WWRW! I finally read!

June was a good month for reading. I jumped back in with two feet. It was time to really really get back on track with the reading consistently and so I did. Which means I can link up with Jessica!

My best friend and C's Godmother went to Disney with her family and I was in charge of bringing in her mail. No big deal. She is a teacher librarian by trade so... she had a lot of children's books in her home. In the office area of her house she had a lot of Andrew Clements. I liked Frindle so I thought I'd grab a few and read them.


Things Hoped For

It wasn't until I put the book back on the shelf that I determined that in fact this is a sequel to the book Things Not Seen. Which might have been helpful only I doubt it because while I thought it was pretty ridiculous that this Robert (Bobby from the other book) character knew all about this going invisible thing and claimed it happened to him. It was really really random and not necessary to the plot of the story at all. But it was like Clements was like, "oh crap, this was supposed to be a sequel, I should add that invisible junk back in." A really strange book. Also we never find out if either Gwen or Robert make it into the schools of their choice which just seems wrong since it is the build up of the entire book.

And after knowing that the whole first book is about the invisible thing I have no interest in reading that. Weird. Like trying to be a sci-fi fantasy but not well... skip them. There's even ANOTHER one too, to follow this. Clements just needs to stop.

The Report Card/No Talking

Andrew Clements at his basic level. The man has a formula and it works. Similarly to Frindle, both of these books feature kids as the main characters trying to stick it to the man with some creative plan. The plan backfires and after a heart to heart with a trusted adult everyone is wiser and things go back to relative normal. Super quick reads but enjoyable.

The School Story

Similar to the Andrew Clements formula, but instead of trying to stick it to the man, the plan was just to work the system and get a book published without parents finding out. Enjoyable, though doubtable that a New York publishing house wouldn't be able to tell a book had been written by a twelve-year-old. Fun to read though. This one had a lot of heart. 

So the other part of reading again was beefing up mi library queue and getting on wishlists for books I'd like to read. I am smack dab in the middle of two that I really wanted to write about so expect a secondary linkup in the nearish future.  But I did finish one from this category.  

The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown

I don't know if I hyped this book up in my head or what, but I was expecting a lot more from it. It was not a bad book by any stretch of the imagination and I definitely continued to read. It follows the 1936 Olympic crew team from Washington and their development as a team. At the same time the book somewhat mirrors the boat's rise to power with the Nazi's rise to power and their propaganda. But after reading In the Garden of the Beast it was kind of a let down.

When you know perfectly darn well what is going to happen it takes phenomenal talent to keep you at the edge of your seat. This book had that in waves but not throughout I'm afraid. It was not a poorly written book and I did find myself invested in Joe Rantz especially. Worth a read but definitely one to get from the library and not spend money on.

Last but not least as it is now July I feel like I should remind the world about this:

If you ever were looking for a chance to join in a Harry Potter book club you're in luck! I am hosting one! It's just 135 pages a day!