Water for Elephants Redux (copy)

Do you ever return to a book for a second or third reading? My husband returns to the Charles Portis’ well every year when he rereads Gringos.

I recently reread Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen for the Reading Round Table sponsored by Sycamore Bank. The experience is comparable to watching a movie for the second or third time. You catch things that you missed in the first viewing like you miss in the book.

Unlike re-watching a movie, I forget so much in a book. For instance, I read Gruen’s book back in May of 2007 and completely forgot characters and plot. How in the world did I suggest it to anyone to read with my faulty memory? I am sure it was lame, something like, “It’s a good book.”

The prologue starts with a flashback from Jacob Jankowski. He remembers a turning point in his life as it unfolds over 60 years ago. In the memory the character August is killed. In my first reading I knew Rosie killed August, but in the second reading I was sure it was Marlena. Why such a discrepancy?

In the first reading I focused on the “redlighting” of roustabouts. To redlight a person is to throw them from a moving train. It can be certain death if the subject is thrown while the train travels over a trestle. I remember two episodes in the book where our hero, Jacob, is threatened with the custom by physically being dangled out the train’s car door. In the rereading, it only occurs once. Where did this extra episode in my head originate?

What happens to your brain when they make a movie and now all you see are the actors as you read? I habitually substitute actors for characters as I read. In Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series, I picture Sandra Bullock although she has outgrown the part. If a book features a little person, I see character actor Billy Barty. Morgan Freeman looms large in my reading, too.

It shakes my brain up to see someone placed in the part that is against character. Throughout Gruen’s book brunette Marlena is constantly moving one hand up to cover her mouth. Readers can guess she is either embarrassed about her teeth or afraid of what she might say. Reese Witherspoon is neither brunette, snaggletooth nor afraid to speak; thus, wrong for the part.

Ask me about the book and for the next few weeks and I will have lots to say before I drift back into, “It’s a good book.”

Water for Elephants Redux (copy)

https://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2011/09/d-o-you-ever-return-to-book-for-second.html

Me...Jane (copy)

I believe I hold in my hands the 2011 Caldecott winner. The winner and honors will be announced in January, but this one, published in April 2011, has to be sitting at the top of the committee’s stack.

The artwork has a sepia feel. The colors are brown, yellow and green with a cream background. The art leads the little reader’s parents down memory lane while the child experiences a little girl who carries her stuffed chimpanzee, Jubilee, everywhere.

Parents will be amazed at the 19th and early 20th century engraving, while the child seeing the same images might lift his pretend arm to trumpet like the elephant or tell her father the time from a pocket watch stamp. Included on three pages of this easy book is artwork by the subject herself. Our subject has a very detailed eye.

Inspiration can be found in the pages, but readers will have different experiences. Moms and dads will dream of their child’s future. Because my child loves to play with Legos, she will become the next great architect. Our boy makes the best mud pies! He is destined to be the next Julian Childs. The child reader may not make the same connection when they see a woman touching a real chimp at the end of the book.

Laying on the cool grass and looking at the birds in the trees our main character, Jane, dreams. This small act is enough to send any child running outside to commune with nature, but Jane is also curious. She takes Jubilee to the barn where they discover the origins of chicken eggs.

Jane creates puzzles with animals as answers and she starts the first ever Aligator Society! She might have had more participants had she spelled the glorified animal correctly.

Little Jane reads and rereads books about Africa. She is especially enthralled by the Tarzan series. She climbs a tall Beech tree with Jubilee hanging around her neck. Once she reaches the top, the two sit on a limb and she pretends to swing through the jungle.

Have you guessed whom I am referring to? It is Jane Goodall!

Mark my words. Come January the committee will announce to the world that Me…Jane is the 2011 Caldecott winner. Cartoonist Patrick McDonnell, producer of the syndicated strip MUTTS, will be thrilled with his award.

Me...Jane (copy)

https://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2011/09/mejane-copy.html

Freak the Mighty (copy)

Have you ever read a book that makes you pump your fists in the air in triumph? I finished Freak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick last night and although sad at the end there is still this feeling of unmistakable victory.

Max is our narrator and he begins telling his story by relating the first time he met Kevin aka Freak. Max had a nickname of his own, too. He was known in preschool as Kicker. Apparently, he lashed out at anyone who got near. Day care workers, mommies, and even children covered their shins when passing Max.

When Kevin came to preschool that first day he was not quite known as Freak, yet. He was the same size as all the other students back then and his crutches were so tiny they were hardly noticeable. Um, that was before he started hitting other people with them. Day care workers, mommies, and even children began to cover their shins when Kevin passed by.

The two bonded over the similarity noting that neither one ever kicked or whacked the other during the first week together. It was a nice week for both the boys, but then Kevin did not return the next week or the following week or until some years later.

It was the first day of seventh grade when Max, towering over his classmates, saw Kevin at the entrance. Then he lost him in the sea of middle school heads. Before long Max could hear the yelps getting closer as Kevin made his way down the busy hall by whacking those close enough to step on him.

Their differences were undeniable. Max had grown two feet taller than his peers while Kevin was only a slight taller than his preschool days. Max hardly ever spoke while Kevin was want for breath between sentences. Max was assigned the learning disabled classes while Kevin would enter the advance placement classes.

Max begins the book, “I never had a brain until Freak came along and let me borrow his for a while, and that’s the truth, the whole truth. The unvanquished truth, is how Freak would say it, and for a long time it was him who did all the talking. Except I had a way of saying things with my fists and my feet even before we became Freak the Mighty, slaying dragons and fools and walking high above the world.”

Trust me. You will raise your fists in solidarity!

Freak the Mighty (copy)

https://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2011/09/freak-mighty-copy.html

Unbroken (copy)

This week I got my hands on Laura Hillenbrand’s new book Unbroken and do not want to take them off. So much so that I ignore phone calls and annoying text chats so that I can read to the end of a chapter. Somehow laundry has magically been sorted, cleaned, folded, and put away while I immerse myself in the events. Oops, I confess. I take my hands off only to chew my nails to the quick!

Hillenbrand’s name may sound familiar because she wrote Seabiscuit back in 2001 that became blockbuster gold two years later. During the 10 years taken to write this new book, she remained in her bed. She suffers from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: possibly, choosing her subjects like racehorse Seabiscuit and foot racer Louis Zamperini as a way of vicariously exercising.

Unbroken begins with the ultimate in scary cliffhangers. Our running hero is lost at sea with two fellow crew members after the bomber they serve in crashes into the Pacific Ocean. Louis Zamperini is sharing a life raft with one serviceman while the other man lays tethered alongside.

During the 27 days, sharks circle and brush up against both rafts while they drift into Japanese-controlled waters. The men are burnt and displaying an odd color of yellow as their lifesaving floats deteriorates into a jelly-like substance.

The future looks gray until they hear the familiar noise of a piston engine. The men yelp and raise their arms to signal the plane as Zamperini launches two flares and pours orange dye into the water to attract the help. The plane passes by without acknowledging them.

But, wait a minute. It returns and begins to bank very low and close. Zamperini gets a good look into the man’s eyes before the plane opens fire on the stranded soldiers. All three jump into the water as their rafts take the pelting blows.

They pull themselves back into the one remaining raft as the plane circles for another run. Zamperini looks at the men and realizes they will be too weak to disembark for a second time as he enters the shark infested waters alone.

Argh! I will have to read 167 more pages to find out what happens because this is the opening preface! Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption delights.

Unbroken (copy)

https://maggiereads.blogspot.com/2011/09/unbroken-copy.html