Books I Read and Other Assorted Oddities

 John Green is a world-famous author, but he isn't typically known for nonfiction. Instead, Looking for Alaska , The Fault in Our Stars,  and his other works are typically geared toward teen readers. However, this book is different. I started following John Green on Instagram maybe a year or so ago, and enjoyed his reels. There was a definite shift in them after a while, as Green started talking more and more about Tuberculosis. I was fascinated by his perspective on the disease, and so I've wanted to read this book. There are bonus points with this one, because I'm also planning on adding it to my AP curriculum. Everything is Tuberculosis  explains just that: how so many things are tied to TB. Green discusses the history of the disease, how treatments were developed, and (I think) most importantly, the stigma tied to TB. It all started years ago in Sierra Leone, where Green was visiting with an organization he works with. He wasn't there to study TB, but a different cr...

  A while ago, I read David and Goliath  by Malcolm Gladwell and found it interesting. As my sister was preparing for the AP exam last year, she read this and then recommended it to me. The Tipping Point  by Malcolm Gladwell explores how "epidemics" start and spread. Gladwell's analysis of how people can influence trends follows several different types of people and their roles in epidemics. As with all of Gladwell's work, I like the way he structures his argument and utilizes evidence. He has a very specific structure to his work that I find particularly helpful. His writing is clear, and I feel like I always know what the point of his evidence is. Like I tell my students, he doesn't leave things up to my interpretation as the reader. This structure does bother some readers because it gets a little repetitive by the end, and I also feel that Gladwell's use of that structure fizzles at the end. Sometimes I got lost in the evidence a bit as well. This was an in...

 This is a book that was recommended to me by several of my coworkers. I read it for my AP class, as several teachers before me used to use it in that class. If you want to truly know and learn about the horrors of the Holocaust, this is the book for you. Elie Wiesel took a ten-year vow of silence before writing about what he experienced at the hands of the Nazis during World War II. Wiesel describes how the Jews in his village in Romania hoped that the war would pass them by, how they knew that something was happening to Jews in other countries, but they hoped that nothing would happen to them. Wiesel then describes being forced into ghettos, then being taken to Auschwitz, where he was separated from his mother and sisters. Wiesel describes his experiences in the camp and the ending of the war as the Jews in the camps were liberated by the Americans and Russians. This book is chilling. There is no other way to describe it. Wiesel writes in vivid detail and describes the deep fear ...

This is a book I've used as an option in my AP class. It was the only book I hadn't read for the longest time. I finally finished it, and here is my review. The Devil in the White City  covers two true stories. The first is the story of the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893. This part of the book follows the story of how the fair was built and the work that went into it by the famous architect Daniel H. Burnham. The second storyline follows the life of America's first serial killer, Dr. H. H. Holmes, who was active at the time of the World's Fair. Both accounts are true and pulled from primary source documents. Larson attempts to use the voices of the actual people involved wherever possible. This book was an interesting account on both sides. The individual stories were interesting, detailed, and as I said, Larson pulled from primary sources wherever possible. He often uses the "characters'" words when recounting their story. I enjoyed this aspect of it...

 This is a play that I grew up watching with my dad. We loved the Kenneth Branagh adaptation (bare butts at the start and all) and I watched it many times with him. My dad's love of Shakespeare was definitely a big reason that I love it so much, and it has been literature we've bonded over. Since becoming an English teacher, this is my favorite play to teach, and I love sharing it, with its complicated but funny plot, with my students over the years, who have reported liking it more than they thought they would. Much Ado About Nothing  begins on the heels of some sort of short war. The prince, Don Pedro, and his brother, Don John, have just returned from fighting each other. In a gracious move, Pedro has forgiven his brother, and has taken him back into his company. It is from this conflict that the armies arrive in Messina to stay at the house of the governor, Leonato. As the soldiers stay in Leonato's house, Claudio, Pedro's right hand man, falls in love with Leonato...

 This is another book that I read because of my AP class. I do have to admit that I enjoyed it more than I thought I was going to. The Boys in the Boat  tells the story of the 1936 U.S. Olympic rowing team. This team came from Washington State and was made up of a seemingly rag-tag group of boys. One boy in particular, Joe, came from very humble circumstances. Having been basically abandoned by his family multiple times in his childhood, Joe lacked confidence. By the time he got to the Olympics, his coaches had helped him succeed. I know next to nothing about rowing, but that was not a requirement to understand this book. Daniel James Brown does a great job of explaining the sport, and also introducing the mechanics of the boats themselves. I thought much of the background information he provided about boats and the legendary builder of them fascinating, but at times unnecessary. Joe's story is in many ways inspiring but also heartbreaking. Brown describes his childhood and ho...

I first read The Hiding Place  in my 8th grade honors English class. It was a book that I found fascinating and enjoyed at the time. As I was again trying to find books to include in my AP class, this is one that I thought of. I read through it a second time.  Corrie ten Boom was a devout Christian, raised in Denmark. She lived with her father and sister, Betsy, in their clock repair shop in a small Dutch town. As World War II broke out and the Germans invaded, the ten Booms were suddenly very aware of their Jewish neighbors. Corrie and her family begin helping the Dutch underground, helping take in Jews for short periods and hiding them in their home. Eventually, the ten Booms were caught, and Corrie was sent to Ravensbruck. This is a story of survival, faith, and doing what's right. This book is a memoir, with Corrie ten Boom telling the story of her experiences during World War II. The story itself is well-written, and the pacing of the story kept my attention. It was a rel...

 I picked this one up to possibly use in my AP class. It had been recommended to me by one of my coworkers and I was trying to decide if it was worth using in AP. The 57 Bus  recounts the true story of two teens whose happenstance meeting on a public bus in Oakland, California. Sasha identified as nonbinary, liked to wear skirts, and went to a private school in Oakland. Richard was a black student, a good kid, but also tended to get mixed up in trouble. He went to a public school in Oakland's poorer side of town. One day, Sasha was riding the bus as they always did back to their house from school. This time though, Sasha fell asleep on the long ride. Richard and his friends boarded the bus as well, and seeing the skirt hanging off the edge of the seat, decided to see what would happen with a lighter. The material of the skirt burst into flames, and suddenly Sasha was burning. This story is unbelievably sad for both teenagers involved. In working with teenagers, one thing is tr...

 I know I posted about this book a couple of years ago, but I just wanted to take a second and highlight it again. I just finished this for another time through (probably my fourth or fifth time reading it). I can't say it enough: I LOVE this book. It gets me every time I finish it (even like four times later). I convinced my mom to read it, at a time when we're watching her parents struggling with illnesses and conditions we know aren't treatable. And it's hard. And we're so far away. And it just sucks. I hadn't even thought about them, when I suggested it, because I just wanted my mom to read it. She came back to me and told me how much she loved it. She finished it in one day, and her reaction was, "It allows you to feel however you feel about death and terminal illness. It shows that whatever you feel is ok and if you are honest with yourself you can be ok too." And as I said in my last review: Losing loved ones is a universal experience of being h...

 This is a book that I use in my AP class. I've been looking for an excuse to read it for a long time, as it's always sounded interesting. Tara Westover grew up in Idaho. Her parents were something of doomsday preparers, taking the religion of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to an extreme. They believed fervently in preparing for the End Times, stockpiling food, fuel, and other supplies, and making their best effort to go off grid. Westover's father also deeply mistrusted the U.S. government and what he called "the Medical Establishment." Even after horrendous accidents, the family rarely visited hospitals or saw doctors. Westover was also kept out of school. Things began to change for her once she started suffering horrific abuse from her older brother Shawn. After taking the ACT, and earning a scholarship to BYU, Westover started to realize that the world was so much wider than her father's. As she discovered herself, she lost her family, fin...

 This is a book I'm getting ready to teach in my AP course for next term to help with the argument section of the test. David and Goliath  explores the advantages of being the underdog, and what makes it possible for Davids to beat Goaliaths. Gladwell attempts to persuade readers that sometimes, being bigger and stronger is actually a disadvantage, and that when a person has nothing to lose, they're more likely to do anything to be successful. Disadvantages can also sometimes be strengths. Gladwell uses real stories from people he interviewed to persuade his readers that people like David are more likely to defeat people like Goliath. Overall, I really enjoyed this book. Gladwell uses fantastic real-world examples and stories to prove his point. I think he did a great job setting up his book within the context of the Biblical story of David and Goliath, and I enjoyed the details that he chose to include to make his point. The one complaint that I have was that the last chapter...

This book was recommended to me by one of my teachers as a possibility for AP. I didn't end up going with it, and I don't think I still will, but I very much enjoyed the memoir. I Want You to Know We're Still Here  is Esther Safran Foer's memoir about life after the Holocaust. She describes how her and her parents came to the United States following the end of WWII, and her life following. She is obsessed with discovering her family's history. She describes traveling to Israel and Ukraine to meet with people who knew her family, particularly her father's family. She eventually is able to track down the Ukrainian family who helped hide her father during the war. Through this family, Foer was able to learn about her half sister, who her father had never mentioned. This connection to family is so incredibly important to the author. Overall, I did enjoy this book. The family history side of it particularly drew my attention. In my religion, there is a big focus on f...

I read this novel for Battle of the Books, but I also wanted to read it. I keep trying Sepetys novels, thinking I'm really going to like them, and then finding myself disappointed. This novel was an exception. This is probably the best Sepetys novel I've read so far. I Must Betray You is the story of Romania behind the Iron Curtain. Christian Florescu is seventeen. His grandfather, an intellectual, questions the current regime, and Christian finds himself agreeing. Romanians are struggling; waiting in long lines hoping for food, spies everywhere, never knowing who's an informer and who isn't. Amidst these tensions, Christian is confronted by an agent of the secret police and blackmailed into informing on Dan Van Dorn, the son of the American Ambassador. Stuck between his beliefs and his fear, Christian does as he's told, hoping that he can dupe the agent. I loved this book, more than any other Sepetys novel I've read. While Sepetys excels at many things in her w...

 I am finally off hiatus... Sorry that was such a long gap! Like I said, 2021 was really tough as far as teaching, and 2022 started off with a student teacher. Because of that, I've been able to read a pretty substantial amount and will be posting hopefully for the next two months consistently. The first book I was able to finish was Out of the Dust  by Karen Hess. This novel is written entirely in verse and follows 14 year old Billie Jo through the trials of living in rural Oklahoma during the dust bowl. Their young family is thrilled because Mama is expecting a baby boy, but that thrill soon turns to despair after an oil accident fatally injures Mama, and eventually the baby as well. As the dust storms get worse, Billie Jo finds herself desperate to leave Oklahoma and start over somewhere else, but realizes that her father is her life, and she ultimately decides to stay. This book was riveting and gut-wrenching. I'm not typically into books written in verse - I've tried s...

This is another book that I use in my classroom. My 10th-grade students enjoy this story. I've read this book a few times, and I enjoy it more every time I read it. Warriors Don't Cry  by Melba Patillo Beals tells the true story of her experience integrating Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Melba was a normal teenage girl. She had friends, went to class, got good grades. She had a tight-knit family at home. Her life was forever changed when she put her name down on a list of students to possibly integrate Central High School. Melba went from a normal school to what she describes as a battlefield. She had to be escorted to every class by a soldier from the U.S. military, she had to watch every corner and staircase, she was beaten, spit upon, and yelled at, and even had segregationists calling her home to try and scare her out of going to school. This book is another narrative that is particularly sensitive in the current climate of racial tensions. I also think this...

 This is once again a book that I teach with my seniors, and it is one of my all-time favorite books. There is also a film version of this book that is every bit as good as the novel; in fact, Patrick Ness had a significant hand in creating that film. Conor O'Malley is 13. His life is not normal. His mom is horribly sick with what we assume is cancer, and this fact has completely altered every aspect of his life. Conor is determined that his mom is getting better. He is determined that the treatments are helping her. It isn't long before at 12:07 AM, Conor is woken from an awful recurring nightmare by a monster. Conor finds that he is not afraid of the monster, much to its surprise and annoyance. The monster tells Conor that he will tell him three tales, and once he is finished, Conor must tell his own tale, and that tale will be the truth. Can Conor face the reality that faces him? This book is amazing. There are no other words to describe it. The illustrations in this book ar...

 Again, this is another novel that I read with my students. I LOVE this book. I always thought that it would be scary, and initially, I was terrified to read it. Everyone paints it as such a horror story, and of course, we all have Halloween. Frankenstein  by Mary Shelley is considered the quintessential horror book. Victor Frankenstein had what he considered a perfect life. He had a happy family and close friends in Geneva. Victor was fascinated by the sciences from a very young age and pursued the philosophies of the alchemists. After being mocked mercilessly by a college professor, Victor eventually gives up these beliefs, but not for long. He discovers the secret to life. Creating a being out of the remains of the dead, initially, he is thrilled by his creation, but once he finally bestows the spark of life, he is terrified at his creation and abandons it. The monster is then left to fend for itself, learning morality from works like Paradise Lost , and observing a French ...

This is my second time through The Great Gatsby . This time, I was reading to annotate it so that I'm ready to teach it. I really enjoy this book! The Great Gatsby  by F. Scott Fitzgerald is an American classic set in 1922 at the height of the Roaring 20s. Nick Carraway is new in New York City. He moves into a dumpy house next to this gorgeous mansion owned by one Jay Gatsby. Across the bay, in the upper-class East Egg lives the Buchanans, a distant cousin of Nick Carraway. Tom and Daisy Buchanan are "old money," while Gatsby is "new money," with no one actually really knowing where he got all of his cash. Gatsby and Daisy dated for a time before he went to Europe to fight in WWI. While he was gone, Daisy married Tom, and Gatsby is trying to win her back. He throws elaborate parties at his mansion in an attempt to impress her. Will he win her back and get the happily-ever-after he wishes, erasing the past few years? I love The Great Gatsby . Maybe that's the...

This post is a book that I've read a couple of times because I read it with my seniors. It's one of my favorites, but I'll get into that more later. Code Name Verity  by Elizabeth Wein is about a British spy, code-named Verity who crash-landed in Nazi-occupied France during World War II. She is arrested soon after her landing while attempting to carry out her mission. While in prison, the Gestapo show her pictures of the plane wreck, leading her to believe that her best friend, Maddie Brodatt, the pilot, is dead. Ultimately, Verity begins working with the Gestapo and giving them sets of wireless code which would allow the Gestapo to intercept Allied communications. They also ask her to write her confession: a document with as much information as she knows about Allied plans, bases, and planes. However, knowing that she's going to die no matter what she tells them, Verity takes her time with her tale, instead telling the story of how she met Maddie and how she ended up...

My reading habits have definitely changed in the last few years! College kind of killed off my love of reading for a while, but now that I'm teaching high school English, I've started reading more, and more often for pleasure. I'm going through the books I've read so far this year and posting some reviews of books. First on my list is A Christmas Carol  by Charles Dickens. I read it for the first time with my students last December. This classic novel follows Ebeneezer Scrooge through one insane night filled with ghosts. Mr. Scrooge is a stalwart Christmas hater. The descriptions of him at the beginning of the novel describe him as cold and almost uncaring. His partner, Jacob Marley, died before the events of the novel, but they are also a key to understanding what's happening. Marley was possibly more cold than Scrooge. Scrooge goes home on Christmas Eve after sending his assistant home and reluctantly giving him the next day off. After climbing into bed that n...