VVMBookBlog

Kirsten is starting 7th grade in her private school worried about friends, her parents constant fighting, and feeling a little overweight. When she is late on the first day of school, she meets Walk–real name Walker–who is new and is one of three African American students at this exclusive private school. When her best friend abandons her for the more popular girls, Kirsten gets to know Walk as a friend which causes concerns for her parents and the friends who have abandoned her.

Each chapter alternates between the story as Kirsten tells it and as Walk experiences it. As often happens in middle school, students don’t treat each other very well and issues of racism and prejudice show up in how people react to Walk’s presence in their school. Then the big surprise is revealed and both families have to re-evaluate what is important in their lives.

Written by the same author as Al Capone Does my Shirts, this book maybe doesn’t have the same amount of humor, but most people will be able to relate to the unpleasant ways that characters–and real people–sometimes treat each other.

If you’ve heard me do booktalks, you know that I’m really interested in books about the people who attempt to climb Mt. Everest and everything they have to do to get there.  Well, I’ve found a new interest in books–Shackleton’s attempt to get to and cross Antarctica, and the series of unfortunate events that happened in the course of the journey.

In this fictional account, 18-year-old Perce Blackborow happened to be in Buenos Aires when Shackleton was hiring his crew for the trip south.  Needing a job and wanting some adventure, Perce decided to hide out on the ship until they were on their way and too far out to bring him back.  So now he had to prove himself to be a contributing member of the crew and worth the space and supplies he would require.

While this is a fiction story, it is based on the actual Shackleton expedition and many of the people who made up the crew, including the real Perce Blackborow.  A few months into the journey, the ship encountered the first sighting of pack ice that would slow their journey, and that would be just the beginning of 2 years of desperate attempts to survive the cold and almost certain death.

I started reading this on the first Friday of spring break and I just had to keep reading until I finished it.  It’s so amazing what people are able to go through under the worst of conditions.  It’s a good thing no one is depending on me to do any world explorations, but I really enjoy reading about them.  And, BTW, we also have several non-fiction books on the same topic.