Book It

Ah!! Do you remember the Book It!  reading program?!  Your class got a Pizza Hut party if everyone read?  That memory just came back to me when I typed that title.  I remember in 2nd grade we had a read-a-thon at school and we were allowed to bring a treat to share.  I chose these sour balls and I did not share a single one.  There was another time they sent home a list of funny places to do your reading and I remember loading my pillows and blankets into the bathtub.  It was not comfortable.  Excuse me while I chuckle to myself!  Funny memories!

Anyway,  here's a long overdue look at what I have read recently.  (By the by, I know you all aren't probably all that interested in these, but these are more for  my sake.  Especially with the the youth fictions I read.  Someday my kids will be old enough to read them and I want to remember what I read and what I thought of it.)

#1:  A Hero for WondLa by Tony DiTerlizzi.  This is the second in the WondLa series.  Eva continues her journey and meets new people. I don't really want to say too much about it just in case anyone is interested in reading them.  I did enjoy the book quite a bit.  I like Eva as a heroine.  She's definitely young, but she's tough and courageous and  I like that as a role model for my children.

#2:  Kenny the Dragon (also) by Tony DiTerlizzi.  I read this out loud to my children.  We loved it.  L-O-V-E-D it.  It is a retelling of The Reluctant Dragon (which I haven't read, or maybe I have, I can't remember, but it is now on my list).  Kenny is a rabbit and his family owns a farm.  One day, his dad runs home with news that there is a dragon living on a hill on the their property.  Kenny goes to investigate and discovers that Grahame (like the cracker) is not at all what he expected a dragon to by like.  Grahame likes to read and cook and perform.  They become fast friends.  The villagers catch wind of the dragon and, of course, decide it must be "exterminated".  Kenny must figure out a way to stop it and the resulting story is sweet and funny and completely charming.  There are wonderful illustrations throughout the book.  I highly, highly, highly recommend this one.

#3:  Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.  Again.  Always.  I love this book.  Jane has such wonderful qualities.  She is strong, courageous, steadfast, faithful, industrious, humble.  She perseveres in the direst of circumstances.  She is well educated and well grounded.  She's young, but she's not silly.  She truly has an old, wise soul.  I love her journey.  Yes, she falls in love with a terrible grouch of a man (who I love in spite of it), but I love that when she must, she leaves him because it is the right thing to do.  She has no silly romantic notions.  She stands firm in her social and spiritual beliefs.  She is so self-aware that she is not swayed, even the possibility of having the love she never thought she would have.  And I love her and Mr. Rochester together.  Hang me if you will for that, but I do.  I only have one hangup about the book in general, and that is the part after she leaves.  Since I've read it a couple times already, I always skip over most of it until she gets back to where she ought to be.  Anyway, I enjoyed reading it again.

#4:  Instruments of Darkness by Imogen Robertson.  I picked this one up at the library.  It is the first in the Westerman and Crowther series that has four books so far.  It is a murder mystery set in the late 1700s in England.  Harriet Westerman, a well to do lady, stumbles across a dead body on her property one morning.  She enlists the help of Mr. Crowther, a scientist who's main interest is the human body and the effect violence has on the body, to figure out what happened to the dead man.  Soon more deaths occur and they all seem to be connected to Thornleigh Hall, the home of the Earl.  They feel compelled to figure out what is going on as the local authorities seem eager to brush it under the rug.  I really liked it.  It was well written and well paced.  I very much recommend it as well.

I am currently reading Anatomy of a Murder (the second in the Westerman and Crowther series) and a biography on Elizabeth I.  (We'll see how that goes.)