Author: S. E. Hinton

Narrator: Jim Fyfe

Time: 05:27:26

Reread.

Oh my gosh this books gives all the feels!  I haven't read this book since elementary school and I had forgotten how much I loved it.

The story is haunting in a way.  The social division between the Greasers and the Socs is something so true and real and very prevalent in today's society.  The struggle of being a teen just trying to navigate the world around them was depicted so well.  Being a kid/teen sucks no matter your social/financial situation.  All walks of life come with their own set of problems and it's hard enough dealing with them and having to fight one another over, well nothing really.  Jealousy, hate, boredom? 

The characters draw you in and make you develop attachments to them.  I didn't remembered how very much I adored Sodapop until rereading this.  And Dally... I always liked Dally, but reading this as an adult, I can appreciate him more.  I can better understand why he was the way he was.  Why he was so tough and cold, and why he was well and truly lost after Johnny's death.  Ponyboy hit it on the head: Johnny was the only thing Dally loved.

I love everything about this book, the writing, the story, the characters.  The family dynamic between the Curtis brothers--the whole gang, because they're all one big family that looks out for one another as best they can.  It's both beautiful and sad.  I'm only sorry I took so long to reread this.

This book is about a student who has an issue thinking of a creative item to bring to class for the 100th day of school. The assignment is to bring 100 of whatever object the student has chosen. During the week she noticed that it seemed as though every student already knew what they were bringing. She asked for help from both her parents and teacher. Her teacher continuously assured her that she was creative enough to come up with something. Then finally, she though of an item that was both sentimental and creative. She chose to make a poster using the fishes pebbles, spelling out its name on the poster. I think this book would work well with k-1st. The activity could include  of that similar to the book. The students could be required to bring 100 of a certain item, whether that be 100 pieces of cereal or 100 buttons from their collection, anything that means something to the student. This would be a great book to introduce as the 100th day of school was approaching. I feel as though 1st grade would be able to do the activity better than that of a kindergartener.

A link to my main blog showcasing my picks for this week's Top Ten Tuesday entry.  Some personal stories linking to books that resonated with me as I read them coming up through school.

Because my family has always had loads of books, we have a special closet that contains all the ones that won't fit in the bookshelves. Unlike places I live - which I've always crammed full of bookshelves - my mother likes to have books kept in certain areas. So there are very nice looking old books here and there, and books that are currently being read on various tables - but if you want to find the books to dig through, it's in the book closet. I assume it was once a linen closet, but it's better for books because it has a light inside so you can actually see what you're looking for. And because its shelves are deep there are two rows of books on each shelf - thus the need for keeping it tidy since books are easily hidden in there.

Anyway, we were doing some cleaning, which basically meant trying to put the books in some sort of order so that you might actually find things. And because I always say "but I haven't read that yet!" we didn't purge many. But I did notice this book from high school and thought about how it'd been a long time since I read it, and so I glanced inside.

wikipedia: Cyrano de Bergerac

wikipedia: Edmond Rostand

I ended up rereading it - though I started out by bouncing around to my favorite scenes. And I had to skip over parts where Cyrano has hopes that he might be loved in spite of his nose - I always have problems with "hopes disappointed" scenes, because I do like the character so much. And as melodramatic and theatrical as the final scene is -

- it made me tear up a bit. Because, ok, honestly I do love this character.

Much of the play's emotions you read into the scene - at some parts there are few words and it's up to the actor to express the feelings behind them. Which is why this is a play actors still enjoy performing.

Version I read was translated by: Brian Hooker (Amazon link here for more detail)

I've said this before about translators - SO much about whether you will love a book can depend on how well they do their job. To discount this is to miss both the difficulty of translating from another language and how much small word choices and phrases can matter.

Exciting sci-fi experience with lots of action and inspiration.  The author written it so well that a young reader will follow the story with ease and enjoy the fascination of sci-fi with a military tinge to it.  Great Star Fight adventure.  I won this book on BookLikes.  Thank you, Darlene Cruz