Summer Reading Assingment

Entry four

 

I chose this book because my friend asked me to read this book with him. Therfore, I did not chose this book. However, I really liked this book because how author wrote the story was really good. This book drew my attetion because I know the author and I liked the settigs and how characters developed in the story was amazing.

 

 

The personal connection between me and the book is that Eric, who is the main character in the Chapter 1, and he forgets a lot. This is because  Tor gives a tea that makes Eric to forget everything. This connect me because I always forget everything. Like I forgot that I have to do a summer reading assingment and the school starts tomorrow.

 

 

I would recommend to this book to a people who has a time to read a book, because I think it was really nice book to read, and this book does not have a specific genre, so anyone can enjoy it. Although this book is not that long, it's about same pages compared with Harry Potter.  It only took me about 2 months to read it.


I really enjoyed reading this book, because how the author wrote the story was really great, also the how it is worded was really easy for me. 

Summer Reading Assingment

Entry Three

 

In my summer reading novel, which is "Midwinterblood" by Marcus Sedgwick, the section where intend of hooking the potential reader is at the last section of the chapter 1.

 

In the last section, the story ends with a lot of mysteries to know. Eric went to the church, where he saw the painting, and the citizens living in the island put him on the table. I think this is the point where is "hooking". The mysteries that are unsolven in chapter 1 are

• Who was Merle and Tor?
• What was the painting tat was coverred in the cloth which was in the church.
• Why did Tor gives tea to Eric so he will forget what happened to him.
• Who stole the One degree app?

 

I think chapter 1 is the "hooking" to a reader, because the reader wants to know the answers to thes questions, and try to solve it as they read. I think this is a technique that authors uses to make their book more intresting.  I know these answers because I finish the book. I think that these made me to read more and more.

 



Summer Reading Asignment 2

 

 

The main character, Eric Seven wants some information about the island. As the journalist, he is really curious about what he sees and thinks. The another character is Merle, who is the citizen in the island. I think she wants keep her secret so Eric will not notice. Lastly, Tor wants o keep secret of the island. He uses the tea which make Eric to forget things so he will not know the secret of the island.

 

 The theme of this book is "There are things that one should not have to know." I think of this, because Eric is in danger because he tries to figure out the secret of the island. I don't know what will happen in next chapter, but maybe this theme may help the story.

 

This book is constructed in ways that each chapter, and each chapter is at different time. In my guess, the main character will change in each chapter. Also the secrets in Chapter 1 will make sense as I read through the book. 



Summer Reading Assignment

 



I chose the book call "Midwinter Blood" by Marcus Sedgwick. This book is about the journey of Eric Seven, who is the journalist.

 The major character in this book is the main character, Eric Seven. Also there are characters like Merle and Tor, who are the citizens in the island.
 The stting of this book is different for each section of the book. Chapter 1 takes time at 2073, Chapter 2 is 2011, Chapter 3 is 1944, Chapter 4 is 1902, Chapter 5 is 1848, Chapter 6 is 10th century, and Chapter 7 is time unknown.
 The conflict of this book is Eric Seven and the citizens in island.

My prediction of this book is that as the chapter goes, it will go back time and explain what happened to Eric and the secret of the island. In the Chapter 1, I saw few key parts like " But he has not seen a single child" from page 18. As the story goes, maybe there will be answer for this question.
My connection to other works is the book call "Alex Rider Stormbreaker" The main charater go to somewere that are full of mystery and he tries to find the answers.

Grendel by John Gardner
Chapter 2 Part 2

 

Grendel wakes in the darkness to catch his first glimpse of men. Surprisingly, they speak Grendel’s own language, though it sounds strange. The men baffled as to what this strange creature in the oak tree might be. At first they think Grendel is a kind of fungus, but then they decide he must be a tree spirit.They further resolve that the spirit is hungry, that it eats pig, and that they must feed it. Grendel overjoyed at the prospect of the food, and he laughs out loud. The humans take this laugh a sign that the spirit is angry, and they starts to attack Grendel.Grendel tries to communicate with the humans, but they do not understand his words. As Grendel watches them plan their attack, he realizes that the humans are no dull-witted animals, but thinking, pattern-making beings, and therefore more dangerous than any creatures he has far encountered.Just as Grendel feels he will fall to the humans, his mother arrives to save him.

I really liked how John Gardner describes the mother. It saids "She came roaring down like thunder, screaming like a thousand  hurricanes, eyes as bright as dragonfire, and before she was within a mile of us, the creatures(humans) had leaped to their horses and galloped away." The similie it is used helps image the mother.

Grendel wakes up in his mother’s cave. He tries to share his revelation about the nature of existence with her, but she only stares blankly at him. Grendel becomes more and more agitated at his mother’s unresponsiveness, and she reacts by rushing to embrace her son. Grendel is sickened with fear, and feels he is suffocating in his mother’s mass.

Grendel by John Gardner
Ch.2 Part1

 

 

After reading chapter 1, Chapter 2 takes us an unspecified number of years into the past to tell the story of Grendel’s first exposure to the human world.

 

 

In his youth, Grendel explores his vast underground world with childlike abandon. He is always alone, as the only other creatures in the caverns, aside from his mother, are strange, unspeaking beings that watch Grendel’s every move but never interact with him. One night, Grendel arrives at a pool of firesnakes. He thinks that snakes are guarding something. After a moment of hesitation, he dives into the pool. When he breaks the surface of the water he finds himself, for the first time, in moonlight. Grendel did not go  further the first night, but as time passes he ventures farther and farther out into this strange new world.

 

One day, lured out to the upper world by the smell of a newborn calf, Grendel finds himself painfully trapped in a tree. He bellows for his mother, but she does not come. Then he saw black shaped bull appeared. Grendel’s screams, comes charging at him, its horns ripping Grendel’s leg up to the knee. Grendel realizes that the bull has struck too low and will always strike too low, the bull is a creature of blind instinct. Grendel knows that if he can twist his body away, he will be able to avoid the bull’s thrusts. This event caused him to know that world is nothing  but a chaotic mess of casual, brute violence. The bull continues to attack Grendel, but Grendel ceases to pay attention. Nothing seems to matter anymore, and eventually Grendel falls asleep...



Blog Assessment #1- English B                  Satoshi Matsutani

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1.       There are specific words /phrases demonstrate my voice, for example, “The first few pages of Grendel echo the beginning of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, a work that features one of the most famous openings in the English canon.” My goals over this trimester were become more fluent with English and try to tell new information that the reader did not know. So I always try to find new information and putting on the blog so reader can know same information. I think these words/phrases showcase my personality as a writer, because I love teaching people news or things that they may not know.

 

2.       For the diction, one example is “The ram’s stubborn stolidity reminds Grendel…” The word “stubborn” is elevated diction, because I could use words like “The ram did not move and not changed their attitude, and that reminds the Grendel…” I used word “stubborn” because it better explains HOW ram did not move. One example of the syntax is sentence length. I like using long sentences because by making sentence longer, there can be more information. Long sentences sometimes makes reader tired, therefore I uses commas to divide the sentence to make it easier to read.  

Ch.1 Beginning

 

The story begins with a monster, Grendel watches an old ram stand stupid and inert at the edge of a cliff.  Grendel yells at the creature, stamps his feet, and throws stones at it, but the ram refuses to so much as acknowledge Grendel’s presence. Grendel lets out a howl so terrible that it freezes the water at his feet, but the ram remains unmoved. The ram’s stubborn stolidity reminds Grendel that spring has arrived in a similarly undeniable fashion.

 

The first few pages of Grendel echo the beginning of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, a work that features one of the most famous openings in the English canon. I think the opening of the novel expresses the common tendency in postmodern fiction for a work to call attention to its own literariness, that is the fact that a novel is actually a novel, written and crafted by an author’s imagination as opposed to rising naturally out of the characters’ consciousness.

KRISTA: Locking into the magic of Legos

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/columnists/krista-ramsey/2014/02/15/krista-locking-into-the-magic-of-legos/5521245/

The summary- There is a LEGO store that small children are invited to construct a small, cleverly themed object.

"They're in a world beyond learning objectives and select soccer, safely out of reach of arranged play dates and online language programs. Legos let them claim the two things adults don't even realize they need: space and silence." I think this line is most important, because this line explains hoow LEGO help the small children. I really like how the author, Krista Ramsey's word choice. Thre is no syntax in this line.

How the Ramsey writes is really unique. She uses a lot of quotes from others, like in "For better vision, kids need time outdoors", there are 4 quotes that helps the column. Therefore I think Ramsey uses quotes to make her column more better.

My three questions are:
How do you get these ideas from?
Is there any idvice to write a great writing?
Why did you start writing a column?

Changing the book

I will not wite a blog about "Eagle Strike" anymore because I did not had a time to buy a book. Therefore I will choose a book that is at my house. It is a "Grendel" from John Gardner. I heard that this book is the first and most terrifying monster in English literature. I do not like a horror movie or a book. I will try to finish this book but maybe I will quit.

 

Grendel is a 1971 novel by American author John Gardner. It is in part a retelling of the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf from the perspective of the antagonist, Grendel. In the novel, Grendel is portrayed as an antihero. The novel deals with finding meaning in the world, the power of literature and myth, and the nature of good and evil. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grendel_(novel)

 

Prediction of "Eagle Strike" by Anthony Horowitz

 

I have not bought this book yet, so I will predict what will happen on this book. The story of Alex Rider series are kind of same in every series. Alex finds out something that he don't know, then he will talk to M16, they will fight and they will win. Yay!

 As I read the plot of wikipedia, this time, he will go to the South France and he will meets Yassen Gregovich,who killed his uncle. Alex will tell this to M16 and they will fight against Yassen. As overall, I am not so pumped up for reading this, but I have to read it for the grade. The 1st one and 2nd one of Alex Rider series was really good, also I watched the movie and it was uhmmm... Then I read 3rd one, which is Skelton Key, it was not so much intresting. I wish this book will be more intresting than Skelton Key.

The planning for the next book

I don't have a book yet, and I want to start a book call "Eagle Strike" from Alex Rider series. I have read 1st, 2nd and 3rd series when I was 7th grade and I haven't read the next one yet. When I was 7th grade, it was hard to read because of my English skill. Took me like 4-5months to read a book and it was painful. But now, maybe I can read more easier and quicker.

"Eagle Strike" is Anthony Horowitz's enormously popular series about the world’s premier teenage spy,  another round with secret agent Alex Rider fighting ingenious villains and charming every girl he meets. ( from Wikipedia)

Characterization in Fahrenheit 451: pages 1-40

As I read the Fahrenheit 451, there was a lot of description of Clarisse. Her face was slender and milk-white, the dark eyes were so fixed to the world, her dress was white. Also she talks a lot and there are really important quotes said by her like "But they all say the same things and nobody says anything different from anyone else." This quote really tells a lot. The most important quote said about her is "I'm seventeen and I'm crazy." This is what Clarisse said about her self and not other said about her, but this really tells about her.

Clarisse is a character that is so unique because usually people don't taste the rain, or rubbing a dandelion under the chin. I think what makes Clarisse differnt from many of the people in her society is her uniqueness, because she is antisocial. Maybe she became antisocial because she is afraid of children her age.

 

CP English Final Blog Reflections

 

Oh no.. I thought yesterday's post will be my final post, but I have to do it.

 

I really learned a lot of stuffs during this trimaster. By doing the blog, I could summarize what I have read each week and know more about it. I never done a blog before, so I was little bit afraid that what people thinks about my posts, and am I using correct grammar.  However, people commented my post about how they feels about what I'm reading, which is "their eyes were watching god" and I was really happy that someone viewed my post. ( I thought I will only have like 2-3 pageviews)

 

The main character, Janie is really hard to analyze, because she is woman and I am man, so I don't feel same as Janie. For example when she tries to be love with Joe, while Logan is buying mule for her, and I thought Logan is a really nice man. Maybe he abused the Janie, but I think he did not know how to communicate with Janie. Janie is a powerful woman who has a big dream, that being love with other. She did not match with Logan because she did not feel love from him, and I don't know about Joe, because I did not finish a book yet. However, I can know that she achieves a strong sense of self and comes to appreciate her independence.

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What I learned that reading a book , then summarizing it without using google was really hard. It tooked me several hours to think about it and maybe that's why I didn't finish the book. I think one main reason that it was hard to summarize was that the book, "their eyes were watching god" uses slung English that I have to say it to know what the word is. (For example,  "dey" means "they") This really killed me and maybe I chose wrong book, because  it is really hard.

 

 My goal of next trimaster is to finish "their eyes were watching god " and start a new book. My new book have to be more easier one because "their eyes were watching god" was pretty hard and I don't like reading slungs. What I'm thinking is maybe reading "Alex Rider series", because as I commenting to other blogs, there were a lot of people reading "Alex Rideer Series", also I have read 1st and 2nd.  Then I want to post more, because 1 post/week did not improve my English skill, so I want to read more, and post more! And those will be my goal for next trimaster and I hope I can acheive it.

 

 Thank you to all the people who visited to my blog and commented, because your comments really helped me, like what to fix or what was good. I'm really happy that doing this post may connect to other people. Thank you.

 

 

Overall?

I really enjoyed reading "their eyes were watching god". I didn't finish reading it, but I wanted to write a overall post about this trimaster, because I have some kind of test tommorow and I don't know if 9 posts are enough. If it is not enough, then I will write maybe 1 or more tommorow really quick, but if not, then I think this will be my write post. Yay!!

I did learn a lot of things while doing this posts, like uhmmmm..... ..

Therefore I learned a lot of things, and I am proud. YAY!!!!!

Summary of Chapter 4

"their eyes were watching god" By Zora Neale Hurston

 Logan pampers Janie less and tries to get her to perform manual labor, claiming that she is spoiled.  One day that Logan leaves to buy a second mule for the Janie so that Janie can help him work in the fields.
 While Logan is getting the mule, Janie spies a good-looking, sharply dressed stranger ambling down the road. His name is Joe Stalks, he is from Georgia, that he has saved up a lot of money, and that he has come down to Florida to move to a new town that is being built and run by blacks. They get each other and they will meet everyday.
 He dazzles her with his big dreams, and Janie’s hopes for love come alive again. Finally, after about two weeks of clandestine flirtation, he says that he wants her to leave Logan and marry him.

Text to text connections or discuss new ideas of "their eyes were watching god" and "1900's Black American South"

http://dmckenn2.umwblogs.org/the-color-purple/page-5/


This article(?) is about how black women treated in mid 1900's. I think this article is related to my book which is "their eyes were watching god" because the book is about 1900's black woman.
In the article, it saids that "Legally, black women had no voice in legal matters and any abuse they faced would not be entertained by the courts.  So, they only way to deal with abusive issues was to survive them the best way they could, be it by submission..."
 This quote is important because in the story, Janie had no voice to the Logan and she got abused by him if she did not obey. Wow...
 If you have time, you should read this article because there are things that are important!

The Summary of Chapter 3 "their eyes were watching god"


The chapter 3 begins with Janie questioning about whether or not marriage brings love. Then Nanny tells Janie that she will definetly love Logan after she marries with him. So Janie consents to marrying Logan and becoming the mistress of sixty acres of land.

 

 

 When Janie reaches Logan’s house, she finds that it’s a pretty lonely, boring place off in the middle of nowhere. She waited three months for the love. But the love did nit come. She visits Nanny to ask for the advice. She told her that the best thing to do is wait. 

 A month later, nanny dies. A year passes, and Janie still feels no love for Logan and becomes even more disillusioned.

Research about Zora Neale Hurston

I did research about the author of "their eyes were watching god", Zora Neale Hurston, because I wanted to know what she did, and why she wrote this book.

Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist, anthropologist, and author. She was born in Notasulga, Alabama, Jan.7 1891. She was the fifth of eight children of John Hurston and Lucy Ann Hurston . Her father was a Baptist preacher, tenant farmer, and carpenter, and her mother was a school teacher.                                                               She was a Republican who was generally sympathetic to the foreign policy non-interventionism of the Old Right and a fan of Booker T. Washington's self-help politics. People say " Zora Neale Hurston is considered one of the pre-eminent writers of twentieth-century African-American literature."(http://zoranealehurston.com/ ) Hurston supported the presidential campaign of Senator Robert A. Taft. Like Taft, Hurston was against Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal policies. She also shared his opposition to Roosevelt and Truman's interventionist foreign policy. She wrote "their eyes were watching god"  during her fieldwork in Haiti. And her writings show an affinity for feminist individualism.                                Now I know what she did for the politics and why she wrote this book.          

 

 

The most important line from a chapter is on page 14, it says ".....Honey, de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able tuh find out" This sentence is really important because then this shows that white men is more powrful and the black people can't fight back against them. Then we can know that this is around 1900. These one sentance can make image of when this event ocurrs.