SLIS 5420
BLOG7: Realistic Fiction
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Plot Summary: Roy Eberhardt is the new boy at school. One day while being bullied by Dana on the bus he sees a boy running beside it, Mullet Fingers. During another Bully session on the bus Roy punches Dana and breaks Dana's nose. Roy is forced to write a letter of apology to Dana. Finger bruises on Roy's neck force the VP to believe Roy's side of the story.
Concurrently an All-American Pancake's ground breaking ceremony is delayed by repeated acts of vandalism. So many acts of vandalism that a guard and rottweilers are placed to watch the construction site. The vandalism is being perpetrated by Mullet Fingers who is the step brother of Beatrice. Mullet Fingers is living wild in the Florida swamplands to escape his step mother. Beatrice is Mullet Fingers connection with his family and civilized society. Roy meets Beatrice who explains all of this to him. Mullet Fingers is distrustful of people,but comes to trust Roy. Dana threatens to beat up Roy some more. However, Beatrice ties Dana to a flagpole.
As Roy's friendship with Beatrice and Mullet Fingers continues to grow, Mullet Fingers reveals that he is sabotaging the construction to save a species of Burrowing Owl. Roy decides to help Mullet Fingers and convinces Dana to break into the construction site. Dana gets caught. The guard is not convinced that Dana is the perpetrator, because he was scared of a plastic alligator, after a live alligator was placed in the toilet. Regardless Dana is placed in juvenile detention.
Roy begins to research the laws protecting the owls. He gives Mullet Fingers a digital camera to take pictures of the owl on the property, proving their existence. The Roy leads a march on the construction site exposing the dishonesty of the company.
My Impression: This is a really fun book. What is extra cool a bout this book is that if kids like this novel, they can read Carl Hiaasen's mystery novels when they get older. Mr. Hiaasen's novels share similar narrative flourishes, he has away of writing eccentric characters and his novels are all set in Florida. I also love how many story threads and points of view are incorporated. For a kids novel this has a pretty extensive plot construction and one really has to pay attention to comprehend the plot. However, it was made into a truly terrible kids movie.
Reviews:
Hoot - Children-Youth Fiction Book ReviewBy Lillian Brummet
Hoot is a story about a fun adventure that has a small group of young people making positive choices. The setting for this mystery-fiction tale takes place in the state of Florida, USA. The main character, Roy, has moved regularly with his family and he is used to being the new kid in schools and neighborhoods. His previous experience helps him make new friends and ward off a big bully who singles him by stalking and harassing Roy.
This new life seems like just another cycle to Roy until he witnesses a very strange event that leads Roy and his friends on a whirlwind adventure. Young boys and girls find themselves taking on something greater than their selves or their small worlds - the very definition of a hero. Saving a few members of an endangered species from greedy building contractors is an issue dear to my heart.
I not only loved the environmental theme but truly feel the author deserves praises for creating such intelligent, well-spoken characters - especially Roy, Beatrice and the mystery boy. I was impressed by Roy's speech about schools teaching youth how ordinary individuals became a part of positive change in the world simply by doing what they believed in - which was very moving and is something teachers and parents alike will appreciate. Two of the kids in this book have a difficult home life and the awareness of how hard life is for some, may bring some discussion into classes and families.
Author Carl Hiaasen depicts a character without describing in minute detail - thus leaving the imagination of the reader to determine how a character looks. Forgivable flaws in individual characters are made so by being so human - such as the policeman who makes some serious, yet understandable, blunders.
I would recommend Hoot by Carl Hiaasen anywhere, anytime! This is a fantastic tale that youth between the ages of 7 to 13 would relate very easily to, though I believe the range of readers Hoot would appeal to would be much wider than this. I, for one, am nearly 37 and I truly enjoyed doing this review project!
Brummet, Lillian. [Book review of Hoot] Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?Hoot---Children-Youth-Fiction-Book-Review&id=265653
Hiaasen, Carl. Hoot - Book Review
Kliatt, Sept, 2002 by Paula Rohrlick
Random House Knopf 304p. c2002. 0-375-92181-8. $17.99. J
Hiaasen, a columnist for the Miami Herald and the author of many best-selling novels for adults about the wild and wacky side of the state of Florida, offers a hoot of a read here in his first novel for YAs. Roy is the new kid in town, a student at Trace Middle School in Coconut Cove. From the school bus window, as a bully is harassing him, Roy spots a barefoot boy his age running by, and he becomes intrigued. Roy follows the boy, and gradually learns that he is involved in trying to protect the nesting site of some rare burrowing owls. This site is currently an empty lot that is about to be turned into a pancake house by a corporate executive called Chuck Muckle, with the assistance of a bald foreman called Curly. Adventures and misadventures ensue--alligators pop up in portable potties and a tough girl takes a bite out of Roy's bike tire--before Roy works out a way to get revenge on the bully and help the barefoot boy save the owls.
My 14-year-old daughter read this and liked it, calling it "clever and funny" and commenting "it was interesting how the plots came together." Hiaasen's trademark over-the-top humor and satire, along with his concern for safeguarding Florida's wildlife, come through clearly and will entertain readers. Here's hoping he continues to write for YAs.
Kliatt, Sept, 2002 by Paula Rohrlick
Random House Knopf 304p. c2002. 0-375-92181-8. $17.99. J
Hiaasen, a columnist for the Miami Herald and the author of many best-selling novels for adults about the wild and wacky side of the state of Florida, offers a hoot of a read here in his first novel for YAs. Roy is the new kid in town, a student at Trace Middle School in Coconut Cove. From the school bus window, as a bully is harassing him, Roy spots a barefoot boy his age running by, and he becomes intrigued. Roy follows the boy, and gradually learns that he is involved in trying to protect the nesting site of some rare burrowing owls. This site is currently an empty lot that is about to be turned into a pancake house by a corporate executive called Chuck Muckle, with the assistance of a bald foreman called Curly. Adventures and misadventures ensue--alligators pop up in portable potties and a tough girl takes a bite out of Roy's bike tire--before Roy works out a way to get revenge on the bully and help the barefoot boy save the owls.
My 14-year-old daughter read this and liked it, calling it "clever and funny" and commenting "it was interesting how the plots came together." Hiaasen's trademark over-the-top humor and satire, along with his concern for safeguarding Florida's wildlife, come through clearly and will entertain readers. Here's hoping he continues to write for YAs.
Rohrlick, Paula. [Book Review of Hoot] Retrieved from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBX/is_5_36/ai_107202424/?tag=content;col1
Suggestions for Library Use: It's length prohibits its reading at a story time. This book would be a good suggestion for students moving from elementary to middle school, because of it's intricate plot and the fact that it is a great deal of fun. if the library has enough copies or can get enough interested, the Library might consider showing the movie as well.
Olive's Ocean by Kevin Henkes
Plot summary: One day Martha Boyle is visited by the mother of a recently deceased school acquaintance, Olive. Olive's mother gives Martha a page from Olive's diary that names Martha a person Olive would have liked to have known better. In the journal entry Olive says she would like to be a writer and live by the ocean. Although she did not know Olive well, Martha is profoundly affected by Olive's death. Martha is thirteen, which means that she is going through puberty and she finds it difficult to connect with her family, particularly her older brother. Martha's the desire to know and interact with boys is also growing. When summer comes she and her family got spend time with her grandmother who lives on a beach. Martha is very close with her grandmother and they talk candidly with one another. Over the summer Martha develops a crush on a boy, Jimmy. Martha had a crush on Tate Jimmy's younger brother, but shift the affection. Jimmy and Martha strike up a friendship working on Jimmy's movie. However, it turn out that Jimmy was using the friendship to get Martha to kiss him on film. This embarrasses Martha. One day Martha decides to get a sample of the ocean, but nearly drowns. The incident shakes Martha up and causes her to reflect on her own mortality. Martha takes her ocean sample to give to Olive's mother, but finds out the mother has moved. This causes Martha to reflect even more.
My Impression: The short chapters make you feel smart because you cover so many pages in a short period of time. The short chapters reminded me a little of Out of the Dust. As jarring as the short chapters can be the book flows quite well. The emotions and feelings are universal and described with great care. The book does not make easy choices for its characters and the ending is an internal denouement. With the mortality theme is handled truthfully and does not condescend to the reader.
Reviews:
Their letters could lead to lasting love . . . or expose Sabrina’s mortifying secret.Sabrina Kincaid didn’t intend to fall for Nantucket native Tucker McCabe, the man she serves coffee to every morning—a man tied toa past she deeply regrets. But she has. And she’s fallen hard.
I have always had a soft spot in my heart for good children's novels. There is a simple elegance to them that cannot be matched by anything geared toward adults. Olive's Ocean, a recent Newbery Honor winner, is the most recent I have enjoyed.
The book starts off with our main character, Martha Boyle, answering her family's house door. A strange woman is there and gives her a a piece of paper. The woman identifies herself as being Olive Barstow's mother. The paper is from Olive's journal and the woman wants Martha to have it.
Olive was hit by a car a number of weeks ago. Martha had barely known her. She was the quiet girl no one knew or thought about. Yet, in reading the journal entry, Martha starts to see parts of herself in the writing. Every paragraph in the book mirrors something about Martha. Olive wants to write novels. Martha also has a secret desire to write a book. Olive wants to visit an ocean, and Martha is leaving the next day to visit her grandmother who lives on the Atlantic coast. The last paragraph even mentions Martha by name. "I hope I get to know Martha Boyle next year... I hope that we can be friends... She is the nicest person in the entire class."
This sets off a hurricane of thinking for Martha. It's sobering enough for a classmate from school to die. It's even more so when you read a journal entry from that person and you get named as a hopeful future friend.
Arriving at the ocean does not stop the hurricane for Martha. However, it does skew her thoughts in several different directions. She starts to think about her grandmother's inevitable death. About the neighbor boy whom she has her eye on. And, yes, about Olive and even her own life.
She falls for Jimmy, the neighbor boy a couple of years older than herself. He is working on filming a movie titled "The World Is Not What You Think It Is." It's definitely an interesting artistic statement and Jimmy's only thought is to get the footage he needs for the film. He finds the time, however, to go on walks with Martha, holding her hand as they talk.
It's not too long, though, before he goes for the plunge and kisses her. It turns sour when afterward Martha realizes he had his camera on and was filming the whole thing. The walks, the holding hands, it was all just a build up so that he could get a kiss on film. Martha is devastated, and embarrassed because everyone will see it on his film. And to make everything much more irritating, there was even a bet between Jimmy and his brothers as to how fast he could get the kiss from her.
I have always had a soft spot in my heart for good children's novels. There is a simple elegance to them that cannot be matched by anything geared toward adults. Olive's Ocean, a recent Newbery Honor winner, is the most recent I have enjoyed.
The book starts off with our main character, Martha Boyle, answering her family's house door. A strange woman is there and gives her a a piece of paper. The woman identifies herself as being Olive Barstow's mother. The paper is from Olive's journal and the woman wants Martha to have it.
Olive was hit by a car a number of weeks ago. Martha had barely known her. She was the quiet girl no one knew or thought about. Yet, in reading the journal entry, Martha starts to see parts of herself in the writing. Every paragraph in the book mirrors something about Martha. Olive wants to write novels. Martha also has a secret desire to write a book. Olive wants to visit an ocean, and Martha is leaving the next day to visit her grandmother who lives on the Atlantic coast. The last paragraph even mentions Martha by name. "I hope I get to know Martha Boyle next year... I hope that we can be friends... She is the nicest person in the entire class."
This sets off a hurricane of thinking for Martha. It's sobering enough for a classmate from school to die. It's even more so when you read a journal entry from that person and you get named as a hopeful future friend.
Arriving at the ocean does not stop the hurricane for Martha. However, it does skew her thoughts in several different directions. She starts to think about her grandmother's inevitable death. About the neighbor boy whom she has her eye on. And, yes, about Olive and even her own life.
She falls for Jimmy, the neighbor boy a couple of years older than herself. He is working on filming a movie titled "The World Is Not What You Think It Is." It's definitely an interesting artistic statement and Jimmy's only thought is to get the footage he needs for the film. He finds the time, however, to go on walks with Martha, holding her hand as they talk.
It's not too long, though, before he goes for the plunge and kisses her. It turns sour when afterward Martha realizes he had his camera on and was filming the whole thing. The walks, the holding hands, it was all just a build up so that he could get a kiss on film. Martha is devastated, and embarrassed because everyone will see it on his film. And to make everything much more irritating, there was even a bet between Jimmy and his brothers as to how fast he could get the kiss from her.
Martha settles into a state of grim acceptance. She has fun. Relaxes. Almost dies...
She figures out a way to do something for Olive's mother, a gesture to soothe her own, sudden involvement in the drama. Recalling the part of the journal where Olive wants to see an ocean, Martha grabs a small, round jar. She goes to the ocean to fill the jar with water.
Wading into the ocean to fill the jar, she sees Jimmy walking along the beach. In embarrassment she tries to hide. The result is that she drops into the water and almost drowns. But she gets the water she needs.
In the end, this is a novel about one girl's discovery of a new world, a step into a different level of awareness. She goes beyond herself and starts thinking of others.
What makes the book click, however, is Kevin Henkes (author of the beloved Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse) ability to vary the style he uses words to convey emotion and feelings. During the part of the book where Martha almost drowns, there is one long run-on sentence to create the feeling of urgency.
The chapters are there to create a physical representation of a changing of gears. Perhaps a jump in time or a re-focus of the topic. Some chapters take up only a half a page, as that's all Henkes needed to create the feeling he wanted. Other chapters others are longer, but rarely go over a few pages. It's rare to see an author so unconcerned about getting chapters to be "appropriately" long, so Olive's Ocean is a breath of fresh air.
In general, this book's main target is girls who are pre-teen or just entering their teen years. Most males around that age will be unimpressed with the "lovey-dovey" aspects. However, older people who enjoy children's novels such as myself will appreciate this book also, male or female. After all, checking the book out at a library will cost you nothing at all. Unless you are like several of my friends and find that late-fees plague you like flies.
Olive's Oceanby Kevin HenkesHarper Children's Audio, 2004Review by Christian Perring, Ph.D. on Jun 4th 2004
Twelve-year-old Martha Boyle has a wonderful close family; her parents, her grandmother Godbee, her older brother Vince and her infant sister Lucy. They are from Wisconsin but they are on their annual summer vacation with at Godbee's beach house on Cape Cod. Her father has been looking after Lucy full time and trying to write a novel, but his writing hasn't being going well, so he decides to return to his job as a lawyer. Godbee suggests to Martha that it could be their last summer together. Martha gets a crush on one of the five Manning boys, Jimmy, who is staying just down the beach and plans to be a filmmaker. Martha decides she wants to be a writer. It is a time of transitions.
Kevin Henkes' story gets us into Martha's mind and the whirl of feelings she experiences. Most of the novel is fairly standard fare for young readers; the embarrassment of trying to speak to someone you have a crush on, keeping secrets from your parents, having adventures that you don't want to tell other people about, realizing that your grandparents are not going to live forever. However, the book starts with the death of a girl from Martha's class, Olive Barstow, who was hit by a car while riding her bike. Martha is given a page from Olive's journal and is surprised to learn that Olive liked her, even though she had hardly ever spoken to the girl. Olive's death gives Martha a sense of the fleeting nature of life and a need to somehow come to terms with the lost opportunity of knowing Olive better. This theme of loss mixed with realizing future possibilities makes Olive's Ocean a distinctive work. One of Martha's friends tells her "you think too much," but that is what makes Martha appealing. She is sensitive and reflects on her life in a meditative and even philosophical way.
Of course, her life is secure and privileged, and the drama in her life is modest. Olive's Ocean is pleasantly thoughtful, and it has won the award of being a Newbury Honor Book, but it is still rather bland and earnest.
The audiobook is performed very well by Blair Brown, who brings the characters to life with her different intonations. Occasionally chapters are introduced by a maudlin violin theme, adding to the morosely humorless feel of the book
Perring, Christian. [Book review of Olive's Ocean] Retrieved from: http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?id=2176&type=book&cn=174
Suggestions for Library Use: In most libraries and bookstores there adult fiction is divided in to genres, sci-fi, horror, mystery, etc. For children's lit the books are separated into picture book, fantasy, etc. This book should be placed in a new section aimed at girls, but not exclusively. Titles like Out of the Dust, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, etc. should be placed in this new section.
No comments:
Post a Comment