Nos. 31 - 35

No. 31, Julia Alvarez's How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, was borrowed from the CE2 library.

I started it last year and had trouble getting through it. I finally finished it - trying hard to understand the cultural references. I'm glad we have books like this in our collection for our students of color.

No. 32 was John Steinbeck's The Pearl:

I snagged this from CE2, too. It's very short, so students often choose it for their reading assignment. It's horribly tragic! Talk about a surprise ending!

No. 33 was The Giver by Lois Lowry, also from CE2:

I haven't seen the movie and didn't know the plot at all. I wasn't thrilled to realize that it's a dystopia kinda story - not my favorite. But it hooked me, and I was flipping pages to see what happens. Again - horribly tragic ending! What's with these books we make our students read?!?!

No. 34 was a lighthearted mystery - Julie Kaewert's Unsolicited:

It was a fine story, but it seemed to take me forever to get through it. I usually cruise through this kind of book. I'm not sure what it was about the writing style that bogged me down.

No. 35 was James Patterson's Violets are Blue on audio book:

I didn't read as many audio books this summer - too busy working with Mom and Eryn on family projects instead of solo projects when I can check out and get absorbed in a book.

This one had two simultaneous plots, and one was about vampires! I really wasn't into the vampire story, but the other was good. I tolerated the vampires to get the other one :)

Definitely an interesting mix of books in this last little bit!