I love to read,  LUV it.  The summer is when I really get a chance to find things that I like and just consume them.  I think I read 20 books this summer, an average of almost 3 a week.  Here is just a sample of what I read:

1. Everything’s Eventual by Stephen King – Most of you might have heard of Stephen King as the master of the horror genre.  He’s got lots of talent besides just making you jump in the middle of the night.  He’s also a pretty good short story writer, and this collection here includes an award winner, “The Man in the Black Suit,” (about a boy who is visited by the devil himself), and a really creepy one called “Autopsy Room Four”.  I started reading Stephen King back when I was in middle school in the late 70s / early 80s and since last summer, I decided to reread some of his really old stuff to see if it still creeped me out.  So far, Salem’s Lot is my favorite – a vampire story.

2. The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd – Kidd is the author of a book you may have read or will read later this year called The Secret Life of Bees.  In Wings, she tells two stories set in early 19th Century South Carolina: one is of a slave named Hetty “Handful” Grimke who is given as a playmate to the other narrator of the story, Sarah Grimke.  Hetty undergoes trial, loss, and other problems as a slave working on a South Carolina plantation, and Sarah, from a very young age, feels that slavery is wrong despite growing up with it all of her life.  Sarah tries to free Hetty several times as she gets older, and discovers that Southern women are meant to be seen and not heard.  Sarah becomes a real abolitionist near the end of the story as she leaves SC and moves to Philadelphia.  Hetty is freed by Sarah to run away when the chance arises.

3.The Martian by Andy Weir – once I heard that this was coming out as a movie this fall starring Matt Damon, I picked it up and I loved it.  The main character, Mark Watney, is stranded on Mars after his space mission is doomed by a massive dust storm, and he is separated from the rest of his crew as they leave the planet.  Everyone thinks he’s dead, but he is definitely alive and trying to find ways to survive on a planet that has no air, food, and freezing temperatures.  The story is part journal written by Watney as he struggles to survive, and the other part of the story is what is happening on Earth and in space to try and get Watney home once they discover he’s alive.  I really enjoyed this novel and I think you would too.

Your job: give me a description of a book / graphic novel / manga that you read this summer and really enjoyed.  If you’re having trouble picking one, describe a novel, etc. that you really liked that you’ve read within the past year.  Your answer should be a minimum of 250 words and is due BY CLASS on Friday, Sept. 18. 

Usually once a year, I check in to see what you guys and gals are reading for fun – outside of class / school.  My hope is that you are finding something to read, whether it be YA fiction, non fiction, manga, biographies, or other stuff.  Here’s a couple of things that I’ve read recently:

1. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel – This is a post-apocalyptic story that doesn’t really focus on the future, it focuses on the characters before the epidemic flu event that wipes out 99% of the population.  The book starts on a night in Toronto before the flu hit when a famous actor playing King Lear dies of a heart attack on stage in the fourth act.  The story follows one of the young actresses, Kirsten, who survives the flu.   Twenty years after the flu, she is part of a traveling symphony / actors’ guild that tours what’s left of Michigan along the coasts of Lakes Michigan and Huron.  But  the story also follows the famous actor and how he started out as a fledgling actor doing commercials then moving up to small roles in films.  It’s a really good story that is more of a grown up dystopian novel that doesn’t have a teenaged girl as its main protagonist (Hunger Games, Divergent).  There are several well-rounded characters who you end up caring about after the novel is done.

2. The Secret History of Wonder Woman by Jill Lepore. This is a strange story about the creator of WW, an experimental psychologist who also happened to be a huge feminist in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s.  William Marston met and married his high school sweetheart and both studied psychology in college.  His wife, Sadie, was a liberated woman of the time period who wanted everything, a career, family, and a husband, but didn’t want to sacrifice work in order to have children.  So, William and Sadie bring another woman into their marriage, Olive, who will raise their children but also be married to William too.  Between Sadie and Olive, William is the father of four kids and lives with two wives.  Out of this interesting mix, Marston goes on to create Wonder Woman who is a reflection of his two wives and also a reflection of suffrage literature.  The early WW, along with Batman and Superman, were the most popular comics in the 1930s and 40s until the backlash came out against comics in the 1950s.  Wonder Woman has been used as a feminist symbol since the late 1960s, especially when she appeared on the cover of the first issue of Ms. Magazine in 1972.  Until this book was put together by Lepore, the whole story of WW’s origins and her creator has never been completely told, especially because the Marston family had been uncomfortable with the arrangement of Sadie and Olive as wives of Dr. Marston.

Your job for this blog is discuss one book that you have read within the past year that you really enjoyed.  If you’d like, you can pick a book that you want to read and tell us why you want to read it.  Whatever option you choose, tell us how you first heard about the book, and why you liked it (or want to read it).  I’d prefer that you not use something that you’ve read for school, because I’m trying to promote outside school reading.

This is due by class, Thursday, January 8.  200 words minimum. 

Since we’re studying American writers from the turn of the century, I figured that now would be a good time to talk about stuff that we’re reading.  Your job is to share a book that you’re currently reading, have read recently, or plan to read soon.  Tell us why you picked it, and give us a brief summary of the book.  If you’re planning on reading a book, tell us more about why you want to read it / what you’ve heard about the book (essentially, what piqued your interest in it).   (The Jungle is NOT an option, but another book for another class is acceptable).

1. The Murder of the Century – Paul Collins — this book is a true story that reads like a quick crime novel.  Parts of a man’s body are found scattered around the New York City area, and this eventually leads to two suspects being tried for murder: the man’s mistress and the mistress’s new boyfriend.  The book goes into lots of detail about the competing New York tabloids, The Journal and the Herald, run by  Pulitzer and Hearst as they compete for readers w/ sensationalized headlines and gruesome stories.  It’s also the story of immigrants coming to America trying to find a better life but running afoul of the law.  Highly recommended. 

2. The Other Wes Moore – Wes Moore — a story of two young men named Wes Moore who both grew up blocks from each other in Baltimore in the 1970s and 80s.  Both lost their fathers at a young age.  One man was sent to military school when his mother wouldn’t put up with his skipping school and failing grades.  The other man got involved in the drug trade, especially crack as it became infamous in the 1980s.  He was involved in shooting an off-duty cop and is now serving life in prison.  The other Wes graduated from high school, went to college, became a Rhodes Scholar, and served in Afghanistan afterwards.  He regularly appears on MSNBC and is a child advocate.  The book came about because the soldier/college graduate wanted to find out more about his imprisoned namesake.  It’s a good book that explains the pressures of growing up a young, black male in today’s society. 

3.  Bertrand Russell in 90 Minutes – This is one in a series of books that helps someone learn more about philosophy in a short amount of time.  Bertrand Russell is an English philosopher who tried to show how math is logically sound in a book that took him ten years to write.  The problem was, about halfway through it, he discovered that math had a paradox within it that defied logic as he saw it.  So, he had to reclassify his illogical discovery and reconfigure his book.  Russell has written several books that I’ve read including The History of Western Philosophy, Why I Am Not a Christian, and The Problems with Philosophy.  While I was doing some research on Russell, I also discovered a graphic novel about him called Logocomix, so I’m going to be reading that book too as soon as I get it. 

You can list one, two or as many books as you want.  The word minimum is 200 words, so please have this done by Friday night at midnight (February 8. 2013).   Thanks.