Slumdog Millionaire by Vikas Swarup (Q&A) Book Review
This story grabs you by the collar pulls you right into the pages of the book and doesn’t let go until the very end. It drags you through the wild rush of modern India and leaves you wanting more. This story is narrated by Ram Mohammad Thomas, the orphaned waiter who is the star of this tale. His life is filled with horror and happiness, I was able to connect with him more than any other character.
I really cannot give away anything about the plot except what it says on the back of the book because if i do the story will not be as exciting as it was to me when I first read it. Ram Mohammad Thomas, has just won one billion rupees on the quiz show Who Will Win A Billion. But then he is thrown in jail under the suspicion of cheating. Because he is a kid from the slums, how could he know anything? The answers to each question asked comes from a specific event in his life. With each story he tells to his sympathetic lawyer one more puzzle piece is put in place. The end result is something beautiful, a romance, a thriller, an adventure, a drama, and everything else woven into one beautiful tapestry of life.
(By the way that was originally written by me not taken of someone else)
Here is the first page of the prologue:
“I have been arrested. For winning a quiz show.
They came for me late last night, when even the stray dogs had gone off to sleep. They broke open my door, handcuffed me and marched me off to the waiting jeep with a flashing red light.
There was no hue and cry. Not one resident stirred from his hut. Only the old owl on the tamarind tree hooted at my arrest.
Arrests in Dharavi are as common as pickpockets on the local train. Not a day goes by without some hapless resident being taken away to the police station. There are some who have to be physically dragged of by the constables, screaming and kicking all the while. And there are those who go quietly. who expect, perhaps even wait for, the police. For them, the arrival of the jeep with the flashing red light is actually a relief.”
I personally think that this piece of narrative is extremely strong and is one of the best in the book. The expression of emotion in this book is very well done and is one of the reasons that kept me reading it. The book has something about it that will keep you reading, and it will not let you have any sleep. Vikas Swarup has spun a tale finer than any other.
If you are planning on reading this book I highly recommend it but you have to bee pretty mature to take it all in. DO NOT LET ANYONE READ THIS BOOK WHO IS UNDER 11 PLEASE!
Thanx and see ya!
My Literary Magazine Competition Story
Death
By Alexander Whiting 6C
The darkness is just creeping up on me. A cold lonely darkness. I hear ambulance sirens in the distance, blaring so loud. I feel my life just slowly slipping away… I think I’m scared. I tilt my heavy head to the right to find my crumpled car… It‘s nothing special, just a car. I hear yelling and screaming. Chaos.
As a child I would find myself thinking about death. I would ask myself is it scary, or am I just going to fall into a peaceful eternal sleep. Death must be what is going to happen to me soon. I can feel the warm blood on my body. I thought I was scared but that wasn’t the right emotion. I don’t know what emotions are running through my head. Maybe I feel lost.
I don’t think many people will attend my funeral. I’m only 32 and I have no family members left. I’ve never had a girlfriend, all my childhood friends are somewhere in the world, they probably have better jobs then me. I just work in a small cramped little office. Maybe my boss and a few co-workers will attend my funeral. I don’t think there will be any tears.
I think the ambulance is here now. I’m being put on a stretcher and I think I’m in the ambulance. I feel my already terribly ripped clothing being taken off. My cuts are being cleaned up, I think. The ECG is being connected to me now. I hear it coming to life. The beeping, It’s echoing through my head.
I remember my dear mother and father. They were such nice people. They taught me many lessons and always comforted me. They died the same way I think I’m going to now. They died when I was 6. I cried too much when that happened. I went to live with my aunt after that, she was a nice woman. She read so many wonderful stories to me.
The stories she read to me inspired me to do great things when I grew up. I never got to do anything like that. I aspired to travel the world and see all the majestic beauties of our planet. I’ve never even left my birth country.
That wonderful woman died when I had just finished high school. I felt as if all the happiness around me had died. My childhood came crumbling down. And I wanted to live my dream for her, which I’m never going to get to do. My beautiful aunt, I hope I join her wherever I end up.
The darkness is advancing. Swallowing me up. Faster, faster, faster. The ECG is beeping slower now. I feel weak. I don’t hurt anymore. The beeps are dying, dying with me.
I feel like I’m falling. Falling through thoughts and memories. Everything is rushing into my head, all the things I had done, everything in my mind, was just jumping to life for the last time. I now knew the rights and wrongs of everything I’ve done. Everything now clicked into place. I don’t know why, it just did.
The beeps are slowing down; I’m getting closer and closer to my final moments. The dark is ready to shut me out… Goodbye, I’ve played my final hand.
Then David Sheppard died.
1-Month Latter…
“He always talked of traveling the world. Now he will get to.” David’s boss whispered as he pushed a coffin of the shore of a beach. The strong tide pulled the coffin out to sea. The sun shone over David’s coffin as it floated over the crystal sea. Now David will get to fulfill his dreams. David’s colleagues waved goodbye to the coffin. David was very wrong; there were tears.
THE END
Grade 6 Mythology Comic Project
For this project we will have to write a comic strip featuring a famous myth. As a part of it we have to post a blog with useful websites about comic making.
This website is called All You Need To Know About Cartooning. It has sections about the materials you need, the creative process, adding life, adding actions, and marketing tips. I don’t think we really need the last section. This can be used to do some basic comic strips but I think I will be able to find it useful during the project.
D.Gray-Man is a manga set in a imaginary 19th century which is alive with demons “Akuma” (japanese for demon) and the heros Exorcists. Now when you hear the word exorcist you probably think OUT WITH THY DEMON I BANISH THEE! No, that is not what happens in this manga. In this manga the Millennium Earl who was destroyed a long time ago has come back to bring a second great flood (Noah’s Ark). The protagonist Allen Walker is a teenage boy who happens to be an exorcist and it was said in a prophecy that he would be the destroyer of time (Time is related to millenium which is related to Millenium Earl). This story shows a good good vs. evil type story line which is the kind that I love because a lot of the time the characters will be faced with a great evil which threatens them their friends and everyone around them. You have great action a great story and lots of good humor. This is a link to the wikipedia page for D.Gray-Man.
This third website focuses more on writing comics and is more in depth then my first website which was pretty much the basics. In this website the writer focuses on what you need to write and what you don’t need to write it gives examples of comic scripts and the different ways you can write them. Here’s the link.
DOCTOR WHO! Voyage Of The Damned Review
If have not watched Doctor Who you will probably not have the slightest idea about what I am talking about so I will attempt to explain the series. Doctor Who is about the many adventures of a alien Time Traveler called The Doctor who travels time in his TARDIS. The TARDIS appears to be a Police Box from the outside but is much bigger and grander in the inside. On his adventures with his companions he fights many monsters and solves many problems.
“A spacecraft set on an apocalyptic collision course with earth, a host of killer robot angels and an evil severed-headed mastermind-it’s just another Christmas for the Doctor…” That quote pretty much sums up this Christmas special of Doctor Who.
The special had to many deaths which made it a tad less enjoyable. The ship gets hit by meteorites because the captain magnetized the hull causing many offscreen deaths, That is followed by the death of a steward who opens a door to be sucked into space, then the death of one of the passengers Morvin Van Hoof he steps on a weak piece of the ships wrecked metal catwalks above the nuclear engine of the ship and falls in, then in the same place a small alien cyborg with no hint of human genes called Bannakaffalatta sacrifices him self by using the energy in his cyborg structure to destroy the homicidal robot angels. I’m not finished yet! Next Morvin’s wife Foon ties herself to the last surviving robot from Bannakaffalatta’s attack and jumps into the nuclear engine. Then near the end of the episode the character Atrid also sacrifices herself by ploughing the evil mastermind of the episode off of deck 31 and into the ships engine using a forklift. This does create a certain atmosphere.
David Tennant as always does a great job as The Doctor and provides many great moments. One of my favorite quotes come from this episode. “I’m The Doctor. I’m a Time Lord. I’m from the planet Galifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous. I’m 903 years old and i’m the man who is gonna save your lives and all 6 billion people on the planet below.” Those few lines are performed and spoken with much strength making it a memorable part of the special.
I don’t think that it was the best Doctor Who special but it still had some very good scenes and quotes. The story was not the best of the series because of the many deaths and the fact that it was one of those big disaster movies but the ending made me smile and David Tennant’s acting is always AWESOME!
The Firm by John Grisham
I am currently reading The Firm by John Grisham.
Mitchell McDeere is fresh out of law school and one of the top students in his class. He comes across a tax firm in Memphis that offers him a dream job. The money flows in but something suspicious is happening, the FBI shows up and Mitch finds himself in the middle of a mob family and a hard place.
If you like the works of Dan Brown you will like this.
English Class: Roald Dahl Character Project
For my Roald Dahl Character Project I choose Mary Maloney From lamb to the Slaughter!
Poems From The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy By Tim Burton
Stick Boy and Match Girl in Love
Stick Boy liked Match Girl,
He liked her a lot.
He liked her cute figure,
he thought she was hot.
But could a flame ever burn
for a match and a stick?
It did quite literally;
he burned up quick.
Staring Girl
I once knew a girl
who would just stand there and stare.
At anyone or anything,
she seemed not to care
She’d stare at the ground,
She’d stare at the sky.
She’d stare at you for hours,
and you’d never know why.
But after winning the local staring contest,
she finally gave her eyes
a well-deserved rest.
Stain Boy
Of all the super heroes,
the strangest one by far,
doesn’t have a special power,
or drive a fancy car.
next to Superman and batman, I guess he must seem tame.
But to me he is quite special,
and Stain Boy is his name.
He can’t fly around tall buildings,
or outrun a speeding train,
the only talent he seems to have
is to leave a nasty stain.
Sometimes I know it bothers him,
that he can’t run or swim or fly,
and because of this one ability,
his dry cleaning bill is sky-high.
Stain Boy’s Special Christmas
It was clean and well pressed,
comfy and warm.
But in few short minutes,
(no longer than ten)
those wet, greasy stains
started forming again.
Are Field Studies Needed?
I think so.
It’s important that we get to go out and experience camping and Hiking. It’s good that we get to experience good times with our friends, make new relationships and just to have good plain fun.
I think it’s important to get out there and go learn differently!
Hatchet Book Review
Plot Summary:
On his way to visit his father in canada Brian’s plane crashes in the wilderness. All he has is a hatchet, a broken watch, some good tennis shoes, a quarter, three dimes, a nickel, two pennies, a twenty dollar bill, and himself.
How is he going to survive???
Comments:
The book wraps you up and pulls you straight into the canadian wilderness where brian has been stranded.
The writing style shows Brian’s thoughts very well and you will feel like he’s your friend and you’ve known him all your life.
I highly recommend this book!
Rating 9/10
Middle School
Middle school.
It’s been quite good so far. My test scores so far have been:
A
A
B
B-
I think those test scores are pretty good!
Now the subject of survival.
My drama teacher says almost everything as a put down. But he is very sarcastic so it’s kind of hard to tell if he is joking or not.
My science teacher is very nice people just don’t think that. It is always “OH NO I AM LATE FOR SCIENCE!” but i just make sure i get to class on time.
I am realy enjoying middle school! YEAH MIDDLE SCHOOL!
