The Things They Carried

O'Brien, Tim.  The Things They Carried.  New York:  Broadway Books, 1998. ISBN: 0767902890. PBK. $ 14.95. 

Awards:

France’s Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger

Chicago Tribune’s Heartland Prize

Pulitzer Prize Finalist

National Book Critics Circle Award

Annotation:

 Author Tim O'Brien shares his tales of his time in the Vietnam War through fictional short stories. Realistically portrayed with devastating emotions and vivid imagery, these stories are sure to put the reader right next to the soilders in the Vietnam jungle.

Book talk:

Imagine yourself just out of high school, taken away--possibly forever from everything you have ever known. Cities and towns no longer exist as you grew up in, you no longer can just join your friends for a soda and a movie. No longer are you trying to catch the girl of your dreams.

Life as you knew it is gone. You are no longer your own person, you're owned by the jungles of Vietnam. The only things you own are what you carry in and out on your back. The more your carry, the longer you've survived. But you never know when a bullet has your name on it.

You are young...BUT you aren't guaranteed a future... 

You weren't sure of hope as death is around every corner. 

BUT what you do have are The Things you Carry. 

Image courtesy of: www.thingstheycarried.wordpress.com

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

Frank, Anne. Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl, The Definitive Edition. New York, NY: Bantam, 1997. ISBN: 0553577123 - PBK. 352 pp. $6.99.

 Awards:

ALA Best Books for Young Adults (1996).

Waterstones Books of the Century (1997).

New York Times Bestseller (Nonfiction, 1995).

Reader’s Annotation: In the face of horrific genocide during one of history's worst nightmares one girl's diary has remained a light in a time of darkness. Anne Frank hid with her family from the Nazi's as she kept a very honest journal in response to a call from a BBC radio personality in order for history to be accurately preserved. 

Review: Widely read and heavily acclaimed, the Diary of Anne Frank has seen several transitions over the years as her father Otto was able to release less edited versions as time went by. The Definitive Edition is Frank's diary at it's most honest. Frank struggled with her coming-of-age while in hiding from the Nazi's for over two years until her family's untimely discovery. Her strength and honesty in a time of hardship and constant fear helps Frank's diary remain a core piece of literature in today's modern world. A piece which is still avidly read in classrooms and out but folks of all age groups, the diary's core message of survival in a seemingly endless period of darkness and horror helps its remain as popular today as when her father first released it years ago. 

Image courtesy of: www.librarything.com

The Outsiders

Hinton, S.E. (1967). The Outsiders. New York: Penguin Putnam Inc. 

Classification: classics

Genre: fiction

Age level: 13+

Subjects: coming of age, survival, family and friends

Awards: New York Herald Tribune Best Teenage Books List, 1967, Chicago Tribune World Spring Book Festival Honor Book, 1967, Media and Methods Maxi Award, 1975, ALA Best Young Adult Books, 1975 and Massachusetts Children's Book Award, 1979. 

Reader's Annotation: A coming of age story told in the first person by the protagonist about his life as a Greaser in a story reminiscent of West Side Story. 

Summary: Ponyboy shares his life with the rest of the world as a member of the lower class Greasers who are constantly at odds with the upper class Socs. Ponyboy's people are the "outsiders" who are always blamed by authority for all the trouble, while the Socs can essentially get away with anything due to their societal connections. Ponyboy and his best friend Johnny are harassed and attacked by the Socs one night after bonding with two fo the girls who belong to the Socs crowd. When Johnny murders one of the Socs, the two boys find themselves on a journey that will literally change their lives forever. 

Image Credit: http://www.eastchester.k12.ny.us/schools/Ms/teachers/burke/images/outsiders_000.jpg

Go Ask Alice

Anonymous. (1971). Go Ask Alice. (p. 185). Aladdin Paperback.

ISBN: 0-689-81785-1

Classification: classics

Genre: non-fiction

Age Level: 12+

Subjects: coming of age, drug addiction, sexuality, death, friends and family

Awards: N/A

Reader's Annotation: An anonymous journal of a teenage female in the late 1960's during her experiences with drug addiction.

Summary: The anonymous author of this journal was just fourteen when she experiened her first acid trip and began her foray into drug abuse and addiction. The author nicknamed "Alice," takes the reader on a trip of emotional highs and lows as she lives her life in between drug trips, periods of sobriety and reconciliations with her parents after running away from home twice. By the time "Alice" is sixteen, she had begun working on her sobriety but the drug crowd she used to be friends with attempts to make it difficult for her to maintain her commitment of staying clean with their constant harrassment. What results is a compelling, often terrifying and heartbreaking caution tale of drug use and abuse. 

Image credit: http://www.scls.lib.wi.us/sunpraise/images/GoAskAlice.jpg

The First "One"

Hi all-

Thank you for taking the time to stop by my blogspot. I have created this blog for a class project at Drexel University's ischool. I will be reading pre-selected books and reviewing them as well as focusing on a specific genre of reviews---genre TBA. I am welcome to any questions or comments on my post which you can leave on here or feel free to email me: soc26@drexel.edu. I will try to respond speedily! So happy reading and check back often for reviews....until then, see you on the flip side.

Susanna

ps--That's me on the side:-)