Life As We Knew It.

Life as we Knew it by Susan Pfeffer foretells a journal told by Miranda, the main character, and her life story throughout. In this book, a unusual meteor hits the moon and somehow alternated the climate of the world. Miranda had to do some major shopping and fell in love, and her family became desperate.

I find the book completely similar to Hurricane Song. Heck, the people were so desperate that they had to get lots of toilet paper. Lots and lots of toilet paper. In the book, people were left to stay in a large stadium called the Superdome because of Hurricane Katrina. This is a...dome. Obviously. Violence and loss of food became a major issue in both books; although in Life as we Knew It, violence would be referred as fighting against family members. Oh, and, loss of food wasn't much of a deal in Miranda's family (they stocked up in supermarkets as if the world was going to end in 2012), but became an issue in other cities that Miranda thinks she should be generous to give food for.

Conflict occurs all over in the book - most that start with different perspectives, in my opinion. For instance, the time when Miranda and her mom argue over having Dan as Miranda's lover. Miranda thinks that her opinion is correct because she can do whatever she wants to do in her life (at least before her death, ehem)(And, I mean, she's a teenager. Her levels of estrogen are raising! Puberty! YAY!). However, her mother's perspective is that she's going to die if she gets pregnant, and possibly get STD (this was a nice assumption I made because she talks about kissing frequently in the certain book). She also exaggerates that the family won't have food either if Dan was "in the way" of getting needed material. Both are really correct, but since a parent is always right, I go with the mother's perspective. It also makes sense since there were almost no doctors at all, and going beyond to pregnancy is just...stupid. STD's is also a really bad thing to get.

Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles

The book "Sherlock Holmes and the Hound of the Baskervilles" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is about a talented detective named Sherlock Holmes set in London, trying to figure out the culprit behind Sir Charles' death, the master of the Baskerville household. The story is set in the perspective of Sherlock Holmes's sidekick, Dr.Watson.

I find this book very challenging because of the specific words used in the story - some that I learned this year through a vocabulary book, and others that I simply assume is what it is. So far, I find the book confusing - there's no one that I am 100% clear as for the culprit, and I am halfway towards finishing.

So far, I am predicting many assumptions - one that the culprit to Sir Charles' death is the workers who left the mansion because of such. I say this because, first, the fact that they've served for generations and are already prepared to leave is a huge factor; plus, the fact that they want to leave afterward may be because they've tainted their hands in Sir Charles' blood.

Another assumption is Sir Henry of the Baskervilles, which I find surprisingly suspicious as well. It was possible that he killed Sir Charles himself to gain his position as master, and acting innocently in order to remain safe from Sherlock Holmes's hands.

Lastly, my least favorite assumption is Dr.Mortimer. Similar to Sir Henry, it may be possible that he killed him and is helping Sherlock Holmes playing innocent.

What a mystery! Who knows what it'll be.

Sherlock Holmes and Perspectives.

Whose perspective is missing? In Sherlock Holmes, oh, it's everything. Every single person in a chapter, usually.

In the book, the beginning starts with both Sherlock Holmes and Dr.Wattson's perspectives, each voice starting at a fresh, new chapter. However, around the middle of the book, you only hear Dr.Wattson speaking. This leaves with Sherlock Holmes out, and Wattson with more thinking. This then leaves with Sherlock Holmes' perspective missing.

In my opinion, I think that Conan Doyle, the author of this text, excludes Sherlock Holmes' voice because Sherlock Holmes is the one who solves every case! He's the one figuring out about 90% of his cases. If you add his perspective back in the story, the solution to the case will be there before he even explains it! It also seems like the author wants to exclude his part in the story to give readers more deeper thoughts and chances for theories.

Because Sherlock Holmes' perspective is missing, the one that stands out, Dr.Wattson's perspective, gives a more normal start. Dr.Wattson is often curious and wants to know more about Sherlock Holmes. This is much like Curious George, only the settings are different and George is...a monkey.

Current points of view are better than having Holmes' perspective around because it'll lessen the spice and adventure, and adding Holmes' thoughts is much like a spoiler that's occurring in the book.

Sherlock Holmes and Criminal JUSTICE.

Sherlock Holmes is, as before stated, a man of justice. He would do almost anything to solve a case, usually a criminal case. However, I sometimes think that it's much broader. As if Conan Doyle, the author, is trying to emphasize these cases and make them much more challenging. It leads from deduction to action, and soon goes from case to case.

Sherlock Holmes Volume One was about, obviously, a man named Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick, Dr. Watson. They go through a journey of adventureful criminal cases. Crime and death, which was the main themes, are also one of the major issues of this story.

It's clear that justice was served in the book. Well, Holmes served justice more than just once. Like, what. They even say it. He represents justice, but he's not a judge from court. It's very obvious to even figure out is he is the "justice man" - he's a detective! I even knew this back in childhood.

In reality, well, I really won't expect some detective agency appearing in New York. It's not...realistic. I've never seen a detective, detective agency, or incidents where a detective interfered, or what not. Never seen one in my entire life. And, at the same time, it'd probably change my aspect of what I currently think about them and that's not cool.

Reading this book makes me wonder about why we do such things. In the book, they make up reasons, sometimes excuses, about why they've done, say, a locked-room mystery. Most reasons are personal, however. Nonetheless, it makes me think more about Holmes himself. Starting with the basics, "how is he so smart? Where are his parents?" and so and so.

Sherlock Holmes and Steroids. Oh, and the author was on drugs.

Ah, Sherlock Holmes. You don't know what he is (if you do, pretend please) but a simple detective, am I correct?

Well, WRONG.

Sherlock Holmes is a detective, which is rather obvious, but he is a man of justice - as I read, his quotes overflow with such action, power, and intelligence; much so like a man of reform. I refer to him as the new Barack Obama (no offense intended).

I still do NOT clearly understand this difficult book, as I have to re-read a couple of times, but it is almost impossible for me to stop reading at the same time. It's like how you take steroids and drugs and alcohol and a cigar. You want more. You want it. Now you want it, don't you?

Moving on. There are many indirect social issues, and some that are so obvious and some that...you probably never seen yet. In this book, the main 'issue' is crime, or the whole story relates to crime. In these crimes are the involvement of social issues. But there are other times whence there are other ideals in a chapter that lead to a social issue.

In "A Study in Scarlet", a man named John Ferrier becomes a part of the bundle of Mormons going towards Salt Lake City because of discrimination against their religious views. Mormons were known to be a disgrace in the religious New England communities (much like Quakers back in their era) mostly because a part of their religion is for men to have multiple wives. As for that, they were often kicked out of neighborhoods or treated badly. This is a large part of an issue for the chapter because it is very discriminative. Lucy, Ferrier's daughter, cannot marry a non-Mormon, who was a man named Hope. The whole chapter described Hope trying to meet Lucy numerous amounts of times, and in the end, Lucy dies. Hope could not even go to her funeral.

Discrimination gave roles in the chapter, and it also became stereotypical as to when people think all Mormons are just naive people that carry lots of wives. Gender roles also came in play, since men carry that many wives around with them and women usually have no gain. Pretty harsh, ain't it.

Phantom Tollbooth - Connecting/Miscellaneous.

Phantom Tollbooth is utmost fantasy and "pure gold" - that theme, that plot, and Norton Juster's writing style. And don't forget the many parts when he intrudes inside the story, which sometimes explains a moral.

The very first thing I notice is the theme, which is definitely educational. The first thought I came up about the book was "literature about literature". This book speaks in a literature manner, yet in a logical way. In page 34, "When they began to count all the time that was available, what with 60 seconds in a minute and 60 minutes in an hour and 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year, it seemed as if there was much more than could ever be used." And how letters that were used less tasted less good than the ones used everyday in the Word Market. And homophones, as the Whether Man, whom rather check whether weather's coming than if there is any weather.

On page 26 is an author's intrusion. "You weren't thinking, and you weren't paying attention either." These intrusion's, although contaminate throughout the entire book, is rather hard to find, in my opinion. Compared to Charlotte's Web by E.B, E.B makes them rather easy to get because it describes something about life in a paragraph, and most of the time the word 'life' is in that certain paragraph. Phantom Tollbooth, on the other hand, has intrusions starting from sentences to paragraphs, even quotes. Some are hard to find, yet some are truly easy to find.

Sometimes, you can see morals deeply engraved in your thoughts. On page 117, for example, one of the quotas were: "Then one day someone discovered that if you walked as fast as possible and looked at nothing but your shoes you would arrive at your destination much more quickly. Soon everyone was doing it. They rushed down the avenues and hurried along the boulevards seeing nothing of the wonders and beauties of their city as they went." Once I finished reading this quote, I began to think, "Moral: Enjoy things in life. Don't worry about looking at your shoes, look around you or you might get into a car accident...wait, how can you even cross a street without looking at anything but your shoes?!"

And as what that Phantom Tollbooth Appreciation said,

"Mazel tov, Milo, Norton, and Jules!"

Archetypes Entry - Charlotte's Web.

In Charlotte's Web, I notice how the journey that the main characters take is a Loss of Innocence. Wilbur, who is although the spotlight of the story, isn't much of a Hero OR Protagonist (notice how I capitalize it?) character. He shows almost no courage, nor ANY self sacrifice at all (his most outraging quotes to me in page 180: "You can't all go. I would be left alone, with no friends. Your mother wouldn't want that to happen, I'm sure"). Like, yeah, I know you're like, best friends with Charlotte, but having her children forced to be with him forever is such selfish attitude, with so much bias. He acts like a dictator, claiming this and his formality. This is what I hate about Wilbur. Most importantly, he's all grown up!
Second off, my favorite archetype is the Mentor, which is obviously Charlotte. She's extremely calm, and is incredibly smart. To be honest, I wanted to be like her, although considering the fact that she's a spider. She also supports Wilbur by preventing him to be killed, as it shows on page 78, 95, and 141. Charlotte is a truly nice ... thing, compared to ... erm, Wilbur.

Connecting Annotations Entry - Charlotte's Web

Some of the things that I always begin to think about is the way the author of Charlotte's Web, which is E.b White, and his writing technique. The descriptions and few sentences in each and ever chapter that are supposedly randomly appearing in the book really show the theme of the book; and it gives a huge, clear picture in the brain because of the clear description directly from the book. It almost gives the reader a sense of how the author, E.b writes.
There is an example in page 25, which described the rain. "Rain fell in the barnyard and ran in crooked courses down into the lane where thistles and pigweed grew" - I loved this quote because of the different words E.B uses, such as 'lane' or 'crooked courses'. It makes the scenery you imagine turn it into a beautiful landscape.
In page 32, another interesting sentence pops up: "And when your stomach is empty and your mind is full, it's always hard to sleep". This sentence is connecting to the reader and reality. Some sentences in this book also made me think, "WOW! I DID THIS BEFORE TOO!" and "YEAH! I COMPLETELY UNDERSTAND". It kind of makes me happy too, when I see something that relates to me.
In page 110, I also notice how this character, Dr.Dorian, and other characters like the old sheep in the barn talk about life, like a wise old man. This is also an author's intrusion, where Dr.Dorian explains how animals might have talked to him, and how "children pay more attention than grownups."
Lastly, in page 114, in one of the quotes I noticed personification, which actually is used mostly in poetry. "A little maple tree in the swamp heard the cricket song and turned bright red with anxiety. I was actually a bit surprised that E.B White used personification; throughout the book, I noticed how the descriptions were so poetic, but none of them have any similes, metaphors, or anything other than this one (that is, if I have not skipped one. Well, how about I say "most obvious" poetry characteristics you can find).

Responding Entry - Charlotte's Web

One thing I've noticed in Charlotte's Web (also throughtout childhood) was how the animals thought of Fern as an equal. I wonder how they began to think so? Was it also possible that it was Wilbur's influence? Or was it that the wise animals thought she wasn't like Mr. Arable (the one that was close to killing Wilbur) or Lurvy & Zuckerman.
I've also begun thinking whether the animals were jealous of Wilbur, because the animals told Wilbur that leaving the pen was his best choice. It may have been a nice idea, or an idea to remove the 'spring pig' and have Fern. In chapter 14, after Wilbur failed to be able to spin a web, Charlotte tried to cheer him up and said, "But cheer up, you don't need a web. Zuckerman supplies you with three big meals a day. Why should you worry about trapping food?". It sounded like Charlotte was jealous of Wilbur too, because Zuckerman supplies Wilbur, and doesn't even need any work put upon him. They also disliked Wilbur in the very beginning, because of his formality. It kind of makes me wonder what the animals' first impression of Wilbur was.