The Girl in the Gatehouse (p 1-83) (p84-128)

The Girl in the Gatehouse begins with the main character, Mariah Aubrey, leaving her house in a carriage with her former nanny, Susan Dixen, to her aunt's house. She must leave behind her family and go live in a gatehouse for a reason that is not yet revealed. Her aunt does not come to greet her and Mariah is hurt. Her aunt's caretakers help her unpack and that is where I left off.

I made a text to text connection. This book reminds me of Narnia: The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe as the four children had to leave their home and go somewhere strange in the beginning as well.



PART TWO:

The caretakers have finished unpacking and the chapter ends. The next chapter goes a couple months ahead. Her aunt is getting sick and wants to see Mariah. Mariah goes up to her aunt's house and a key is given to her for a chest that she is not to open until her aunt is dead. Then Mariah meets her 'cousin' who she instantly hates.

I made a text to text connection. In the last Narnia book, the four children hate their cousin as well.

The Coldest Girl in Coldtown (p325-396)

Tana has been bitten by a vampire and tore another's throat out and drank his blood. Then she was taken to discuss plans to destroy the Spider, one of her friend's greatest enemies. She later finds out that the people who were 'taking care of her' were planning to betray her friend and she killed them all after nearly losing her own life. She then finds out that her little sister has arrived in Coldtown and she must find her before another vampire does. Tana herself only needs to drink the blood of a human to become a vampire.

Text to text connection: I made this connection because this book is a lot like the Immortal Rules. Vampires live in special places and are constantly hunted. The main character also faces many dangers and dilemas.

Hollow City (p. 1-69)

At the beginning of Hollow City, Jacob is rowing with all the peculiar children to a small little island and is hunted by wights. Only he alone can sense when they're near and see them. They reach the island after barely surviving a horrible storm and are soon found. They run for lives and one of the children starts screaming and crying. One of the peculiars must read her a story that turns out to be true. I ended where they all climbed into a giant slingshot.

I made a text to world connection. Sometimes stories do come true.

Ending of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

I liked the way the author wrote this book. It was very easy to understand and I followed along quite well. The only problem I had was when it suddenly went to a memory with no warning and you sort of had to figure it out for yourself.

My reaction to the end of the book was immediate sadness. Bruno ended up dying and it took forever for his family to figure out what had happened to him. I was also angry that yet another book ended with the main character's death.

Being naive can be a good thing, but it can also be a terrible burden. Being naive means you don't understand what's going on around you, therefor you can't be troubled by it. Then again, being naive could be the cause of your death, as it was for Bruno.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

PART 1: Harry doesn't think anybody will ever like him, especially his aunt and uncle, until the day Hagrid arrives and tells him that he's a wizard. Harry starts a fabulous quest to reach his full potential at Hogwarts and meets new friends, Ron and Hermoine. The three of them face many challenges together. Harry also meets Draco Malfoy, one of his new enemies. Harry may be famous, but can he pass the challenges of Hogwarts?


I connected this book to The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. Katniss was famous but she had to go on and face the arena all over again. If she lost, her name would go down in history but district 12 would be looked down on again. If she won, she would be a hero to many.


PART 2: Harry is having a great time at Hogwarts and even got accepted onto the Quiddatch team, the first first-year in a long time. He wins 2 matches for his team and then finds out that Snape, the only teacher who seems to hate Harry with a passion, is planning to steal the Sorcerer's Stone. Harry goes to stop him but gets caught and has to go into the forest with Hagrid, his friends, and Draco and he finds a dead unicorn and a figure drinking it's blood.

I connected this to Maximum Ride books. Max was hated by the Erasers and had to fight them, then found out that one was her brother and they had to work together. Harry and Draco, sworn enemies, were forced to work together which was torture for them both.

Chapters 16&17

Grandmother died. This impacts Father only a little bit. He's sad but he doesn't want to quit his job. He doesn't quit because he's proud of the work he's doing for the Fatherland.

Medicinal sherries are alcoholic beverages. Mother uses them because she doesn't like Father's job and is unhappy. She needs fewer now because of Kurt.

Lt. Kotler was sent away because of the dinner discussion.

She would hate them. I know this because she disagreed with Father's job and the idea of killing Jews.

She gets rid of her dolls! "In their place she had hung up maps of Europe that Father had given her, and every day she put little pins into them and moved the pins around constantly after consulting the daily newspaper."

They have touched for the first time which means they don't think of each other as enemies and are planning to stick together.

They seem to be getting into more and more arguments and are getting father apart.

Bruno only looks alike in the way that they both are bald at this point. Otherwise he was completely wrong. He's fatter and healthier while Schmuel is weak and thin.

In 17, everybody is leaving but Father. This causes problems for Schmuel and Bruno. Bruno may decide to sneak over to Schmuels side which could cause him to get into serious trouble or even bring his death.

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas Chapter 13

Bruno doesn't understand that he can't be beaten because he isn't a Jew, he doesn't understand how big Poland is, and he doesn't understand that there's no possible way that Pavel and Schmuel could know each other when there are thousands of people on his side of the fence. 

During dinner, Pavel was getting weaker and weaker and he went to open a bottle of wine for Pavel. He poured Bruno's father a glass and went to pour Kotler one when he spilled it. It landed on Kotler and Kotler beat him with everyone watching. 

I can infer that Kotler doesn't have much in common with his father and he's going against his father's wishes. I can also infer that Kotler will get into a lot of trouble because of his father. He chose to beat Pavel because he was angry at the way the dinner conversation had gone and wanted to take his anger out on someone he could actually hit. 

Virals (Chapters 1-7 then 7-11)

In the beginning, there's a new girl in town who's father is a scientist. He goes to work at the lab when an experiment goes wrong, affecting all the kids in the town. There are only about four others beside his daughter. They all start changing. The parents don't figure it out right away, but the kids are freaking out.

I learned the term abhor. Abhor means to hate or detest. In my book, the kids of the tiny island all abhor the scientists because they experiment on helpless animals.



At the start of chapter 7, the kids are just beginning to figure out what happened to them. As the book goes on, they find out that they're turning into werewolves. They discuss how to use their powers to get revenge on the scientists and free the poor animals. The scientists figure out that the kids somehow were affected.

I learned the term amiable. Amiable means friendly. The kids are amiable werewolves and only want to help the animals that have been experimented on.

Chapter 12

Schmuel does give a correct answer for a boy his age, but if he had been older, vital pieces of information are missing. I know this because he refuses to talk about some bits of his travel to Auschwitz with Bruno. The Nazi's took all the Jews out of their houses and moved them from camp to camp, kidnapping or killing those who hid. They are currently starving the Jews at Auschwitz and they determined who were Jews by the armbands everyone had to wear. On Schmuel's side of the fence, they're all working and not eating.



     

The reason the Nazi's chose the first symbol is because many other cultures wore it and it meant to be good. Hitler, believing his actions were pure, thought it would be the perfect symbol. Before Hitler used it, it was connected to good things.
(About.com)

The Jewish had to use the second symbol as means of identification. They were made to humiliate the Jews and mark them for segregation.
(British Library)

Chapter 11

"Two people stood outside: a rather small man and a taller woman."  Bruno refers to Hitler as small and the woman who accompanied him tall. Hitler, at 5'8'', normally wouldn't be considered short. The woman who accompanied him was only 5'4'' but carries herself well so she would seem a bit taller to a nine year old boy. He was also shorter than Bruno's father.
(Found at google)

"She had blonde hair and very red lips..." At this point, Bruno is talking about Hitler's wife. Pictures show she was strawberry blonde and her lips were very red.
(Pictures)

"He had dark hair, which was cut quite short, and a tiny moustache..." Bruno refers to Hitler's little stache here. Bruno thinks it's too short to be bothered with. Even thinks he missed a spot while shaving. Although it was small, it wasn't small enough to be a spot missed while shaving. His hair was dark and short, more of a brown and modern.
(Pictures)