Wamb-Blog

“Room” by Emma Donoghue is an amazing book, it is a psychological trip, but it is an amazing read. It is narrated by an uneducated 5 year old boy who has lived his whole life in this room. His mother was kidnapped when she was 19 and was constantly raped eventually becoming pregnant and giving birth to the main character Jack. We are introduced to their life in this room, living day to day, finding ways to distract themselves from boredom but not to rot their brains. Eventually they escape by pretending Jack died and having the kidnapper Old Nick take him out in a rug to bury him somewhere, but he gets out of the rug and escapes Old Nick and gets help for his mother. After the police rescue his mother, Jack and her are admitted to a hospital where they are checked in and eventually move to a mental institution. Jack is not used to the world at all and needs a lot of time to adjust, while his mother is finally able to process what exactly she has gone through. Jack gets the hang of life outside of the room a lot quicker than his mom, and has to go live with his grandmother for a while. He explores the outside world, but his mother is still having trouble and eventually tries to kill herself. Jack continues to explore the world while his mother gets better, and she eventually does. After she gets better they both go and see the room they were trapped in for so long, for one final time. They say goodbye and are finally able to move on. “Room” is an amazing story, it has so many plot points I was not expecting going into it. I would recommend it to anyone who likes psychological thrillers, but you should stay away from it if you have problems with rape or suicide. “Room” is a great piece of literature and if it sounds interesting to you, you should check it out.

“Animal Farm” By George Orwell is a very crazy yet real story. It tells a story about farm animals being tired of how they are being treated so once they get the chance they decide to rebel against the humans. They kick the humans off the farm, and eventually make their own rules that basically state they are not going to be humans. It gets really crazy as the story goes on because the pigs eventually rule the farm. The farmer comes back with a group to take back the farm, and they lose. The story just gets better as it goes on, or worse if you decide to read it.

When I first read this book I wasn’t expecting much, but when I got to the end it really made me think about a lot of things. Especially all the references in the book about the Russian Revolution. The book was a very fast read, and it seems boring at first but it picks up real fast. I really do recommend this book to anyone who just wants to think, and wants to see how animals do ruling a farm. All of the plot twists really do get you thinking.

Also not really a trigger warning, but if you think the government is watching you DO NOT READ THIS!

“The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak is a deeper content type of book in my own opinion. This is because the book is narrated by death, yes, death. Death is the perspective we read this book from which can be a little confusing in the beginning part of the book. However, some of the main characters included a girl name Liesel, who is a little girl getting taken to a new home along with her brother — Werner. It starts off with them being on a train along with their mother. However, everyone is coughing on that train and so is her brother while he is on his mothers’ lap. At some point he stops coughing, Liesel realizes and comes to see that her brother is now dead. They have to stop the train and bury him, where as he gets buried the guard drops his handbook. This is where Liesel steals the handbook and gets her nickname from death — the book thief. Although she stole the book and others later on in the story, we come to find out that she is not able to read or write. Long story short, she gets taken to her new foster parents, where they come to find out that the boy had perished on their way to them. Her new mother– Rosa is very hard and aggressive with her, however we come to find out that she actually loves Liesel. Hans is her new father and he is very caring and gentle towards her. While living there she meets other children while in school and becomes best friends with Rudy who is obsessed with the famous racer Jesse Owens. All this is being taken place during World War II and the event of the Holocaust. These characters are all German but actually have some history with a Jew family. Later on in the story, a Jewish man comes for help to them because he is part of the family they have a connection with. Rosa, Hans, and Liesel try to hide him while trying not to draw to much attention towards the family.

I personally liked the book although it was very hard for me to understand in the beginning. It was very interesting and really good to me because of the historical events that were in the book (the Holocaust is something I was interested in learning about). While reading the book, it was hard to put down because of how interesting the book was. I heard that there was also a movie so that will be something I watch in the future while comparing it to the book. I heard that many people thought this book was life changing although I personally did not believe it was. Like stated before I did think it was good but I do not believe it was to the hype it was receiving. I personally would give this book a 4/5 and recommend it.

This book is the story of Ove, the typical old grumpy man, yet who is still somewhat friendly, who through trials and tribulations finds his peace with the world after a life of ups and downs. Backman uses flashbacks to tell this story, as the reader keeps reading about Ove’s childhood which is the past, and Ove in his present situation as a 59 year old man living in Sweeden. Ove’s first trial is his mother’s death which happened when he was 8. Next Ove has to deal with the death of his father when he was just 16. This left him the house to deal with all by himself. To make this summary briefer, Ove had to drop out of school in order to look out for his house and his own well-being so he could make money. These events were really the start of a spiral for Ove. He had to deal with things like job loss, suicidal thoughts, legal battles, neighbor issues, etc. Meanwhile, Backman doesn’t make this whole story negative. Ove also finds love throughout the story. The story truly is a full circle because it concludes with Ove finding true happiness in the world around him with the help of his newfound friends and neighbors. This book truly is a heartfelt piece and I feel like even though we as readers might not have been through as much as Ove, we can relate to the struggles and difficulties that life throws at us. Even though this story is fiction and made up, it is a realistic piece of literature which is typically not what I read. I would recommend this book to anybody who likes a bumpy ride of up and down emotions and also likes to relate to the book that they read.

“The Girl on the Train” by Paula Hawkins is about a girl who rides on the train every day and watches out on the people on the road next to her as she rides. She watches her ex-husbands road very closely. One night when she was drunk she went to her ex husbands house and believes she witnessed a murder. She sobers up to remember it as it went on and eventually solve the murder. I love this story and how it brings up alcohol and sobriety in the author’s life. I was able to predict one of the twists and not the other one. I really liked it and it was a good story that I would highly recommend.

The book “The Kite runner” explores the life of a wealthy Afghan boy and his servant that can basically  be considered his best friend. The wealthy boy and his servant were very social to each other but an event caused them to grow apart. The book follows the struggles of the rich boy who has betrayed his servant friend for his own good. The betrayal was stuck into his mind even after moving to a different country

I would personally recommend this book for those who want to learn about a different country. There is a lot to learn about the country and their culture. The book was not my usual genre and I only wanted to be able to explore more about different genres. It is not a normal book where the story is predictable and readers would have to fully understand. This book is fictional but his stories can also be relatable to students.

Trigger warning: This story has violence and has a mind-boggling plot twist.

“Gone Girl” is a psychological thriller by, Gillian Flynn that follows the married-life of Amy and Nick Dunne. Amy eventually fabricates her own mysterious disappearance because of her husband’s (Nick) infidelity. As Amy gives up her “old” and “trust-funded” life due to the 2009 Recession she finds revenge in her disappearance, murder, etc. by blaming it on her husband. The only way to find Amy is through their marital anniversary clues and personal “diary” entries that she had purposely made up. And as punishment for Nick he stays trapped in their marriage “for better or for worse.”

I personally loved “Gone Girl” and I honestly see where Amy Dunne was coming from, Nick was an awful person/husband. Not only did he cheat on Amy, and blame her endlessly for things that were not in her control, he also spent all of Amy’s money that had been trust-funded to her by her parents. To some Amy might be seen as a sociopath but I believe she was fed up with being the ideal woman for a man. “Gone Girl” is also a movie, which I feel depicts the main characters very well!

“Twilight” by Stephenie Meyer is about a girl named Bella Swan, who moved back to the town of Forks Washington to live with her father. After Bella moves in with her father she starts to attend Forks High School which is where she meets a mysterious stranger in biology  named Edward Cullen, but after her arrival Edward disappeared for a few days. After Edward had returned to school, Bella and Edward talked and sort of became friends besides the fact that Edward kept changing his mind about being friends with Bella. Later on the became friends but there was on little secret that Edward was hiding from Bella- he is a vampire. Later  Bella and some of her friends go to La Push Beach where they meet Jacob Black, who ends up telling Bella about stories of “the cold ones” leading Bella to discover that Edward is a vampire. After Bella discovers that Edward and his family are vampires, Bella goes to meet the rest of the Cullen family. Eventually Bella gets invited to play a game of baseball with the Cullen family during a thunderstrom. Then another clain joins the Cullens but then they realize Bella is human and the Cullens have to hurry and get Bella away from the other clain of vampires,but it was too late. James is a tracker vampire who already picked up Bella’s scent meaning he is going to track her until he gets her. In an attemp to lead James away from Bella, Edward and a couple of his family members put on a couple of Bellas jackets and run north while Jasper and Alice take Bella south, to Pheniox Arizona, where Bella grew up. After James realizes it was a trick and finds Bella in Pheniox . After James calls Bella and makes her think she is saving her mom by going to meet him at Bellas old ballet studio. After James leads Bella to the studio, he tries to drink her blood but Edward shows up and stops him from drinking her blood. But James still bites Bella. After James bites Bella Edward and his family lights James’ body on fire to kill him. After they kill James Edward then sucks the vampire venom out of Bella’s system to prevent her from becoming a vampire. Finally Bella, Edward and the Cullen family return to Forks Washington.

I do recommend this book. Although the beggining felt a little slow it got better and made the book a lot better. I love how at first Bella and Edward did not talk but as time went on they talked and got together and she even found out he was a vampire. I would 100% recommend this book!

“The Last 8” by Lauren Pohl is a science fiction novel that is full of plot-twists. The reader follows a teenager named Clover Martinez, who lives with her grandparents and is an MIT hopeful. This is all until the apocalypse starts with millions of aliens taking over the world and presumably killing everybody. Clover is left to roam the world by her lonesome until eventually she discovers she is in fact not the last human alive when she finds 7 other survivors. Clover helps shift this group’s thinking entirely and the story takes multiple completely unexpected turns.

To be completely honest I picked this book randomly, but after about 30 minutes I was hooked. The story kept getting more and more intriguing. Just about everything that happens in this book is completely unexpected. To be honest if you are not paying much attention while reading, you will likely get lost without many plot-twists there are. I would recommend this book to anybody who enjoys stories in apocalyptic settings or science fiction.

“The Fault in Our Stars”  by John Green is a story about 2 teens that both have an ongoing occurrence with cancer. Hazel Grace has lung cancer that has affected her life dearly. Because of this her parents forced her to go to a support group for kids that were experiencing the same things as her. Her first few times there she really didn’t like it, but soon started to connect with a few fellow group members where she soon meets Augustus through. Augustus is an amputee from his past cancer. Hazel Grace and Augustus romantically connect almost right away. From this relationship Hazel Grace realizes that her opinion on death could actually affect the people around her and not just herself. So when Hazel learns that Augustus’s cancer is coming back and this time too powerful in which it takes his life. Even though Hazel struggled with this hard loss she knows that Augustus had a big impact on her life and changed it for the better.

In my opinion, I thought that this book was pretty decent. It is a typical genre of book that I would read, but I would still probably only rate it a 3/5 because I have definitely read better. Overall it was a good book. I liked how strong of a character Hazel Grace played in the book, but she also had her ups and downs just like any other person. One thing that I wish didn’t happen was Augustus dying, but I know that it was necessary for the plot of the story.