No Name

 Hi guys, this is the sequel to my previous blog on The Super Life of Ben Braver. Compared to the previous book, this one sees some similarities and differences that I wanted to highlight in this blog. The book begins with Ben returning to the Kepler Academy, the school for kids that have "superpowers", although Ben does not have any, he's allowed to come back for saving the school the previous year. At first, it seems like it's going to be a normal year; no more supervillians, no more fires, and no more evil, but Ben soon starts to get more sad about being at the school. At first, he thought it would be an amazing experience, but as he watches his classmates powers grow even better, while he still has none, he feels left out.  After the start of the year, Ben discovers that there was a fan club made for him, for saving the school last year. He begins to go to underground meetings where students have power fights, where they see who has the strongest power. Ben wins e...

     I'm just going to start off by saying that this book was a great read. I picked up this book at my grandpa's house while he was moving out to the nursing home and wanted to read it because it had been on the list of banned books for the banned books reading project last year. I will say that this book does have reasons to be banned in certain areas due to its mature themes of death, grief and some suggestive material.     The book starts with our main character, a Native American boy named Arnold Spirit who goes by the name of Junior on the reservation where he grew up. He says when he was born his brain had too much grease, so the doctors had to take it out and that messed him up a bit whether it be his horrible eyesight, his lisp and stutter or his skinny body. He lives on the Spokane Indian Reservation with his alcoholic mother and father, sister, grandmother, and many, many cousins. In his free time, he likes to draw comics, play basketball or hang out ...

  Book Review of Trial of the Sun Queen by Marina Price I think that Trial of the Sun Queen is an overall very good book that I would recommend. It is a fantasy book with lots of world building and character development. The main character, Lor, has lived in the worst prison in this world called Nostraza for her entire life despite her committing no obvious crime. One day, she gets mysteriously stolen from the prison, finding herself in the lavish rooms of a castle. However, of course this is a fantasy book, so she must compete in a set of tests called the Trials of the Sun Queen. The castle she is in is called the sun palace, where she is competing in deathly trials (designed to kill the contestants) to attempt to be chosen as the sun queen. The other contestants have trained their entire life for this contest while Lor is only put there as tribute to show the people of the Sun Kingdom why the people of elite society are better. (This is a bit of a SPOILER so skip this sentenc...

       Neal Shusterman’s Arc of a Scythe series brings you into a Dystopian sci-fi future where death has been eradicated by the Thunderhead, which is the mind of an all-knowing AI. Still, someone must keep the population under control. The Scythedom is the group of elite killers tasked with keeping the population in check by ‘gleaning,’ which is another word for murder. This book is dark, strange, and quite a page-turner. The story follows two teenagers who are chosen to become scythes and undergo apprenticeship under the scythes who choose them, learning about the role they will take on for the rest of their lives as they face ethical dilemmas that come with the responsibility of taking people's lives. What really brings these serious topics to life is Shusterman’s unique style. Writing style: Shusterman has a writing style that I thoroughly enjoyed. Here are a few interesting examples from either journals or internal character dialogue: “ There’s a lot written a...

       Since fall has arrived, I decided to read one of my favorite cozy classics: The Little House series. If you don’t know, the hit show Little House on the Prairie was based on these books.       The first book in the series, called Little House in the Big Woods , follows a little girl named Laura. The book is set in the 1870s, which is right in the middle of the American Westward Expansion. Laura and her family live somewhere in rural Wisconsin. In Laura’s words, she lives right in the middle of the woods. No neighbors, and there are trees as far as the little girl can see.      The book just follows her life throughout the year and experiences she has. So the book starts in fall, when it is harvest season. We see the hunt Laura's Pa brings home, and all the preparations Laura and her family make for winter, such as smoking/salting jerky and storing vegetables in the attic.      A common theme throughout the boo...

  The Super Life of Ben Braver by Marcus Emerson is a story about an 11 year old, Ben, who discovers he may have superpowers during a summer vacation. The story begins with Ben, a normal lonely 11 year old boy just chilling and playing video games. On his way to grab a snack from the nearby gas station, he sees someone, Dexter Dunn, bullying another kid. He decides to stand up to Dexter, which turns out to be a bad mistake; he gets sent to the hospital because of a concussion Dexter gave him, after had used some sort of power to shoot ice crystals at him. When he wakes up, everything is explained to him by the headmaster of a school, Donald Kepler. He soon finds out that Kepler isn’t the headmaster of a normal school; he’s the head of a school for children who have superpowers, and Kepler believes Ben has one. At first, he was unsure whether to believe him, but after the headmaster showed his own ability to Ben, he got really excited; this was his dream come true! He agrees to go t...