Summer Reading Assignment Four

The Book Thief was a book that popped to me. It was a book that took place during the WW2 time period, but showed how daily lives were impacted rather than that of a soldier as most other WW2 books do. This point of view interested me because we have all heard the war stories told by soldiers who come back from large operations, but we never hear the bystanders point of view. I usually like to read about stories from WW2, so this one stood out because of its unexpected and under used point of view. Some connections I can make to the book, include my knowledge about  WW2 and what was happening in Germany and other countries. I also saw a personality connection in the hardheadedness of the Protagonist, Liesel Meminger. Another connection I could make was a text to text involving the books Saving Zasha and Finding Zasha, both from a civilian point of view, but with a very different point of view ( in finding Zasha the boy is joining the rebels and in saving Zasha the boy is hiding a German shepherd from his Russian village). I would recommend this book to any WW2 enthusiast or anyone who wants to read a tale about WW2. I would also recommend this book to anyone who would like to see WW2 from a civilian point of view instead of the soldiers.

Summer Reading Entry Three

The quote that I found to be a good hooker in The Book Thief comes fairly early in the book. The quote sets up some interesting ideas for the reader to ponder and play with for predictions and foreshadowing. "Eventually, Liesel Meminger walked gingerly inside. Hans Hubermann had her by one hand. Her small suitcase had her by the other. Buried beneath the folded layer of clothes in that suitcase was a small black book, which, for all we know , a fourteen-year-old grave digger in a nameless town had probably spent the last few hours looking for. "I promise you," I imagine him saying to his boss, " I have no idea what happened to it. I've looked everywhere. Everywhere!" I'm sure he would never have suspected the girl, and yet, there it was-a black book with silver words written against the ceiling of her clothes: The book thief had struck for the first time- the beginning of an illustrious career." - Markus Zusak. The context of the book at this time allows this to hook the reader, because we know it is narrated from a third person view ( by who we can predict is death, given how he describes himself). The quote hooks the reader because it entices them to find out what other books she will steal, and what do each of them mean. Are they for fun?Money?Knowledge? The reader must find out by reading more after this hooker.

Summer Reading Entry 2

The characters in The Book Thief are extremely diverse an intricate. Each of the main characters has a personality that they don't waver from. Rosa Hubbermann is seen as ignorant and holding too much self pride to see the world around her.She has not an will not show any sort of change in heart during the course of the book. Hans Hubbermann is the complete opposite of Rosa and will go out of his way to make someone's day, even if it means ruining his own. Liesel is very torn up inside because of the quick loss of her father, brother and being taken away from her mother, but it appears as though she might change later on in the book. She desperately clings to a small black book that she found lying in the snow the night her brother was buried. It is the only memories she has of her brother and the last time she saw her mother. Some themes that are beginning to appear are the thoughts of lose and suffering. Liesel is consistently tortured by nightmares of her mother and brother. She also has to cope with their lose and her new foster parents ( mostly Rosa, but Hans might be an unlikely suspect later on). Rosa seems to be one of the main sources of suffering for Liesel because she uses her most of the time to take care of herself, instead of thinking what is best for Liesel. The book is structured a little abnormally. The narrator is death, and what he sees though his eye looking into Liesel's world. There are small interventions when needed for clarifications and some of the dialogs is translated from German to English, with the German coming first and the English repeated right afterwards.

Our favorate narriator!

Summer Reading Entry One

For my summer reading project I am reading The Book Thief by the author Markus Zusak. It is about the story of a girl named Liesel Meminger, who had her family ripped from her at a young age. She was moved into the care of her new foster parents, Hans Hubbermann and Rosa Hubbermann. Hans Hubbermann is an extremely kind fellow who would go out of his way to make another persons day. He is a painter and plays the piano accordion in the local inns and bars around town in the winter to supplement income over the winter. Rosa Hubbermann is the poler opposite of her husband, being mean and shrude towards almost anyone she meets. She believes the world revolves around her and that she is privileged. Some other characters include the residents of Himmel Street. The book describes them as such, " Rudy Steiner- The boy next door who was obsessed with the black American athlete Jesse Owens.Frau Diller - the staunch Aryan corner-shop owner.Tommy Müller - a kid whose chronic ear infections had resulted in several operations, a pink river of skin painted across his face, and a tendency to twitch.A man known primarily as "Pfiffikus" - whose vulgarity made Rosa Hubbermann look like a wordsmith and a saint." - Markus Zusak.
The setting of The Book Thief is the rise and fall of Hitler (1933-1945) and is located in a small town near Münich. It is a very dark setting, seeing how Liesel is torn away from her family and put with a foster family that makes her life a misery. My predictions for the book are that Liesel will start to buck up against Rosa and that both Hans and Rosa will be drafted into the war( this was hinted to in a earlier quote in the book). There has been a movie made about this book, but I have not seen it., although I can see the connections an thought that went into including the characters into 1930's-40's Germany as Liesel is placed into the Hitler Youth program.

most important line in chapter 1 of Crocidile Tears

The most important line in the first chapter of Crocidile Tears was on page 15. The line was "Of course,if the disaster had been any greater,they would have raised much, much more," (Horowitz 15). This line was the most important because it set the tone for the book. You can now tell what the antaginists will do toe gain money and power in the book. It also gives a literal sence to the books title "Crocidlie Tears". The meaning of crocidile tears is the belife that crocidiles will cry fake tears to lure in their prey, and then cry actuall tears as the kill and eat them. The meaning of this term matches up because the British Red Cross used a nuclear meltdown in India as an excuse to get money.

Crocodile tears

I chose Crocodile tears to be my next book because it is part a series i used to read, The Alex Rider series. The Alex Rider series follows a 14 year old boy named Alex Rider, who is brought into a wourld of spyies because of his uncles death. The meaning of Crocodile tears closely relates to the first scene. The deffinition is "mid 16th cent.: said to be so named from a belief that crocodiles wept while devouring or luring their prey". This corrilats closely with the bigining because some guys set up a worker at a nuclear plant to set off a bomb and cause a mealt down. They then used this to say that the " British Red Cross" was going to give relive to the people in the area. They ended up raising 2 million dollers and never sent the relife they were soposed to. 

Visual Guide to Lock Picking

The book Visual Guide to Lock Picking, is exactly what it sounds like. It teaches you the inner workings of locks and how to pick them. The book covers a wide variady of locks, some of wich been around for centeries. I decided to pick up this book because i looked into the art of lock picking and it intreaged me, so i looked further into it. The book has allowed me to have a deeper understanding of the inner workings of locks and look at how they work. This gives me the knolage i need to know how to bypass a lock if i ever need to.