The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

I’m here writing this book review while also majorly multi-tasking. I never knew that I could eat Mr. Noodles, write a 5 paragraph essay and also help my sister draw a flower which is starting to look like a mutated animal. I’m doing great. I like how every minute I’m supposed to be doing something… I always have something to do. I missed school so much, even if it means less reading.. it means more things to fill up my time.

After living all her life in India, the spoiled child Mary moves to England to stay with her Uncle. Left by herself to explore the moor, and the huge property that he owns – Mary finds and learns things she could never have dreamed of when she was in India. She takes a turn for the better, and blooms like a beautiful flower in the secret garden that she adores so very much. What more does a child need than to be loved, have freedom, and most of all… get full breaths of fresh air straight out of the moor wind.                                                                                  

As you should know by now, I’ll read almost anything… so when I saw this children’s book on my friends bookshelf, I borrowed it right away. There’s nothing better than a nice classical read… especially (as I’ve said many times before) when the setting is in old England. And this book had such a great plot line… I kept on thinking that the garden would be discovered by the Uncle and that they would all be yelled at and banned and never aloud to go in there again. But no, it never happened. :]

One of the really big things that made this book likable for me, was the Yorkshire dialogue that was said. By the end of the novel, I was very confident that if a person came up to me and started to speak English in a very heavy Yorkshire accent, I would be able to understand it pretty darn well. A great read, whether you’re a kid or a teen.

I give The Secret Garden a 3.5 out of 5. I don’t know much about this author, but we can always learn! he doesn’t have his own website because he’s too ancient, but you know the deal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Hodgson_Burnett

Later Cheese Graters!

MRR

Looking for Alaska by John Green

Ahhh, I went through all of my things yesterday… so now I have extra room on my bookshelf. (An excuse for buying more books? –Hopefully) I finally feel like I’m getting somewhere with my piles… but then I think about school starting up again and I know that I’m going to be screwed in terms of time for reading. I promise that I will try my best though. :D

In search for something more, Miles ‘Pudge' Halter goes away from all he has ever known to attend Culver Creek, a boarding school in Alabama. Then he meets Alaska Young, the incredible and unforgettable Alaska Young. A girl who catches his eye from the start – and changes him as a person forever. Stuck in happily in the middle of the boarding school life, Pudge couldn’t feel more at home. But just when he had thought that he’d gotten Alaska figured out, everything changes… and nothing will ever be the same again.

When my dearest friend Erin first gave me this book while I was raiding her bookshelf at her mansion home… she gave me the worst summery of the book and I raised my eyebrows and she said, ‘Just read it!’. So I did read it. And I know that my summery is just as crappy as hers sounded like, BUT THIS BOOK WAS GREAT! A book that both boys and girls will love, although it is for more older readers.

There were many parts in this book that I would laugh out loud and anybody in the same room as me would just stare at me and give me one of those looks – those were the greatest parts. But this story also tells a sad part too, in which I almost (but did not) cried.

Now, I’m going to tell you a little something about myself.. because this novel really brought it up. The word ‘colonel’ is one of my least favorite words ever in the whole entire English language, because I never pronounce it correctly! I always say it how it’s spelt… and I was doing that the whole entire book until the very last page where I started thinking of the board game Clue… and then Colonel Mustard… all of a sudden, BAM. I was saying the wrong way in my head the whole entire novel. It made me SO angry. I tried to read the page again but I still couldn’t pronounce it  ‘kernel’ like it’s supposed to be.

Bravo, Green. You did a great job on this story, I really liked it. (I hope that a 4/5 is good enough for you Erin) This guy looks like kind of a nerd… he has weird YouTube videos on his website. http://johngreenbooks.com/

Later Cheese Graters,

MRR