sequels

Catching Fire

I read it in just a few short days and I loved it. It truly amazes me when authors are so prolific w/ new ideas. I thought Suzanne Collins’ series, Gregor was fascinating. This whole created world underneath our world, accessed through a vent in a laundry room was cool and now, to have created this look into the future through The Hunger Games; well, I’m just bowled over with her creativity!
http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f8/1543302482

Enjoy the video and click here for Scholastic website where I found tons of cool videos featuring Suzanne Collins discussing life, books and the similarities between Gregor and Hunger Games series. What impresses me most is how real her characters become and how involved I feel. I worry when Katniss doesn’t eat enough. I feel involved with Peeta, Prim, and Gale and this time getting a closer look at past games and how they affected their parents generation was interesting. A peaceful person by nature, I struggle through the actual Hunger Game event, which causes me to cheer when Katniss truly listens to Haymitch’s message; who is the real enemy?? I’m excited for the next in the series but I’ve got a lot of other books to read in the meantime!

I just finished Hunger, sequel to Gone by Michael Grant. The second in this series came out recently, which was great, while I bide my time waiting for Catching Fire, sequel to The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins as well as the sequel to Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson!

Tristan and I both read Gone and liked the idea of the story and the sequel is just as exciting.

The idea behind Gone:

Everyone over the age of 15 suddenly disappears (poof) and all the children are left to fend for themselves in Perdido Beach, CA. Children learn to live with the loss of their families as well as find a way to live day-to-day! This would be hard for my children. That basic element of good and evil, of course, comes into play. Some kids begin to step up and take charge. Sam, Astrid and Albert organize and most of kids begin to look to Sam for answers. Perdido Beach is also home to Coates, an elite prep school with its own leader, Caine. Adding Coates into the already difficult equation adds to the pure excitement.

In Hunger, good vs. evil continues to play out with Caine and Sam struggling with leadership of their own straggling “teams”. As the title suggests food is the main concern for both sides. The grocery store is down to a few meager cans and kids are choking down random jars and cans of food (you know, all the stuff kids would normally hate). Sam, Astrid and Albert know they need to organize kids into helpers, gather more food from fields and solve a few in-fighting going on amongst the town kids. There are a ton of plot conflicts back and forth-just when you think things are resting easy-BAM something else stirs it up! I love some of the characters…Sam, Astrid, Quinn! I can only hope the third book will continue their story well.

Al Capone shines my shoes by Gennifer Choldenko

What a lovely sequel to Al Capone does my shirts! I finished it this afternoon and when I knew it was coming to an end- I had only two chapters left- I stopped reading, on purpose to do some necessary household chores-just to make the book last a little longer and to contemplate the complexity of the story. After I finished some laundry and made a quick dinner I picked it back up and finished. Now I want to go back and read the first one again because I read it a few years ago. If you haven’t read the first one do so now so you’ll be ready for this second one coming in September!

I’m not going to give much away, but here is the story line: Moose lives on Alcatraz Island with his dad (a prison guard), his mom and his sister, Natalie. Natalie is autistic and Capone, while a prisoner, helps get her into a special school in San Fransisco. This story begins with Capone asking for repayment from Moose. Of course a mafia man like Al would want something in return! Moose is nervous about his note-passing relationship with Alcatraz’s most famous convict. His character is well-developed as the nice guy, the good and helpful young man, among the other families. At one point, just to appease, he even pretends to like needlepoint! When problems arise, as they do in all stories, Moose comes through for his friends and his family. The wives were more memorable to me than they were in Al Capone does my laundry and I wondered if this was the author’s intent.
Ms. Choldenko weaves together a fascinating historical fiction, teaching us about life on the island in 1935, with great characters and a very twisty and exciting plot! It’s fascinating how authors’ pick their topics and her idea of giving us a personalized tale of Alcatraz is her very special gift to readers.