The Impossible Knife of Memory, Week #1

Hayley Kincain may seem normal, but she has a lot more going on than any normal high school senior. She spends all her time out of school caring for her father, who is suffering from PTSD. Hayley has never stayed in one place for too long, but she realizes that Belmont High School might be different. She becomes really close with a girl named Gracie, and her friend Finn. Eventually Hayley has to choose between Finn and her Dad. This was my first week reading this book, and I really liked it. It was a little slow, but the main character was really interesting. It was really realistic, and I liked that a lot. I would recommend this book, but a heads up that it is pretty long.

Inside Out and Back Again

Inside Out and Back Again is about a girl named Ha, who grows up in Vietnam during the Vietnam War. But as the war gets worse she has to leave the only place she has ever known. She travels by boat with her mother and her brothers (her father left to go to war, and never returned). She stays in tents in Guam for a while, but then she moves to Alabama. She has a lot of good memories of Saigon in Vietnam, especially her Papaya tree. But she has to adjust, because she knows that with the war, she can not go back. This book was written in verse, which I actually really liked. I would definitely recommend this if you like books in verse.

For a book group I think it would be cool to do a nonfiction book.

Rhyming Poem

Closed windows

Dim lights

If you open the door

It will be too bright

A little desk

A wooden chair

Your all alone

No one else there

You hear footsteps

Look left and right

Then not a sound

And not a sight

When you wake up

When you open your eyes

It was all just a dream

A scary surprise

Skinny by Donna Cooner

Skinny is about a girl named Ever Davies who is insecure because she is really overweight. She started to gain weight when her mom died when she was young. Since then she always hears a voice in her ear that she calls Skinny. Skinny says a lot of horrible and self-demeaning things. So to try to get rid of Skinny, Ever gets a surgery that will make her lose weight and be skinny. But Skinny stays through the surgery. Still, Ever wants to be normal. She wants to be normal, and especially to try out for the musical at her school, but she doesn't know how to overcome her fears. This book isn't really inappropriate, and I would definitely recommend it.