I recently read 13 Reasons Why and was a very intense book. Though it was a book that I could not put down because I just wanted to know what was going to happen next. For me I wanted to keep reading because I wanted the ending to be something unpredictable. I was hoping that the person who recorded these tapes was actually alive and that she just fooled everyone. Whenever reading a book with a concept such as this you hope for the best. Even though she wasn’t alive in the end it was still a very good book. The main theme here was definitely Guilt and Blame since this tape is going around to everybody who was one of the thirteen reason why she committed suicide. No one wants to know that they were an actual cause of the ending of someones life. This just shows that if you bully someone it can lead them to ending their own life because of your actions. I feel that the character that developed the most was the one listening to the tapes, which was Clay. When he first got the tapes he had no idea of the horrible things these people did and he was one who believed the rumors that were spread about Hannah. Though as the tapes progress he better understands Hannah and misses her more. He is probably the one who least needed to be on the tapes, but needed to here everything said. 

     It was a good text to write for adolescents because suicide is a serious topic for that age group, but is rarely talked about. It was even found in 2013 that suicide was the second leading cause of death for people between the ages of 10 and 24. Most people do not want to talk about it because they think that no one ever considers things such as suicide at a young age. They are wrong because a large majority of adolescents think about this and are not informed of everything about it. If they were better informed they might not even consider the idea of suicide. I think this text would appeal to adolescents, especially those who have considered suicide in the past. Also to teens who have never been informed about suicide and now would know the signs and how to support people they feel could be thinking about suicide. SO it would help all adolescents in one way or another.

     Overall I feel that this text was written in a very intriguing way. I just wanted to keep reading until I was finished. I also felt that the book was very informative because I wasn’t very aware of suicide since I never thought about anything like this at any point in my life. 

Rating: A

Between Shades of Gray

     As many people know World War II was a very difficult and traumatizing war. This book is focused on a family going through the hardships of the war and being suddenly forced onto a train by the Soviet Union and having to work in a labor camp. A main theme that you can see in this book is survival. If you know anything about World War II then you will likely know that the concentration camps that people were forced into had horrible conditions. They barely fed them, made them work all day, and killed them if they weren’t complying. Typically the concentration camps are more connected to Hitler and the Jews, but Stalin was equally as ruthless as him. I love the fact that this takes place on the Stalin side of things rather than Hitler because in school you never go into deep detail about how bad Stalin was. The character that I feel developed significantly is the main character Lina. This is because in the beginning she is very oblivious to all the signs there were there before being taken. Though once being taken abruptly she learns to suck it up and fight for what she thinks is right and ultimately save her family and those around her who have become her friends. Gender is a theme that can also be seen in this book. It is quite obvious in the beginning of the book when they separate all of the men from the women and children. A main reason they would do this is because the men were stronger so they would send them to concentration camps with more difficult work, if they did not kill them. 

     I feel that this shows adolescents being very oblivious to the things happening around them on a day to day basis. In the book Lina is constantly being given signs about what is going to happen (foreshadowing in a sense) before the NKVD actually show up to their house. It makes it seem as though adolescents aren’t ready to take on real issues, such as a dictator getting ready to take over the country you are living in. If her parents would have included her in the discussions about what was going on she may have helped them prepare for what was coming and might have been able to escape in time. This text helps show adolescents why they need to keep up with things in the world such as politics and world matters. This news may seem boring until you are in the middle of it. It suddenly becomes the most important and only thing that your life is centered around. 

     Overall I felt that this text was very interesting. The fact that it centered around a historical moment in history was fascinating. Most everything that the author used actually happened because she went to Lithuania and talked to people who actually went through this. I have always been very interested in World War II and all the details about it and found this book very informative

Rating: A

Eleanor and Park

     I finished the book Eleanor & Park last night. Which I found to be quite intriguing. I will start this off with an analysis of this book. I thought that the two main themes to be noticed were love and family. Love was very apparent in the relationship that developed between Eleanor and Park. Many times throughout the book Park would confess his love towards Eleanor and she seemed almost afraid to admit that she had such deep and unstoppable feeling for him. Though in the end when she writes a post card to him it says, “Just three words long” (Rowell 325). We can all assume that those three words were her finally confessing her love to Park. Family is seen with both Eleanor and Park, though they both had very different family lives. Eleanor had an abusive and controlling stepfather that no one was brave enough to stand up to because of this she never wanted to leave her bedroom and face him. Her stepfather in a way pushed her from having a relationship with her mother. On the other hand Park had the opposite type of relationship with his parents. His parents were very loving and caring towards him, his relationship was the type that Eleanor dreamed she could have with her family. I felt that the character that most developed throughout the book was Park. At first he seemed slightly embarrassed to be friends with Eleanor, but as time went on he openly let everyone know that they were dating. He just had to let down the barriers of caring about what other people thought, in the end he realized it only mattered what he thought of Eleanor. Gender was definitely present throughout this whole book. It is shown when Park thinks he is girly and was doubting liking girls (until Eleanor), Eleanor wearing mens shirts, and even when Park wears makeup to school to entertain Eleanor. The fact that neither ever thought something about them was different because they were more feminine or masculine than normal is not right. They should feel fine in their own bodies without worrying about how others dress and even act. The most stereotypical character when it came to gender was Tina because she was the typical popular girl who everyone looked up to and wanted to be like. She wore makeup and dressed very girly, the total opposite of Eleanor who felt like she was hiding if she wore makeup. 

     The appeal that this book has towards adolescents is the age of the characters, falling in love, and being weird. Anytime that the age of the characters is close to the reader they will typically feel like they can relate since they are the same age. Falling in love is something that is typically included in young adult novels, especially when they are around the age of 16. This is because this is the age where adolescents start to feel that they are falling in love and a majority of them are getting into relationships. Adolescents that read this may relate to the characters because they are weird and don’t conform to societal standards for adolescents their age. I feel that the position this book gives on adolescents is both good and bad depending on what characters are being referred to. When referring to Eleanor and Park it is good, but characters such as Tina and Steve gives adolescents a bad name. They have a negative connotation towards adolescents because they are the typical stereotypical teenagers and do thing such as drinking and smoking. 

Rating: A!!

First off I give it an A because it is a book I have been meaning to read for a while, but also because it was one of those books that you couldn’t put down until you finished. Overall I absolutely loved this book