Category Archives: 2013-2014

Mar
04
2014

Secrets of Shakespeare’s Grave by Deron R. Hicks.

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This book is called Secrets of Shakespeare’s grave by Deren R Hicks. The main characters are Julian and Colophon. The Secrets Of Shakespeare’s Grave is about a girl named Colophon. Her dad owns a big business called Leterford and Sons. One day everything goes wrong with the company (buildings burn). One day in her house in manchester she overhears a conversation that would be a spoiler. On thanksgiving her cousin Julian shows her a painting that supposedly leads to the family treasure.  One day Colophon figures out the clue and it leads to shakespeare’s grave. The setting is manchester, New York City, London, and Stratford Avron. My favorite part is when Mull and Case are being chased by dogs.

I would recommend this book to people who like books with mystery and adventure. I say that because it has mystery and adventure.I would rate this book five out of five stars because it kept me on my toes and was really good. I enjoyed this book a lot, some people might not because the beginning is kind of slow.

Mar
03
2014

The Austere Academy by Lemony Snicket

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200px-Austere_academyI read Lemony Snicket’s 5th book from the series of Unfortunate Events called Austere Academy . It continues the story of Violet, Klaus and Sunny Baudelaire who are still up against the evil Count Olaf who has been trying to get their fortune for a very long time now! This story takes place in a boarding school. This is where the siblings meet another pair of orphans [as they are orphans themselves]. The other orphans are twins, a boy and a girl. They also had their parents die in a fire and also have there own little fortune of their own.

Also Count Olaf seems to follow them everywhere they go and that is why they are sent to the boarding school so that the man in charge of them Mr.Poe, can find a good home for them. But while at the boarding school Count Olaf still finds them and their new friends disappear with Count Olaf. Anyway  the boarding school is a terrible place because of so many reasons. One reason is that Sunny has to make staples all day.  And I must tell you that she is only one one-years-old. “Debo” is something that she says in the book which means “Why in the world would I have to make staples?!!?”

I really liked this book because it was an adventure and mystery book. I would recommend this book to 4th graders because I think that they would understand it the most.It is a bit complicated because you have to remember a lot of little details to help figure out the mystery. Well 4th grader and up would like this book. I would give this book 5  stars because it is a really good book!!

Mar
03
2014

The School For The Good And Evil, by Soman Chainani

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16248113This book is about two girls who go to fairytail school. Sophie a girl with blond hair and silky skin goes to the school for evil. Agatha a girl that prefers to stay alone has a lot of dark thoughts and she has dark black hair that is short down to her shoulders she goes to the school for good. The 2 girls think that the school master a man that chooses the kids from different places made the wrong choice. First Sophie thinks that she should go to the school for good and Agatha wants to go home. Second the girls are friends, and if you are friends with somebody in the other school they send you home.

My favorite part is when Agatha turns into a cockroach and helps Sophie cheat in school. I like that part because it’s fun to think of cheating in school.

“Sophie had waited all her life to be kidnapped “ that is half a sentence from page 1 the first half a sentence, I like the half a sentence because this is the sentence that pulled me into the book.

This book has 488 pages so you might want to see how much time you have to read the book. This book is for people who like fantasy. I would give this book 4***** stares because it was a great book and and the way it is told and the idea of the story is great.

Mar
03
2014

Mallory on the move by Laurie Friedman

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Mallory On The Move is a book about a girl named Mallory who has to move away from her lifelong BFF. When she moves she will have to make new friends with new people she is not so happy about that. She meets a boy whose name is Joey and Mallory likes that she has a friend. Mallory and Joey love the street that they live on because the street that they live on is called Wish Pond Road. Wish Pond Road has a wish pond.

 

Mallorys BFF Mary-Ann comes to visits Mallory and she is not expecting Joey to be friends with Mallory. “How about we all play,” Said Mary-Ann. That is a good idea to her, but most groups of three don’t work if they all play. Bad decision. Read the book to find out what happens next so I don’t spoil the ending.

 

This book is a really good book because there are 14 books in the series so you can read them all. The names of them are  Mallory on the Move,  Back to School Mallory, Mallory vs. Max, Happy Birthday Mallory, In Business with Mallory, Heart to Heart with Mallory, Mallory on Board, Honestly Mallory, Campfire Mallory, Step Fourth Mallory,  Red White & True Blue Mallory, Happy New Year Mallory, Mallory Goes Green and Mallory in the Spotlight. ( they are in the order to read them.) I rate this book 4⅔. If you are 8-12 This book is good for you.

 

 

 

Feb
28
2014

Finally by Wendy Mass

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Finally

Finally

by Wendy Mass

 

My book is called Finally by Wendy Mass. The main character is named Rory. She is 11 years old and it is about her and all the things she does when she turns 12. Rory is shy because she does not have the nerve to talk to people. She is also very brave. She is brave because of all the things that happen to her in the story. She lives in Willow Falls.

 

Rory has some major problems. So she has wanted to do some things all of her life, like get her ears pierced, and get a pet. Well those things don’t turn out so well.. You might think, “Oh getting a pet won’t be so hard, right?” Well, not according to Rory. Like when she was getting her ears pierced the lady said the earrings were hypoallergenic, but no, since you find out that she has a lot of reactions. The reaction is that her ear puffs up like a baby elephant.

 

I liked the book because it was funny. There were a lot of funny parts, including all of the times where something bad happens to her. Like when she gets her bunny, he is evil. An example of when Rory’s bunny is bad is when the bunny tries to kill her.   I would recommend this book to someone who likes books that are funny and mysterious. I would rate this book 4 ½ stars.

Feb
28
2014

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke

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by Zachary Cappadocia

 

The book that I read over the weeks was Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. The main characters in the book are Maggie and her dad. Maggy is a full fledged book reader and she is always very curious about things she is not supposed to know. For example, in the beginning of the book she tries to hear what her dad was saying to the mysterious new person even though she could tell her dad wanted her as far away from their conversation as possible. Maggie’s dad Mo is a book reader also but he is kind of awkward when ever he is lying and he really tries to keep the truth away from maggie. In the beginning of the book the setting is there their aunt’s house which is pretty big and pretty fancy and not for kids to live in because she thinks  if kids live in her house it will get dirty and her precious books will be destroyed. In the whole book Magie and Mo are moving around but that is the first place that we know they traveled. This book could happen right now in the present because the houses have electricity and the houses have a stove that runs off of gas.

Maggie and Mo’s problem is Maggie gets a little too curious and Mo reads out of an unlucky book and the the bad guy in the book magically comes straight into their living room. Maggie has to learn magic to stop this strange villain. One of the important events that happened was when the visitor Dustfinger made fire come out of his mouth because that was the first glimpse of magic. Another important event was when the thugs came to rob the book shortly after Mo read it to maggie.  Thats when the disaster happened. One little quote to prove that the evil guy is bad is “I tried to call the police but the lines are down”,said the aunt. That quote proves if the police had came they would have taken the crook away.

 

I enjoyed the book a lot. If I were to rate this book on a scale of 1 to 5, it would be a 4 because I really enjoyed how they got you interested into the book really fast. Another reason why I enjoyed the book is because I am a fan of fantasy. If you are a fan of fantasy this book is for you. I recommend this book to people who like fantasy because there are a lot of big adventures that have some really strange things but they are always believable. I also reccomend this book to people who like mystery because it has a lot of mystery. The mystery might come to your liking or they might not.

Feb
28
2014

Toys Come Home by Emily Jenkins

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Toys Come Home is about a girl who has a lot of stuffed animals. In the book it does not say what the girl’s name is and it just says ‘the girl’. When the girl is not Unknowninside the room all the stuffed animals come to life and their names are stingray that is a stingray, bobby dot that is a seal, sheep that is a sheep ,rocking horse that is a rocking horse and tuck tuck which is a towel but she needs to stay in the bathroom. The stuffed animals can talk and play games and do lots of things. The stuffed animals don’t get to go outside and they just stay home all day in the girls room. There are lots of other characters that come in the book that I did not introduce yet but I will soon.

When it is the girl’s birthday that is when stingray comes to the girls house. Stingray got shipped in a little box and stingray was the girl’s birthday gift. When the girl brings stingray into the room all the stuffed animals stare at her and when the girl leaves the stuffed animals start to be mean to her. When it is night time stingray does not have anywhere to sleep so she just sleeps on the window sill. Soon the girl’s dad dries bobby dot in the dryer and bobby dot was not supposed to be dried so when he comes out of the dryer he is shredded into pieces. So the next day the girl brings Stingray to the toy shop to get a new bobby dot, but the girl does not seem to like him so much so the day after that she brings Stingray again to the toy shop and exchanges the seal with a bull. The bull is named Lumpy. Stingray and Lumpy make friends and now Stingray has a friend to play with. When the girl has her birthday party her parents think she is old enough to have a bowling party so the girl has a bowling party. One of the girls friend gives her a Plastic ball and the girl named it plastic and then Stingray, Lumpy and plastic all make friends. Stingray, Lumpy and Plastic also really like playing hungry hippos and Stingray says “More hippos are the best.” But Plastic thinks that her hippo was full of marbles nine hours ago and she doesn’t understand that you try to get the most marbles.

I really enjoyed this book because it is interesting how Lumpy Stingray and Plastic all make friends and it is exciting how all the stuffed animals can come to life. I would recommend this book because it is exciting and you want to know what is going to happen next. I would give this a five star rating out of five stars.

 

                                              review by Olivia Im Propp

 

 

Feb
28
2014

Emmy and The Incredible Shrinking Rat

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The book Emmy And The Incredible Shrinking Rat by  Lynne Jonell Illustrated by Jonathan Bean.   The main Character is a girl, Emmy. Emmy’s parents are very rich. Emmy loves them but there are a few problems. The book takes place in Emmy’s town, in her mansion, at her school/school playground and in an alleyway at a store that sells rats.  (They sell rats because every rat in the world has a secret that it can do such as Raston a big character but not the biggest character.  Also the Ender mouse, the Ender mouse has the ability to make people love each other again!)

 

Emmy has a few big problems, the first one is her nanny.  The reason her nanny is so mean is because she had 2 parents, one nice and one mean, it is obvious who she decided to be like, her mean mother.  Also Emmy has yet another problem, her parents.  Her parents go on vacation all the time at first 2 days and at the time that we are reading about, 7 weeks at a time! Wouldn’t that be nice to go on vacation for all that time well it is not nice because Emmy is not allowed to go on vacation with them.  This book is different than others, it really only follows Emmy around like a camera and does not leave her side, everything that she does is like a record of her life.  “Every minute counts” as Emmy says.  As I say about the book, every minute/page of the book is great and plentiful!

I enjoyed this book a lot because it is funny and it has very unusual parts to it.  A funny part about  the book that I liked was when Emmy goes through all of the different potions made by all of the different rodent powers.  One of the funny parts is, they pick out a potion and the potion works in a really weird way, it can sniff out lies.  That part is about the funniest part in the book and the funniest in any book I have ever read.  I would recommend this book to people who really like different themes because this book has tons of different people and themes to keep track of.  I would rate this book a 5 out of 5 the, first, I add 2 for the amount of detail in the writing, second, I add a 2 for the amazing humor and the way Lynne put it and third, I add a 1 for the characteristics of all the characters!!

Feb
28
2014

Museum of Thieves

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I read Museum of Thieves by Lian Tanner a book that brings you into a adventure 9780375859786_p0_v1_s260x420of a life time. It’s about  a girl named Goldie who is annoyed that she’s chained to her mother and gets a ceremony to get her chain off but it messes up. After that she goes on a wild adventure the one I was just talking about. The setting is  a place called Museum of Thieves which brings us to the title there a lot of other places Goldie goes that you might find out if you read the book.

Did I tell you that Goldie meets a boy named Toadspit that thinks that he’s better than Goldie? He says mean things about her like “I was never that stupid,” but he didn’t know Goldie heard. But meanwhile Guardian hope is doing some strange with others you will find out more if you read the book. I DARE YOU! There are lot of interesting characters that are all different personality.

 

This is a good book for 4th grade and maybe 3rd grade. I would rate this book five stars. If you like adventure this for you. I think maybe 50% of people who like adventure would like this book. good reading!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

Feb
28
2014

Adventures According to Humphrey by Betty G. Birney

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Adventures according to Humphrey

Adventures According to Humphrey is a book by Betty G. Birney. Humphrey ( the hamster) is the main character. Humphrey is a kind, nice, curious (and lots of other  things)hamster. Humphrey see’s to the library, classroom, Potters Pond and the bus and i think a few other places.

 

Humphrey does have problems. Like his human friends are bringing boats they did not make and that is against the rules. Humphrey does not have so many problems that include him it is just that his friends are in trouble and it is sometimes because of him so he wants to help and change that mistake he made. The class goes to potters pond  for a trip and they do a race and eat. Humphrey squeaks, “ Thats against the law”. Richie, a student, says , “ I’ll hide it in my backpack. While the race is on, I’ll sneak to the sidelines, slip the submarine in the water, then bring it up fight next to his tall horrible boat”.

 

This book is one of my favorites like when they go to Potters Pond it is really funny. There are lots of good moments and to me i just keep on wanting to read and i am so sad when i have to stop reading! This book is great for 3rd, 4th and 5th grade. I think everyone would love it and is is that sort of book that makes you love reading. I would rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It is really the best of all.