Term 2 litsperation challenge

Letter to the author

Dear Jeanne DuPrau,                              

My name is Matt and I have just recently finished reading your amazing creation, The City of Ember. I found the book to start off a little slow as I was hoping for more action and excitement, but I loved how you used so much description and characterization throughout the whole book.  The most exciting part of the book for me was when Doon and Lina found the room full of all the candles and boats in chapter 17/18.  At that moment I just got so much more into the book I stayed up all night to finish it.  Unlike other books, The City of Ember had many different climax points and I enjoyed that a lot. But on another note you much be a very creative person because in the book there are so many cool things that you made up around the city for example, all the jobs that the kids get was just such a creative thing and it astonished me. I also really enjoyed the antagonist of the book, the mayor.  When I read the part where Doon finds the mayor sitting in that room with all the resources it was very surprising to me. I really enjoyed reading this book and I can’t wait to start the next of the series.

Yours truly,

Matt

                                                                                                             

The Maze Runner Term 2- Review 2

Maze Runner

For my second report I chose to do The Maze Runner by James Dashner, and Cole reviewed this last term.  Cole, in your report you say that the author always described things in great detail and I totally agree with you on that.  Every page there was a significant amount of detail that just flew at me. You also say that you were always trying to think ahead in the book and still got surprised at what happened.  I have to say that this book was very unpredictable and I agree with you there. I also felt that the book was a rollercoaster of emotions and I to found myself reading it for hours on end.  You say that when reading it you felt it was missing something like more character personalities.  I also do feel that way; I found that the author could have gave the characters more personality as most of them are static characters.

I chose to read this book because I heard that there was a lot of action and mystery in it and those are the kind of books I generally read.  I would say the antagonists are the creators because they created the maze and there trying to stop the kids from getting out, and the protagonist would be Thomas because he is trying to find a way out and save everyone from the glade.  The glade is the type of setting where you don’t really know where they are because the author doesn’t give much detail on the glade other then that its surrounded by huge walls.  But I think that the time period of the book would more in the future but you also don’t get much on that because all the kids in the glade don’t remember anything.  Overall this was an exciting thriller with twists on every page and I can’t wait to read the sequel.

The City of Ember Term 2- Review 1

City of Ember

For my reading challenge I choose to read the book City of Ember.  In the first term Anthony did a review on this book.  Anthony, in your review you say that in the book the author gave away to many things, and I totally 100% agree with you there.  The main character every chapter talks about a door opening and a staircase to a new world and that is what basically happens in the end, and to add on to that I would say the rest of the book was pretty easy to predict what would happen next. You also mention that you would rate the book 4/5 stars and I have to disagree with you on that.  I found the book rather slow and boring up until chapter 18/19 where I felt it started to get more exciting and interesting and then towards the very end it got back to that boring predictable book. I would rate this 2/5.  You talk about how you think the author wrote this book based off of the idea of non-reusable resources and how without them it would be a hard life, and I have to agree with you there. The author when writing this book probably had that idea in mind.  You also say that you found the book interesting because of the way the characters developed and I also agree with you there. The book would have been a lot worse if the author did not use so much descriptive characterization.

 I choose this book because it seemed mysterious and intriguing and I like those kinds of books.  In the story the 2 main characters are Doon and Lina, I would have to say that they are the protagonists of the story and the Mayor is the antagonist because he is going against their plans to save the city.  Doon and Lina are the protagonist of the story but they were kind of undeveloped characters. I really would have liked better detail and more excitement to happen with them and not just as an individual character.  The Mayor was a great choice for the antagonist in this book because he was greedy and didn’t want to help the other people.  One stock character I want to point out is Poppy, Linas little sister. Although Poppy was a stock character they used her a lot in the book to create drama and that really made it more exciting.  A dynamic character in the book would be Linas best friend.  At the start she is all excited and happy and towards the end, she is mad and keeping secret and I think that character made a great addition to the book. The time period of this book seems like it is in the 1950’s because they don’t talk about video games and all that but they do have electricity.  When reading the book I found it started a little slow then hit many climaxes, like for instance, when they discover the instructions, when they discover the boats and candles, and the ending were all points in the book where a climax hit. Then there was a lot of rising and falling action throughout the rest.  Overall I found the book kind of slow and boring and probably wont read the next in the series.