. Harriet Tubman, one of the greatest and most influential dreamer and risk taker in American history, once said: “Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”


In my life, I live by a motto, “Live the life you love, love the life you live, no regrets.” I found that once I realized that life really is short, I knew that I wanted to make the best of it. I wanted to one day replay every minute and never regret a thing. I have already put this frame of mind to work a few times. This summer, I went camping in the Poconos, and a few people from the camp were going cliff jumping. I thought ‘wow what an amazing experience!’, but as i gazed off that 45 foot cliff into the black water, I was thinking otherwise. Just before I jumped (after about 20 minutes of clutching the rock next to me, shaking) a thought came to my head. I told myself over and over, “no regrets” (haha, and thought of how much I would get made fun of if I chickened out), said a prayer, and jumped. I felt the rush of air, my mind blank, and kept expecting my toes to feel the cold water long before they actually did, but eventually made a splash in the water below. When I surfaced I heard the cheers of my friends, and immediately was proud of myself for overcoming my fear. Looking back on this experience, I can check another thing off my bucket list, and know that if I hadn’t dreamed of being fearless, or thought about how little time everyone has, I would have never done it. As I continue through my life, making so many choices that I know will shape me as a person, I know that I need to dream as if I’ll live forever, and live as is I’ll die today. No regrets.

Book Review- Elixir by Hilary Duff

Elixir by Hilary Duff

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Elixir is a suspenseful, confusing, and epic telling of the twisted fate of an innocent girl. Seventeen-year-old Clea Raymond is living in the spotlight. Her father is a renowned surgeon and her mother is a well known politician, so she is constantly being watched by the public eye. Her only escape is her photography, and she has a job as a photojournalist, allowing her to travel to many exotic places. After her father mysteriously disappears while on a humanitarian mission, she starts to notice a strange man appearing in all of the pictures that she takes, a beautiful young man - that she has never before seen. Her best friend Ben, who happened to work for her father, saw the pictures, and remembered that in her dad’s office, there were pictures of her as a child with the same man in the background! He was sitting at the table behind them at a restaurant, or in a crowd of people at a public event. Soon after this, she starts having cycles of dreams where she is four other girls, from four different time periods, all in love with this man - the man from the pictures. She would either be Olivia in Renaissance Italy, trying to perfect her watercolor paintings; Catherine in rural England, a hundred years later, racing on a horse bareback through the countryside; Anneline, and stage actress in France’s finest nineteenth-century stages; or Delia, who lived during the Prohibition-era Chicago. When fate brings her and this man, Sage, together, it stirs up powerful emotions, and some trouble. The closer they get, the deeper they are drawn into the mystery behind her father’s disappearance, and they discover the truth behind their century old connection. The secret that they have to face, has Sage, Ben, and Clea racing against time to decode their past and save their futures.
“So what can we do?” I asked, “How can we find my father?
“And the Elixir of Life,” Ben added.
“There is no Elixir of Life” I said.
“Yes, there is,” Ben and Sage chorused.
One theory that both Ben and Clea’s father had was that somehow the Elixir of Life was involved with this strange man. The Elixir of Life is something that can grant eternal life; but most people believe it to be a legend, or a myth. Clea’s father, during an arceological dig in Italy, found the vials to the Elixir, but found so sign of the actual thing. When Ben and Clea are in Rio for one of Clea’s photography destinations, she sees Sage on the beach and runs after him. She and Ben chase him for a while and finally meet Sage (after running from them, he only came back after Clea twisted her ankle). While they are talking, they are attacked by people wearing all black, and somehow manage to lose them after running. They find a deserted cave, and Sage tells them everything that he knows about who was chasing them and why. Apparently, there are people who are protecting the Elixir, and Sage believes that they captured her father because they wanted to know where to find it again. Clea doesn't believe a word of it, but she ends up agreeing with the two boys that they had to find a woman who may know a lot about the Elixir, let her show them the way to it, and use it to bribe her father’s kidnappers.
“I knew he was telling the truth. His eyes were affectionate. I was his, not just in the past, but today and forever, and nothing had ever made me feel more secure.”
On their long journey to meet the “dark lady” that would perhaps lead them to the elixir, Clea finds herself falling in love with Sage. She can’t help herself. She wants to believe otherwise, then just stops trying to kid herself. The only problem is what lies ahead. So many dangerous secrets and mysteries await the trio, and nobody could have guessed what ends up happening in the end.
I would recommend this book to anyone who likes suspense, action, love, and mystery. I usually could guess the ending of books, but I had no idea what was around the corner, what would happen in the next chapter, or the next. I enjoyed reading this book, and it always kept my attention. I didn’t like the ending though, only because it ended shortly, after the beginning and middle were so long and detailed. I also didn’t like the way the characters ended up, but I couldn’t imagine a different ending. It was real. No fairy tale ending, but sort of a slap of reality. It was amazingly written, and I have no doubt that I will be re-reading it.



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