My Top 5

Book Review

Pirate Latitudes

By: Michael Crichton

Ahoy matees! Michael Crichton in his new book Pirate Latitudes is absolutely amazing. There’s action-adventure, thrilling sea fighting and best of all MONSTERS…….. To put it all in perspective Pirate Latitudes is nothing short of greatness. “The setting is the crown colony of Port Royal in Jamaica. Hunter, our dashing privateer, is an American -- coincidentally a Harvard man -- born in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. When asked by an attractive woman whether he's a Puritan, he replies, "Only by birth." You get the picture. Meanwhile, a treasure ship has arrived in the heavily fortified Spanish port of Matanceros, and Hunter is asked to capture it.”(New York Times, Janet Maslin) The plot is driven to the point of hallucination for the gold on the ship Hunter is trying to capture.  Like Maslin said earlier “coincidentally a Harvard man”, the mans no fool a privateer or not the guys pretty smart. 

" Hunter has assembled his piratical A-Team: Don Diego de Ramano, the Jew, is an explosives expert who makes fuses from rats' entrails; Mr. Enders, the barber-surgeon, is the best sea artist in Jamaica; Lazue, the transvestite, is a deadly markswoman who exposes her breasts in the heat of battle to disorient the enemy; Bassa, the Moor, had his tongue cut out, but he's just the man to scale a sheer 400-foot cliff of naked rock; and finally Sanson, the Frenchman, is "the most ruthless killer in all the Caribbean." (Book World  Ron Charles) Sanson, the Frenchman is an enigma. He has the personality of a fox he is sly and desperate. At the beginning he is Hunter’s friend but after he feels betrayed it’s a whole other ball game that plays deep into the plot of the story.

Crichton wrote this book as if he wanted people to believe that a single character was good but as soon as you started to believe it he flipped the script so fast you had to re-read the page just to understand. It was exciting but very annoying because most people would’ve thought something different was going to change. His style of writing is so unique to the eye; he glorifies one character then makes the character do a complete 360 in character development and personality. As Janet Maslin said “Crichton’s highly opinionated research and editorializing could give great polarizing energy to his narratives. But this is a straight-up pirate story, and its reach does not extend far beyond the Spanish-dominated Caribbean of 1665”. To me it’s saying that he couldn’t change the writing style or voice of a straight up pirate novel. It’s pretty hard to even write a good pirate novel and yet Crichton did an outstanding job at that.

To say that Crichton had ideas for novels was and is an understatement.  He has set the precedent for books to be written for many years to come.  “Unlike those earlier works, though, "Pirate Latitudes" comes to us with an unusual history of its own. The completed manuscript was "discovered" by Crichton's assistant in one of the author's computer files after his death, along with what's been described as an unfinished "techno-thriller." Lynn Nesbit, Crichton's longtime agent, told the Wall Street Journal that "Michael was extremely secretive. . . . We never knew what he was working on until he turned it in." (LA Times Tim Rutten)

For example in the book on page 254 “Hunter looked. To port, there was a churning beneath the surface and a phosphorescent object, blue-green and glowing, came streaking towards them. The dragon. Lazue said. The Dragon has been following us for an hour.” The writing is so stunning that you can picture the eerie feeling on board the ship and the agitation of being followed. On page 201 “ By midday Monkey Bay was burning hot and airless > Hunter, pacing heated decks of his galleon, feeling the sticky ooze OF SOFTEENED pinch beneath is feet, was aware of the irony of his predicament.” Again Crichton shows us not tells us the atmosphere aboard the galleon.

Pirate Latitudes is one of the greatest historical fiction novels I have ever read. Crichton is an outstanding author who is going too remembered as an author who brought readers together through the characters not as an author whom had egotistic few.

Charles, Ron. "Book World: Ron Charles Reviews Michael Crichton's 'Pirate Latitudes'" Washington Post. The Washington Post, 25 Nov. 2009. Web. 04 June 2012. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/24/AR2009112403201.html.

 

Maslin, Janet. "BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Vile Heroes and High-Seas Swagger." The New York Times. The New York Times, 23 Nov. 2009. Web. 04 June 2012. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/books/23book.html?_r=2.

 

Rutten, Tim. "'Pirate Latitudes' by Michael Crichton." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 26 Nov. 2009. Web. 04 June 2012. <http://articles.latimes.com/2009/nov/26/entertainment/la-et-rutten26-2009nov26>.

Blog Post 7

A book that is a non-fiction novel has to be true. That’s why it’s called non-fiction. If what is on the pages is not true then its fiction. It has to be like that because then the author misleads people that what they are reading in the  is true, and the author is disrespecting all the other non- fiction authors that stay true to the meaning of non- fiction. Another reason is authors that write non- fiction are doing so for a reason, telling a story of a personal account, raising awareness for some cause, not to make their book better for more money. That’s just low are so many levels. Half-truths are like a lie straight to the face. People that tell you something that is partially true are liars and are a disgrace. That is in my opinion what authors do when they write half true books and knowingly sell them. To me it does matter if Frey or Mortenson bent the story because that’s rubbing the genre of non-fiction through the mud. It’s as if  Lakota East came over and stomp on the M on Mason’s Football field. We don’t really need lines between genres but we need to have a clear distinction. You go half non- fiction and the other part fiction it just doesn’t work that way. I like that authors use their imagination to their full potential but we don’t need a thick black line between them.  It only matters to the people that are anal about the distinction and have to know if a books a non- fiction book or a fiction book. To me the only part that matters are if the author didn’t mix them together or overly stretched the truth in a non-fiction book, that’s all.

Blog Post: By Andrew Reinert :)

I think that’s its a personal choice of what’s a good book. Someone should not tell what a good book is and what isn’t. They don’t know what your preferences are that’s like saying you can only talk, eat and sleep at a certain time. That’s basically a totalitarian government because someone or a group of people are telling you what to do. You the person should the one and only person that decide what’s good and what’s not. For a school to decide what kids to read is so stupid. There should be a balance. For example still read Romeo and Juliet but then read a book like Hunger Games. There is an absolutely no need for just reading literary fiction. Kids then start to develop an unneeded hatred towards books. We were built upon books and we are destroying the basic foundation. It’s like building a house then destroying the basement. What will happen the house will collapse? And we don’t need for our house to collapse.  Why should kids read books? Children should read books because books in general help to develop imaginations. I grew up with Clifford the Big Red Dog. I loved it; my mom read me the same book every night before I went to sleep. I honestly believe that without my mother reading that to me I wouldn’t be the person I am today, because I love dogs and I always thought when I was like 7,8,9 that we were able a boxer that was all red. Every time we went to look I would always ask is there a full red dog. All of the memories were made from having Clifford being read to me. So yes I truly believe that kids should be rer or read books for their entire life. Now I’m not saying to read every day but do it some.

Hunger Games Video

Book Adaptation

Some specific challenges that a filmaker might have to adapating the book to the big screen are the right characters. No movie is great without right characters. Scenery is very difficult to depict from a story unless the author tells you what the background should be. Some scences that are important to keep are when Katniss volunteers for the games. A second is when the Hunger Games actually start. The third is when Katniss and Peeta when the Hunger Games. A couple of places that I would cut would be when Katniss and Peeta are on the train to the Capitol. Also another scene I would cut is when Haymitch punches Peeta.

Book 1 Project

Survivor

By: Chuck Palahniuk

Book 1 Project

By: Andrew Reinert

Idea:

Many times in the book the main character (Branson) would talk about life and death as if it were a game. So as a reader I inferred that the kid was absolutely nuts and needed help. But reading on I felt that the Branson was only trying to influence himself in a way of getting rid of the evil death cult he was raised. My idea to make a wider audience is to make a t-shirt that says “Live life as if you were dying the next.”

Connection/Quotes

One quote is “Testing. testing. One two three. Testing.testing.One,two,three. If you can hear me this is flight recorder of 2039, and we are across the Atlantic and are about to crash. Life sucked for me and death will be amazing.”(pg 1.)”  The connection is that he believes his life was a total screw up and he needs to redeem his life by dying for everyone that has hurt him. A second quote is “And after you can tell me your life story and walk away from it,” “Fertility says after that we’ll start a new life together and live happily ever after” (pg 6). This quote is the definition of irony because Branson can’t ever live happily ever after because he is going to kill himself since he believes that he must do so since he was brainwashed as a child that everyone must kill themselves. So it’s related because Branson had to live his life as if he was going to die tomorrow literally. A third quote is “Trevor Hollis, do your worst. I dare you, come and seek your revenge.” A connection that was made was that Branson had so much power because he basically owned a suicide hotline and he would persuade anyone and everyone who called to commit suicide because he thought everyone’s life was terribly and they could never escape it and have that little voice go away.

How Idea Works

I think my idea will work because look at the Harry Potter series they have clothing that mimics dress in the books and it proves that clothing will help widen the audience and will want new audiences to read the book no matter if they start to not like it they. The audience was still influenced by the t-shirt. So by putting the sentence “I will die today but live tomorrow” people be curious and will want to read the book because most people follow the in crowd and don’t want to stand out and not to be a part of the “cool” kids club. And by putting the sentence on t-shirts it will broaden the audience since people are seeing it. The same way it will broaden the audience it will draw book attention since again people are visually watching people wearing a t-shirt saying it. It also draws book attention by having media coverage because if there is media coverage most people will see and recognize the book and will want the book and t-shirt and would be probably hoping that the book becomes a globally recognized series and the author writes more and more books. It all started just from a small idea of putting that little phrase/sentence on a t-shirt and look where the author has gotten. The idea helps to encourage fans that like the book already because it shows that the author’s book was so popular that fans go crazy over the book and is causing mayhem over a book. In which proves that the t-shirt idea helped gain popularity with the reading public and media.

"This proves that a t-shirt promotes books and movies since this a playoff of Harry Potter


 

 





Its true kids want to show that they read the books and it also shows that it is very popular and the book is for many ages.

 The Book