Book 3 Review

Catching Fire Book Review

I am going to be telling you about catching fire today. Catching fire is about a girl named Katniss Everdeen and her struggles with the capital after what she did at the end of the 74^th hunger games (which was the last hunger games.) She has to act like she loves petta even though she really likes her “cousin” Gale. So now when Katniss and petta are on their tour to ever district they have to convince everybody that they are really in love. But on the tour they realize something is wrong. Most of the districts start to rebel and now president snow is really made so he punishes Katniss and petta but you will have to read the book to find out what their punishment is. I had never heard of the author Suzanne Collins before the Hunger Games Series. Some other good books that she also wrote are The Underland Chronicles, When Charlie Mcbutton Lost Power, and The Mystery Files of Shelby Woo series. .

            The hunger games books where the best books I have ever read. In fact they were so good that all of them are being made into movies. Catching fire is being made into a movie right now. At the end of every chapter in Catching fire you are left with an action pact cliff hanger. I liked how she split each book into three sections. The first one is normally life before the games, the second one is getting ready for the games, and the third one is the games and after the games. The third part is the best part of the book because it has most of the action and drama of the book (mainly action.) If the books were not broken up into parts I probably would not have read them, because the first part of the book was really slow and boring and I was going to quit reading it after the first sixty pages but then I saw the titles of the other parts and I knew that it was going to get more interesting.

            I am going to tell you two different themes from the book. In this book there are so many things that are wrong with the society like war, starvation, poverty, and violence. So the first theme is telling us about many things that go wrong or are going wrong in society. The second them would be that even when you don’t think anyone is watching you there always is.  Because when Katniss and gale have their first kiss ever at the beginning of the book there is nobody around. But the next day when Katniss gets a visit from president snow because he was telling her about how he doesn’t believe that she and petta love each other. So on his way out he turns and looks at Katniss and says “by the way, I know about the kiss” (page 29 catching fire.) but how would he know… it was in the middle of the night and nobody was around.

            In this book there are three or four main characters. Katniss who is the only girl from district twelve to win the games, also she come from a very poor family whose mother is a doctor and her father died in a mine explosion. Peeta who come from a family that is wealthy because they are bakers, but in the first book he goes into the games with Katniss and falls in love with her. Gale who also comes from a poor family with a single mother because gales dad died in the same mine explosion as Katniss’s. But the two families are friends. This is who Katniss really loves and gale and Katniss go hunting illegally every Sunday morning, and gale supplies his and Katniss’s family with food when Katniss and Peeta are in the games.

            The strengths of this novel are it is action pact; some of this could really happen, all of the cliff hangers, just the way Suzanne Collins writes it you never want to put it down. And there is only two weakness to the book and that is most of part one. This is true because the first part is very slow and I just didn’t enjoy too much of it. The second weakness to the book is that it ends. I wish the book was an infinity amount of pages.     

            If I had to rate this book I would give it 4.9 stars out of 5 stars. I would give it this because the first part was really slow but the rest of the book was amazing and it made up for all of the slow parts of the book. I think that this book is the best book that has ever been written. I think that they should teach the hunger games series in every school across the globe.

 

Top 5 presentation

Truth in Memoir

•             How true does a book have to be in your mind to be considered non-fiction?   Why?

I think that a non-fiction book has to be at least 90 percent true to be labeled as a non-fiction book. I think this because; it doesn’t really matter if the author expands the truth just a little bit because he is still telling most of the truth. Like with the book a million little pieces. He said that just 18 pages were over exaggerated, which is equivalent to 5 percent of his book so 95 percent of his book is still true. Also if you like a book and find out that it isn’t true I don’t think you will care much because it was still a good book.

•             Are half-truths okay if it’s still a good story? Does it matter if Frey or Mortenson bent the truth to tell their stories?

I think that half-truths are ok but only if it is a good story. Because I don’t think anyone wants to read a book that is a bunch of way over the top lies and the book isn’t even well written.

•             Is David Shields right?  Do we need lines between genres—do we need to label something fiction or non-fiction?  Why does it matter?

I think that David Shields is right. I think this because it doesn’t really matter what the genre of the book is, it matters if it is a good book and people read it. Also it doesn’t matter because if a person likes a book that is labeled fiction, it would still be the same book if it was labeled non-fiction. I don’t really care what the genre of a book is, I don’t look for certain books that are in certain sections of the library.

Readicide

Who gets to decide what good writing is?  Who should decide?  Why?

The teachers get to decide what books the kids read in school. I think that this is dumb because the books we read are books that adults like, not books that teenagers like. I think that the kids should take a class vote on what book they read and the teacher should have to read it to. Because the teachers don’t read the old bad books every time that they are assigning to the students, and we have to read and get tested on and have to take notes on every chapter, so even if it is a good book you don’t stay in the flow of reading because for every important part in the book you have to stop copy down a quote and then write down the page and stick the post it note in it. I think that the student should get to choose the books because the teachers don’t know what books we like so we end up reading books that are really bad and it makes reading not any fun so you don’t really want/ like reading anymore. In class there has not been a single book that we have read and I actually like.

•             What should a 21st century English class reading list look like?

I think that a 21^st century English class should have some books like the hunger games, or twilight that they don’t need to take notes on and don’t have test. But then one or 2 books that the teachers choose that are old classics that you have to take notes on and have tests on.  I think this because kids need to enjoy some reading but they also need to know what the writing was like back then, and the teachers do need to know if you are reading or if you aren’t.

Moneyball trailer

Adaptations to Moneyball

I think that they should show when they are first looking at Billy Beane, because it is a book about statistics and when they go and see him he strikes out and he slams his bat against the walls and benches and bends his bat then when he gets up again he uses the bent bat. This part should be in the movie because the book is just stats so some action would make it better. Another part that should be in the movie is when he is at the signing with his parents and then they can’t decide if they want him to go to college or if he should go straight to the MLB, so the scout tells him to think about it and they went home and his dad said lets arm wrestle. So they arm wrestle and Billy wins, then his dad says if you can beat your old man at arm wrestling then you can make your own decisions. This should be in the movie because it is the biggest decision he has made in life so far and he ends up deciding to turn down his full ride in football and baseball to Stanford and play in the minors which was the biggest mistake he has made. They should also keep the part in the book where Billy decides that he is going to quit the team and be a scout. This is important because Billy notices that he isn’t doing anywhere in his career in baseball so he just retires. And since he retired his wife left him because they couldn’t stand being around each other. I think that if you wanted to make the book a better movie you should take out some of the stats and have there be more baseball games that you are watching as Billy goes from game to game. I think that they should also cut the injury he has right when he is being traded because it would be pointless because the whole book is about him.

Book One Project

The book I read was The Hunger Games. I only read the book because people have been talking about it and saying how good it was, so I decided to see if it was as good as the people were saying. I think that the book was even better than I heard it was. It was the best book I have ever read.  At the beginning of the book it was kind of boring but when it hit part two it became a whole different book. The Hunger Games would keep you interested the whole time and make you want to keep reading.

I think that the hunger games should be turned into a video game. At the beginning of the game you will appear in training but you only can show one of your skills so you have to do something to impress the game makers like what Katniss “without think, I pull an arrow from my quiver and send it straight at the gamesmakers’s table. I hear shouts of alarm as people stumble back. The arrow skewers the apple in the pig’s mouth and pins it to the wall behind it” page 102. Also in the game you would be able to pick from any of the people that are in the games but you could also choose primrose and gale. Also you can choose which year of the hunger games you want to play and you can choose any of the battle fields they have played in. The players will have special moves if you get the weapon or the skill that the player you chose does the best with. Like Peeta and his camouflage. “Peeta? I whisper. Where are you? There’s no answer. Could I just have imagined? No, I’m certain it was real and really close at hand, too. I creep along the bank. Well, don’t step on me. I jump back; his voice was right under my feet.” Page 252.And going back to the game if you win the hunger games you get paid $20,000.00 and with the money you get from winning you can upgrade your character or even when you are in battle you can buy the weapon your character is good with and have it dropped down onto the playing field. I came up with getting money because it says in the book who ever wins moves into one of the huge house that were made for the winners of the games and also you win tons of money. But in the game the weapons are more advanced, there are all types of guns flame throwers and even grenades. But to get to these weapons you need to get a shovel that comes in one of the twenty-four bags and you need to find a special spot in the arena and dig deep down and then you will get to a locker and you have to use one of the knives you get in your pack and pick the lock. Also when you upgrade your player you can make it so he is good with every weapon so that no matter what weapon you get you will have a special move. But you can even design your own character our save a picture of yourself on your game system and it will even make you a character and you can play as yourself. I think that this idea would work because since the hunger game has been in the theaters it has made around 215 million dollars. Also it could help you understand the book a little better because you will know what all of the characters look like and you will also know what the area they are playing on looks like. Because when I was reading it I imagined it a lot different than it really was. This game will give the book more attention because most people love to play video games and if you are playing the game you will probably want to see what the book is like and you will read the first one and then get hooked to the rest of the hunger game books. Also the game will make a lot of money because all of the people who are hunger game fanatics will buy it and even people who like killing games will like it to.