The Blood Guard By Carter Roy

This summer I read the book, The Blood Guard by Carter Roy. It takes place in Brooklyn, and an anonymous urban/suburban area. The main characters are Evelyn (Ronan) Truelove, Greta, Ronan’s redheaded old classmate and Jack Dawkins, a member of the blood guard and teenaged pickpocket. In the beginning of the book there was a prologue.  Ronan stayed home sick for school. And the house mysteriously got set on fire… He evacuated safely after leaping of the roof of his house. The main problem begins when Ronan gets picked up from his new school (because he moved after his house blew up) by his mom and she told him that his dad got kidnapped and they got chased by the “police”. They actually are not police.

 

 

That was a lot of information. Let me get down to the basics. There are 36 Pure human beings who always, every single time do the right thing. If one of them dies, something really bad happens to the world. WWII happened because one of the Pure died. They are the glue that keeps together the world.

 

By the way, the people who kidnapped Ronan’s nerdy dad were the people who were chasing Ronan’s mom, Bree, and Ronan. Yeah, those people I called “police” are actually agents of a bad guy group called the Bend Sinister. They believe that the world is horrible and they want a new start where they are the only people in the world left and then they can start anew. They are basically terrorists. “HOW IN THE WORLD CAN YOU GET RID OF BILLIONS OF PEOPLE BUT YOU!!!??,” You might be asking yourself. The answer is simple. Assassinate the 36 Pure.

 

The good guys in this book are, of course, the Blood Guard. They are people who dedicate their lives to protect the Pure. Bree is one of the Blood Guard. And much more characters you discover are too! Throughout the book the Bend Sinister chase Ronan for an unknown reason. There is a lot more, I just don’t want to spoil it. Come on, do yourself a favor and read this fantabulous book. The problem does get resolved,  and I’m talking about almost everything I mentioned. Almost…

 

(PS, I couldn’t find a quote to say that the problem was resolved.)

 

 

Here are my ratings of this awesome book. I enjoyed reading it over a weekend not in 2 hours like I do with some books. I also enjoyed the book because it was medium paced. It does not have many cliffhangers, and you can put it down whenever you want which is not always the case with some books. I would recommend this book to an action adventure and humor reader that has a fair amount of time on his/her hands. I say this because it is not a skinny book but it is not as fat as War and Peace or Moby Dick so you will probably finish it in a few days if you keep at it. I would rate this book four out of five stars.

 

Freakling, By Lana Krumweide

Freakling, by Lana Krumwiede, Is about a boy named Taemon. He and his family live in a futuristic religious world that in a place called Deliverance, everyone worships “The Heart Of The Earth”.

 

The Heart Of The Earth AKA, THOTE, gave everyone in Deliverance telekinesis, which they like to call psi. But, some people in this world have other special additional powers, like clairvoyance, for example, the young lady touched her iphone™ and immediately knew who owned it before her. Basically it is when he/she interacts with an object and immediately knows some random piece of information about it.

 

That is only one of the special powers. Taemon has one of the others. Priests in the THOTE temple arrest and banish people who have special telekinesis. Can Taemon stay safe? Can he even trust his own brother Yens? Read the book to find out.

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Dead End In Norvelt By Jack Gantos

Dead End In Norvelt By Jack Gantos is a gothic-humor-historical-fiction-part -autobiography. If  you read the book then you will understand by what I mean by this.

 

Dead End In Norvelt is set in WWII in Norvelt. Norvelt is a place in Pennsylvania. It is called Norvelt because it was founded by eleaNOR rooseVELT and the last few letters became Norvelt.

 

The main characters are Jack, Bunny, Mrs. Gantos/Mom, Mr. Gantos/Dad, and Ms. Volken. Jack is funny and mischievous. Jack always can cheer-up and put-down anyone he wants to. Bunny, is Jack’s best friend. She doesn’t like that Jack got grounded and that she doesn’t get to play baseball with him. Mrs. Gantos is Jack’s mom. She is strict and loving, but not both at once. His dad, Mr. Gantos, has an old airplane that he rides a lot. Jack’s mom will not let Jack ride in it, even though he really wants to. His dad is always doing something with Jack behind his spouses back.

 

Ms. Volken is the hand-frying obitist. An obitist is a person who writes obituaries. Since she literally fried her hands. Now her fingers do not look and work the same way they used to. So Jack’s mom forces him to be Ms. Volken’s scribe. She is sometimes dead on serious and sometimes extremely hilarious. But sometimes people get mixed up between the two.

 

The plot is about Jack’s worst summer of his whole entire life. He got grounded by a dangerous stunt and his dad is forcing him to make a bomb shelter to protect from the russians. Even though they were in the middle of Pennsylvania and so on.

 

I enjoyed this book fairly well. It is not bad but it is not good. I say this because I wish that there was more action but the humor made up for it. I would recommend this book to

funny people. There is never a chapter in this book where there is not some stupid pun or a strange joke. I would rate this book 3 out of 5 stars.imgres

The Maze Runner By James Dashner

This book was truly amazing. I completely loved it. I read it over break and I was flabberghasted on its amazingness.

 

The book Maze Runner by James Dashner is about a boy named Thomas. He is in a shaky box and all he remembers is his name. The box opens and he sees himself surrounded by other boys whose memories are also gone. Alby, the leader of the group, says “Welcome, to the Glade, Greenbean.” The Glade is the center of the maze surrounded by walls that open at day and close at night. There are horrible monsters with spikes called Grievers outside the walls. They call the last person who came out of a “Greenbean”. They have jobs like Runner, Slopper, and Med-Jacks. But two days after Thomas arrived. A girl comes out of the box. The first girl ever. And everything after that completely changed.

 

What changed? Who created the maze? Why are they in the maze? What terrible people would put teenage kids in a maze? How will they get out?

 

You will have to read the book to find out. I would rate this book five out of five stars because I think it is amazing how the author created this complex and creative and big scene.

I would recommend this book for people that can take on sudden suspense and action (I would know, I spent a lot of time reading at night  on break, it sucks you in!) I would also like to recommend this book for people who can love a great book!

Ranger’s Apprentice Kings Of Clonmel By John Flanagan

John Flanagan Ranger’s Apprentice series is a good book. Since I am on Kings Of Clonmel. I will tell you a blurb of that. In Kings Of Clonmel, Horace Halt And Will travel to Clonmel in Hibernia where the failing king, Lord Ferris, is having a weak hold on his country.

 

For instance, raiding parties have been pillaging villages while the king does nothing. The people of Clonmel are furious. So, a group called the Outsiders, protect any village who pays for their service. But maybe there is a dark side to this mysterious group…

 

Horace is the former apprentice to Sir Rodney the knight and Horace is now an official knight, too. Horace is also Will’s best friend as shown in the past books two – seven.

 

Halt is Will’s former mentor and friend. He is an old, greybeard ranger who has a very sad life. Who, surprisingly, brings joy to Will and his friends. Halt is usually sad because he has never found a spouse until now…..

 

Will, is the biggest character in the series because he is in every single book. He also has a close friendship with Horace and Halt. He is an orphan whose dad died in a battle against fearsome creatures. Will is very kind and pleasant. People seem to be happy when Will is around. Will is also very funny. He even made a parody of a song called Old Man Joe and turned it into Old Greybeard Halt, His mentor!

 

The whole thing is set in a fantasy world but Of all the places in it, there is Hibernia, Araluen, Skandia, Genovia, Arrida, Celtica, Picta, Eastern Steppes, Nih-Hon-Ja, Gallica, Toscana, Iberian, Sonderland, Aslavia. Those are all the places.

 

Horace, Halt, and Will, travel to Clonmel and try to sort out Ferris’s problem with bandits and the Outsiders. They scavenge around the countryside for information. Will stalks the bandits and follows the Outsiders. Halt gets a prisoner bandit to pretend to be him. And so on.

 

I enjoyed this book very much. Because it has a lot of information that is exceptionally interesting because of all the mystery and medieval fantasy involved. I would recommend this book for people who surprisingly, don’t like fantasy because I assure you that once you read this series, you will love fantasy like never before.

I would rate this book and the whole series 5 out of 5 stars.

 

This series is amazing, period.

•Also, if you don’t know what an apprentice is, it’s a student learning to enhance a specific craft or skill.

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A Tale Dark And Grimm By Adam Gidwitz

This book is a horror/humor themed novel. I usually do not like horror and humor together but I think that this book changed my mind. This book is about Hansel and Gretel. All of you probably know about Hansel and Gretel and their cheesy little witch story. but this book shows the original, grimm, tale. Not only does it show you the witch story but it also shows you a bunch of other horrifying, eye-popping, tales. I would recommend this book to people who don’t feel queasy when they read about blood and people who do not get scared easily because as said before, this book is pretty scary (not to me but probably to some people in the grade.) I would rate this book 5 out of 10 stars because I really think that this book did not get the most appealing introduction and ending. But what I really do love about this book is all of the fantasy and adventure in between the horror and humor. The last story about a dragon seemed the most upbeat but if you want to know what it was you’ll have to read the book to find out.

Suzanne Collins’ MockingJay Book review

[WARNING:] [DO NOT READ THIS ARTICLE IF YOU HAVE NOT READ CATCHING FIRE:]

MockingJay  is a very interesting book. I say that because last seen in Catching Fire, Katniss Everdeen almost gets herself killed and finds out that all of the people in the latest hunger games sacrificed themselves for Katniss not Peeta Mellark. Katniss made a deal with Haymitch to save Peeta instead of herself. Haymitch is a drunk man who is Katniss’ and Peeta’s tutor for the hunger games. The whole plot of MockingJay is to overthrow the Capitol. Peeta however, gets captured by President Snow, (an evil elderly man who rules the Capitol) at the end of Catching Fire. I felt that out of the three, MockingJay was the best because it throws a whole lot of information in the beginning of the book. A few people in the comments of my Catching Fire review said that I gave away too much, but this will be different because I am trying my hardest to not give “spoilers,” as you folk may say it. Anyway, The true core of the rebellion is District 13. That district is kept secret to all of the other districts because District 13 and the Capitol had a blackmail-like deal which if District 13 is kept secret to the other districts neither of them will attack each other. The Capitol does not attack District 13 because of their nuclear weapons… until now. I would give this book 5 out of 5 stars because as said before, I just simply love how Suzanne writes this novel with the storyline always from Katniss’ perspective. I would recommend this book for people who could handle or think they can handle the other books in the series (The Hunger Games and Catching Fire).

 

 

Catching Fire By Suzanne Collins

(:WARNING DON’T READ THIS REVIEW IF YOU HAVE NOT READ THE FIRST BOOK:)

Catching Fire is the sequel to The Hunger Games and is by Suzanne Collins. It is about a place called Panem with a place called the Capitol and 12 (or maybe 13) districts. The hunger games is when a male and a female gets reaped from their district to fight each other to the death and the people who got reaped from the other districts. The reaped people are called tributes. Being reaped means you get picked to be in the hunger games. The tributes from district 12 in the 74th hunger games is Peeta Mellark and Katniss Everdeen. They’re mentor for the games is Haymitch Abernathy. Katniss’s best friend who despises the Capitol is named Gale Hawthorne. Peeta and Katniss win the hunger games and become victors. they are also about to become mentors when the Quarter Quell happens. The Quarter Quell is a special hunger games that happens every 25 years. For the 75th hunger games the victors are to be reaped from their district and fight. Now Katniss’s chances of surviving are even slimmer. When you are reading the book you will uncover all different secret/surprise characters. When Peeta and Katniss are reaped again they hear hints of rebellion spreading around Panem. I enjoyed the book dearly because I simply just could not put it down.

I would rate it 1 stars for people who cannot handle gruesome scenes. And 5 stars for people who can handle gruesome scenes and understand every single thing that is happening on the page. My favorite part of the book is when Katniss makes a jaw-dropping performance in the training area with her bow and arrows.  My least favorite part is probably when a poisonous fog starts chasing the tributes. Again, as mentioned, I would really like to recommend this book to people with a tough stomach.

                                                                                                                           

Fun Facts

Haymitch won his games on a Quarter Quell when they put twice the amount of tributes into the arena.

Peeta had a crush on Katniss since he was five.

 

Hatchet, By Gary Paulsen

 The main characters are Brian, his mom, his dad, and the pilot. The book takes place in a plane and in the Canadian wilderness. Some important events were his first fire, a death, and him almost trying to kill himself. I enjoyed this book because of its interesting plot in surviving in the wilderness with nothing but a hatchet.

My favorite part was when he found a way to make food and fire near the middle of the book. My least favorite part was when a tornado came near the end of the book. I would recommend this book to people who can handle intense scenery and very very severe sadness. A death occurs and some of the parts may be a bit gruesome. If I were to rate this book I would give it **** (four stars) because of its complex threading of the words and it really makes you feel like you’re in the book.