Lessons and Craft of Stay

            I just finished the book Stay by Deb Caletti. It was a pretty interesting book. I think there were two main lessons in the book. Before I talk about the lessons I want to mention how the author wrote this book. It was about Clara’s life only. The first chapter was the past and how she met Christian. The second was the present and how she was getting away from him. Both of these stories continued alternating by each chapter. At the end they merged into one story which was the present. It was cool how the author did this and managed to pull it off. Sometimes it was a bit confusing. At one part I was like wait, what happened before this in the chapter about her past? Overall I thought it was a good book.

                The first lesson I thought that the author wanted to teach was be careful about who you trust. A lot of books are about this and it’s a big thing. Trusting the wrong person can lead to many other problems that you might not even imagine happening to you. It was just like how Clara trusted Christian in the beginning. Towards the end of her relationship, she just wanted to get away from him and couldn’t. It was like she couldn’t be free.

                The second lesson was to improve on your mistakes. Clara went through this in the book. Christian didn’t like her to joke with others and she listened to him but only at the very beginning of their relationship. Later, when Clara went out with Finn, she was careful not to joke around with his friends at first. When she noticed Finn didn’t really care whether she joked around or not she understood that he was the right one. This might be a different kind of example but there are many other situations that you can improve you mistakes in. 

Theme of Martin Espada’s Poems Essay

Martin Espada is a famous poet.  He was born in New York in 195. He has published more than 15 books full of poems. His poems have been published in Spain, Puerto Rico, and Chile. His poems have different themes. Some of them do have the same theme but in different ways of expressing them. Some of his poems are based off of pictures or they are just experiences or moments that he thinks about probably. Three of his poems stand out to have the same theme but expressed in different ways. The three poems Revolutionary Spanish Lesson; The New Bathroom Policy at English High School; and Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3, 1877 have the theme that separation is wrong because of the words that he uses in his poems.

            In Revolutionary Spanish Lesson Espada writes about how a guy feels when his name is mispronounced. He writes it from a first-person point of view. He says that when someone mispronounces his name he wants to “hijack a busload of Republican tourists from Wisconsin, force them to chant anti-American slogans in Spanish”. His description is so specific. He shows how there is a separation between the white people and Spanish or any other ethnicity. He shows that there is a border that separates the Spanish and the whites and he is writing this poem to show these whites to try to pronounce names correctly to make this border disappear. It’s like a message for the white people who make no move to pronounce someone’s name correctly.

            In the second poem The New Bathroom Policy at English High School Espada writes about a principal in an English High School using the bathroom while listening to boys talk in Spanish. He doesn’t understand what they are saying except that they are talking about him. He decides to ignore them and relax. This is another example of how there is a border between the Spanish and whites. It’s like the principal doesn’t care about the Spanish kids and he’s like speak your own language and I’ll stick to mine. It’s the principal creating the border by not trying to figure out what they are saying. If there was no border he would at least try to find out what they were talking about which indicates he cares, but that’s not the case.

            In the third poem Two Mexicanos Lynched in Santa Cruz, California, May 3, 1877 Espada writes about a photograph of forty white vigilantes lynching two Mexicans and showed their pride by crowding into the photograph. This is a very clear example of separation. It supports the fat that the whites didn’t care about the Spanish people and were proud to hang them. Except that this photograph was from 1877 which means that this was a long time ago. It’s a message for the people now not to repeat the same thing. It’s so that the separation between Mexicans and whites don’t get so strong that the whites begin to hang the Mexicans. It’s to teach a lesson.

            Overall these three poems represent the theme of separation and how it’s not right. He expresses this message in the same form but in three different ways. He shows it through history, through a first-person point of view, and an example of someone creating it. It’s an attempt to diminish the separation between whites and Mexicans and other ethnicities. It’s so that everyone respects each other and each other’s language. It’s to show everyone separation is wrong.

"Hate List" The Other Side of Bullying

            I just finished the fantastic novel Hate List by Jennifer Brown. When I first opened this book it reminded me of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut. This story was a bit different but similar. I think this is one of my favorite books. At the end it gets really sad. The main character is Valerie and as the author said in her author’s note, it’s about Valerie’s story. This is one powerful novel. It teaches the importance of being nice to people and not bullying anyone.

            Nick is Valerie’s boyfriend in the story. Valerie and Nick are the quiet kids in Garvin High School. They both get bullied all the time. They started a hate list. On this hate list they put all the names of the people that were mean to them or expressed they didn’t like them. Nick kept on giving hints to Valerie about how they could get rid of the people they hated. Valerie didn’t think that Nick was serious.

            One day Christy Bruter (who was on the hate list) broke Valerie’s CD player on the bus. She told Nick the whole thing and he said that he would handle it. She didn’t really get what he meant but when they went inside the school, Nick started shooting. Valerie stopped the shooting and saved Jessica.

            Even though she was the one who stopped the shooting everyone saw her as a threat. People turned away from her and didn’t want to talk to her. No one wanted tot be around her when she went back to school. Even though she also got shot everyone thought she was involved on the plan to shoot people on the hate list. Jessica was the one who started to talk to her. She started to be friends with Valerie. As the book went on, people started to get more and more comfortable around Valerie. Her mom was the one who saw her as a threat. Her mom thought Valerie was a threat to all of the students. At the end Valerie let’s her mom go so that she wouldn’t have to worry about Valerie all the time.

            Bullying was an important part in this book. It teaches that you should always be nice to everyone. You never know, the person you bully might hurt you. You can’t read anyone’s mind. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t trust anyone. I’m trying to say that avoid this by being nice. Bullying someone just might turn around and harm you.

Gossip Girl Format

          In the novel Gossip Girl by Cecily Von Ziegesar was actually a pretty good book. I thought that this book wouldn’t be that good because I’m not that interested in these types of books but I enjoyed it. It was a different type of book in two ways: what it was about and how it was written. The one that puzzled me was the way the book was written. I don’t mean how the text was laid out but how she wrote the stuff she wanted to say. This is probably sort of confusing to say.

          Usually, in most of the books I’ve read, authors say “she thought…” Instead in this book the author didn’t even write she thought or he thought. She just wrote what they thought and left it for you to guess who was thinking it. Sometimes in the book it was easy to figure out because of what they thought. In other places, I had to re-read that line a couple of times to figure out who’s thinking. It’s really awkward the way I have to phrase all of this to describe what I mean.

          I think that the author didn’t really want to get so formal. I think you’ll understand if you read the book. Other than that I thought the book was pretty good. I would recommend to girls not boys. It’s sort of like a girly book if I am thinking right. J

Response on Fallout

            In the interesting novel Fallout by Ellen Hopkins there are three main characters. The three main characters are Hunter, Autumn, and Summer. They have no idea about each other but they have one very important thing that is common between them. That is their mother. Each of them has the same mother, whose name is Kristina. Their lives are broken up one way or another. Kristina, their mother, started taking crystal meth and it broke up all of their lives.

            Hunter, Autumn, and Summer have different problems. None of them want to follow their mother footsteps but they follow in one way or another. At the end they all plan on meeting each other. They know nothing about each other except that they all have the same mother. They found out that they were siblings right before they were about to meet each other. They all want happiness but when they see their mother all they see is themselves.  

Response on "Burned"

I just finished the really interesting book Burned by Ellen Hopkins. This was a really good book. Some times it did get a little boring but that was in very few parts through out the book. I would recommend this book to anyone. The way the author writes this book is amazing. The main character Pattyn has many problems but you could summarize this into one big problem. I don’t want to give it away to those who want to read this book but there are many stages in this book with different problems.

At first Pattyn trusts the wrong person. She trusts Derek and thinks that he actually loved her but he was just using her. This led to another problem. She started to misbehave with her parents. After Derek left her when her dad found out she started yelling at her parents and behaving very badly in school. Being with Derek affected her a lot. She didn’t care about being good anymore she reacted like she wanted to.

When she moved to her aunt’s house she found Ethan who actually loved her and showed her how the world was like. She discovered the world outside of her father’s harsh rules. She lived the way she wanted and actually controlled herself. In the end her father and community ruined her life but I won’t give that away. It was a really good book and I think girls should read because I think that it teaches a really good lesson. It shows you that you shouldn’t really trust everyone.

Response on "The Bean Trees"

I just finished the marvelous novel The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver. This was a really interesting book even though it doesn't look like it from the cover. (Never judge a book by its cover). In the beginning, it's about two different people in two different places. Between the beginning and the middle, they become a family and the story just becomes one. This book is about Taylor Greer (whose actual name was Marietta) and Lou Ann Ruiz and Taylor's daughter Turtle (whose actual name is April Turtle Greer) and Lou Ann's son Dwayne Ray. Taylor and Lou Ann have many hardships that they help each other to solve.

Taylor has the most problems in my opinion. Some lady came up to Taylor's car and gave her Turtle saying that it was her dead sister's daughter. Taylor didn't want to take her but the woman forced her too. When she took Turtle to the doctor later on in the book, the doctor said that Turtle was closer to three, had fractures, and that she may have been molested. Over the time Taylor was taking Turtle to the therapist, it had come to the attention of the Child Protection Services Division of the Department of Economic Security that Taylor had no legal claim on Turtle. Taylor didn't even have any legal papers or know anyone from Turtle's real family. She went out in the search of the family.

Lou Ann Ruiz doesn't have that many problems. She just has problems with her husband. Her husband left her and she can't seem to go on. He comes back once in a while and gives checks but she still loves him. He even says he wants a divorce but Lou Ann can't go on. She can't even get herself to tell her mother that she and him aren't living together anymore. She just sulks around and takes care of Dwayne Ray. When she gets a job she finally takes her mind off of him and moves on in a way. I really liked this book and I would recommend it to anyone. Just don't judge it by its cover.