nostalginaut's reviews
646 reviews

Yet another "at long last."

I'd read countless interpretations of this novel ranging from hokey, high-falutin analogies to human nature and violence to half-baked theories about societal decline and contemporary reality television, and I think that - as with so many other novels - is what turned me away from reading it for so long in the first place. A few years ago, I caught a seventh-grader reading (and enjoying) it, and asked what she liked about it so far, and she'd mentioned a few things about how she thought the language was (in so many words, as best I can recall) both "pretty" and "confusing." That same year, the book was passed over for a ninth-grade reading unit on account of the language being a possible difficulty for some students and, knowing what I did about it already and having just read The Hunger Games, I suggested the more contemporary choice as an alternative.

Lovers of books like The Hunger Games and Battle Royale will readily find parallels between those novels and Lord of the Flies, too. I don't think it matters which was or was not inspired by Lord of the Flies (Battle Royale fans still consider The Hunger Games a rip-off, despite Collins never having read it at the time), but I think it's important to recognize each book as representing different themes. Lord of the Flies is a wonderful take on the violence of human nature and, for lack of a better term, "child's play gone wrong" (which, if you dig deep, could really be seen as one and the same), while the modern choices are rife with coming-of-age, rebellion, and oppression. There are plenty of similarities among the smaller bits of each story, but they each paint a much different "big picture", and I'm a little bit sorry I didn't want to see that a little bit sooner than I did, when I finally decided to finish this book.

It's a pretty quick read, if you want it to be, but there's plenty to stop and think about, all the same. Just don't go into the book with everybody else's ideas fresh in your mind. (Unless that's your thing.)

This was a pretty neat little read. While there were a few footnotes, here and there, there wasn't a whole lot of context to the legends provided, so more than a few left me wondering things like, "what sort of story is this?"

A few of the stories read more like familiar fables, with morals (more-or-less) at the end, though some more implicit than others. I especially enjoyed the "Proverbs" section, and might try to incorporate one or two into my own repertoire (you know, for fun, right?).

(NOTE: I read the Kindle version; typos and formatting issues abound, if that sort of thing bothers you.)

I haven't read anything by John Green in a long time, though I've followed him pretty faithfully on the...um...blogosphere. You know, like, elsewhere on the internet.

I have always loved the voice and both the outward and underlying humor of Green's writing. It helps them to really "jump out" as page-turners, and the inner monologues of his protagonists - imbued with this same sort of humor - help us to grasp the more intricate philosophies of the characters.

This is perhaps especially true with The Fault in Our Stars, and its interesting take on a different sort of suffering than most young adult audiences are used to with teenage characters. Very highly recommended.

Abolish the musical vision of this story!

...all right, maybe not entirely, but I think that popular idea of the story undermines its realization as a "modern fairy tale". A quick read, and definitely a fun one if you're interested in re-imagining the favorite movie in a bit more of a mythological context.

I spent weeks looking for quality contemporary poetry for children that was both appealing and appropriate; many childrens' collections and anthologies I encountered contained a lot of "classic" poetry that - while certainly of good quality - became difficult to read and explain to young students considering their often-dated language and cumbersome turns of phrase. "Poetry should be felt, not simply heard," I'd thought, but this is lost on many children who are still acquiring an understanding of the English language and may not be able to take any significant meaning away from the works of Crane and Dickinson. This was also where I had gone wrong; poetry can of course not even be "heard" by anyone silently scanning the page to themselves, be it in a classroom or at home or anywhere. It's difficult to "feel" poetry, too, when it's simply just read to you. This is about when I began paying mind to books like this one.

Hip Hop Speaks to Children is a collection of performance poetry by Nikki Giovanni and others, including popular artists like Mos Def, Queen Latifah, and Kanye West (don't worry, it's squeaky-clean). Following my flop reading selected poems by Stephen Crane to grade-schoolers one week, I brought in Hip Hop Speaks to Children and "rapped" to the kids about stories and concepts they could understand and relate to - from being creative to being alone to standing up for what you believe in. Granted, you won't encounter the beautiful word-weaving of many classic poets, but that's the point - Hip Hop Speaks to Children's wide range of appeal and easy-to-access language enables listeners to really start "feeling" poetry, and - if the presenter is brave enough (if not, an audio CD of many of the original artists performing their works - some with music - is included) - for the performer to feel it, too. Hip Hop Speaks to Children is good, clean fun with a purpose.