Review of Ghost Town

When Dr. Bertram Pincus (Ricky Gervais), a dentist with a serious social problem, undergoes bowel surgery, he insists that anesthesia is used. But there is a problem with the surgery and he dies, but only for 7 minutes. When he comes out of the hospital, he meets a man named Frank Herlihy, who is a ghost. All of the ghosts are people who died with unfinished business . As Pincus embarks on his hilarious journey, will he overcome his social fears, and meet the girl of his dreams or will he forever be a jerk? Watch “Ghost Town" to find out! Review by Liz

Liz's Review of How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found

This story is about Margaret and Boyd, two completely different kids who are forced together when Boyd’s favorite superhero, the Ratt, and Margaret’s deceased father cause a mystery that seems impossible to solve. The cover of this book makes the book seem like fantasy, with the monster hands and the scary mansion, but it’s an almost believable story! I found this book hard to get into, but once you do, it’s a page-turner!

Disappearing

What reasons can you think of for why someone would want to disappear and never be found (besides the complicated reason in this book)? What would you have to do to make your disppearance work?

Trees

"I’ve always thought of trees as friendly spirits—you know, shade, shelter, photosynthesis—but these trees were not friendly at all. These trees seemed to resent the intrusion of the heavy concrete slab of road—and anyone who dared use it. " I have sometimes felt this way myself, when walking down a lonely road at night. Ever felt like this about trees?

Review of How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found by Sara Nickerson

Sixth-grader Margaret's life has gone downhill since her father's death. Her mother spends entire days lying on the couch in front of the TV, her younger sister is obsessed with "The Hardest Jigsaw Ever Made," which she takes with her everywhere, and their "Family Fun Day" involves going to the laundramat and the grocery store. So the girls know something is up when their mother loads them into their pick-up truck one Sunday, drives them a long way to a broken-down mansion at the end of a lonely road, and then plants a "For Sale" sign on the lawn. Boyd lives next door to the mansion and is obsessed with a series of hand-drawn comic books by an author named Ratt. He finds the comics at the local library which isn't really a library at all: there's no catalog, all the books are hand-written, and there are no patrons except for Boyd, who comes every day to get the latest Ratt comic, which will have shown up on the doorstep during the night. This is one of only two books that I know of that incorporate graphic novel sections into the text. The other is The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick, published in 2007. Margaret goes into the mansion when her mother isn't paying attention, and finds an unopened package addressed to her mother. It's marked Return to Sender, and Margaret takes it. When she opens it later, she finds a comic book, a swimming medal and a key to the old house. Margaret's father drowned, so when she finds out the championship swimming medal was his, she knows she has to find out what really happened to him. How could he have drowned if he was a championship swimmer? There are other mysteries, too. Who is in the old mansion and what is he trying to tell Boyd and Margaret? Is he trying to kill them or help them? He chases them out of the house, along with some growling, hairy monster they never really catch sight of, but he also leaves them pages from comics that chronicle whatever has just happened or is about to happen. This is a creepy mystery with lots of suspense.

Comment on Godless

I thought the book Godless was great except for the ending. The ending was VERY disappointing. This is because the author left the reader too many unanswered questions. I recommend this book to middle schoolers and up, but don't expect the ending to blow you away. Kate M.

Latest book choice available at the library

Pick up your copy of How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found from the display in the Young Adult dept.

This month's book

This month's book selection is How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found by Sara Nickerson. Ms. Nickerson says that she's always fantasized about disappearing, but she was nudged towards writing a screenplay (which later became a book) on the subject when she "happened upon the book, How To Disappear Completely and Never Be Found by Doug Richmond. I hadn't been looking for it, would never have imagined that it even existed...I'd just been killing time in a bookstore, wandering up and down aisles. It was a thin white book with a picture of one of those plastic noses and dark-rimmed glasses on the cover - a stand-up comedian's prop, a drugstore disguise. But this book was no joke. It was a genuine how-to manual for people who truly wanted or needed to escape. I couldn't believe I'd found it." (http://www.indiebound.org/author-interviews/nickersonsara)

Copies of the book will be available at the library soon. Review to follow.

Pete Hautman's Own Book Review of Godless

Pete posted this on his web site. Here's what he has to say about his report: "Feel free to copy and paste these book reports! They might get you a "C" or better in an eighth grade English class, assuming that: a) You find and delete (or correct) the three untrue sentences I have hidden in each book report, b) your teacher has not seen this web page, and c) your teacher has extremely low standards." If you find the mistakes, email us and let us know.

Book Report: Godless
Godless is the book that I read for this report. It is about some weird kids who decide to be water tower worshippers, so they start a religion called Chutengodianism. The book was written by Pete Hautman, who writes a lot of books and once ate 22 hot dogs in 15 minutes.The first thing that happens in Godless is that Jason gets clocked by a guy named Henry, who is smaller than him. Jason gets the idea then to start a religion, Pretty soon his friend Shin is into the religion too. Shin is even weirder than Jason and Henry. The best part is where they all climb up to the top of the water tower at night and go swimming and almost drown, and Henry falls off, and they all get caught.There is a lot of stuff about being Catholic in this book, which Jason is but doesn't like. They are always arguing about God and stuff, which might make some people uncomfortable, especially the part about cannibalism. There is also a bunch of stuff about snails and comic books. I thought it was a pretty good book considering that it is mostly about things that I am not interested in, and it had no sword fights or interesting creatures or cyborgs like on Terminator which is really cool. The only really amazing part in it was when the water tower speaks to Jason in his sleep and tells him to slay his parents. The book is not what you think it will be, because in the end the main kid, Jason, doesn't figure anything out, really. Instead he just gets more confused that ever, but at least his dad is less of a jerk than he was at first.300 words (including these).

Unusual religions

Ok, you think Chutengodianism is a weird religion, there's a temple in India devoted to rats.

What are some other strange religions you've heard of?

Should kids read books like Godless?

I think that this book was fine for people of all religions because the religion in the book was more of a joke that got carried out too far. This book doesn’t say anything disrespectful about any religion and doesn’t make fun of religions, or religious people. Liz