November 15, 2015
Dear Students, This week I had every intention of telling you that I had taken a break from middle grades fiction, and that I had needed some time with adults. It is true. I did need some time in a book with adults. I bought and read a book from a favorite series of mine, with adult characters with whom I enjoy spending time. But I finished that book. Friday night I picked up a book that has been sitting on my shelf since December - Caught which is part of The Missing series by Margaret Peterson Haddix. I started The Missing series last winter after finishing Ms. Haddix’s wonderful series The Shadow Children. This time I wasn’t as entranced. The series begins with a wonderful mystery - a plane disappears, then reappears, and is filled with nothing but babies. No one knows where it came from, or who the babies are. Fast forward 13 years, and the children who were on that flight begin to get mysterious letters. “They are coming for you,” is the message -- but who are they and why are they coming? But then the author threw in time travel, and the paradox of traveling back in time to correct past crimes without harming history, and at that point I was less excited. The first couple of books involved periods of history that were not familiar to me, and they were hard to get through. Caught, on the other hand, was not hard to get through. In fact, I couldn’t put it down, and finished it before lunch on Saturday. You have heard of Albert Einstein, of course, but did you know that he had a secret daughter who disappeared? Or did she…. I enjoyed Caught so much that I immediately picked up the next book in the series, Risked. I’m almost through with that, so stay tuned….. Sincerely, Mrs. Hudson P.S. Please don’t call these books “the Haddix” books. I don’t know why the covers have the author’s name so prominently displayed, but Haddix is her name, not the series.
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Dear students,
Have you ever had a friend recommend a book that you waited and waited to read, only to discover that it really was a wonderful book? And you wondered why on earth had it taken you so long to read it? That was my experience with Rules by Cynthia Lord. Rules was a NC Battle of the Books book last year, which is a HUGE recommendation for a book. The books chosen for Battle of the Books are usually wonderful books, and everyone that I have read has been a treasure. The students who read the book raved about it as well. Everyone I spoke with said it was a wonderful book. So why did I let it collect dust for more than half a year? I have no idea. But once I picked it up, I couldn’t put it down. The main character is Catherine. She is 12 and has a little brother with autism. He can’t learn basic lessons simply by watching other people like the rest of us. He has to be directly taught things like, “Keep your pants on in public.” That is the basic premise to the book, all of the rules that David has to be taught every day. But through the book, other themes arise. Can you be friends with someone who is different from everyone else? Catherine has to wade through the difficulties of friends through this story, and learns that friends come in all shapes and sizes. I recommend this book to everyone. It helped me understand autism better, as well as the day to day challenges we all face in understanding those around us. What we think we understand about people may not be true at all. It is up to all of us to look beyond the surface to really understand those around us. Sincerely, Mrs. Hudson |
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November 2015
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