Homeschool Friday: September 23-27 2013 {Week 4}

We are now at the end of week 4 of our school year, meaning there are only 34 left to go (that sounds like kind of a lot). You might have noticed today that the Summer Reading 2013 page up top went away, and was replaced with 10th grade curriculum. That way, if you are curious about any of the curriculum I am currently using, or see in a post that I did two lessons of math, and are curious what math program, you can now find out!

History
I finished Beowulf, and worked on a writing assignment about Christian and Pagan influences throughout the poem. I did not do as much work as I would have liked, but I think it should be fine.

Science
I did a lot of science this week. I've been reading mostly about minerals and mineralogy.

Spanish
I got stuck early in the week with an exercise where I needed to learn the alphabet. I can't move on until I have it down, and I'm not remembering any part of it, not matter how many times I listen to it on the CD.

English
I've moved into a section on verbs, but I didn't get a lot done in English this week.

Math, Rhetoric, ect.
In math, I did about five lessons, which is good, but not enough to get me caught up. In Rhetoric, I've been continuing to work on a chapter about definitions.

Well, there's not a lot to talk about this week. Mostly just more of the same. I'm going to try to get some more Rhetoric done tonight if I can, and then maybe some math and English this weekend if I have time, which I very well might not. We will see how that all goes. I posted this late today, because I wanted to see how much school I got done today. Hopefully next week will be a little more interesting.

Don't forget I'm going a Q&A post soon, so if you have any questions about homeschooling (or really anything else) for me, please let me know, and I will answer them.

Cutlass: Ten Tales of Pirates {Book Review}

Today I'm reviewing Cutlass: Ten Tales of Pirates , which is an anthology of short stories featuring pirates, written by various authors.

As a collection, I enjoyed this book, though I feel that the quality of the stories varied quite a bit. Many of these stories are quite enjoyable to read on their own, and are the perfect length to read quickly, but still be satisfying.

I particularly enjoyed the final three stories in the book. Broadsided by KJ Kiegan featured fantastic of characters, good back story, and strong emotional ties between characters. The Pensioner Pirates of Marine Parade by Jonathan Broughton had a unique premise, and a surprising ending. The Book of Adventures by Douglas Kolacki was my favorite of all the stories. It took the theme (pirates), and turned it on its head. It was unique, enjoyable, and well developed.

I do have one criticism that goes for many of the stories in this book (though not for the ones mentioned above). Many of them felt like longer stories shoved into a short story format. This was particularly true with Khalballo by Margo Lerwill, and with Diamonds and Bones by Kris Radcliffe. They both had a good idea, but they became confusing because there was so much back story left untold, and too much action for the shortness of the story.

Overall, I recommend this anthology to anyone who particularly enjoys pirate stories. There is a good variety of classic pirate stories, historical ones, and a few that break out of the genre completely. As a reader, I think that short stories are a great but challenging form for prose, and some of these authors did better with it then others.


 I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

*This post contains affiliate links. 

NaNoWriMo - It's Coming!

For the last two years, I have participated in National Novel Writing Month each November. Basically, the idea is to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. So far, I've successfully done it twice, and I'm excited to go at it again this year.

Last year, I worried a lot about the story, and ended up totally switching gears 20k words in because I didn't really like what I had done. This year, I'm going to try to forget the story, and focus on writing. While the story is obviously important, I'm not going to do any planning AT ALL (pantsers FTW!), and I won't even have any idea what I'm doing until the day before. How am I going to do that? A few years ago, I received the Storymatic as a gift, but have never really used it. It's a box with two types of cards: character cards, and plot cards. Character cards are things like: wrestler, servant, animal psychic, or mascot for a professional sports team. The plot cards are things like: shouldn't have touched it, nobody is watching, flat tire, or fear of getting old. I like them because they give you lots of freedom, but still get your creativity going.

My plan (at least so far, things could still change), is to pull a two or three character cards, and one or two plot cards on Oct. 31. That will give me some time to think about how I'll incorporate them all into my story. Then, whenever I need something new, I'll pull a new card. The story I end up with will be totally ridiculous, and the plot will probably be full of holes, but that's okay. I'm not writing this story because I want to publish it. If I did, things would be different. I'm writing to write. I want practice writing, and practice with being flexible with my story.

During November, I'm going to be pretty busy trying to keep up with school and NaNoWriMo, so I might not have a lot of time to blog. I will try to blog twice a week (on Fridays and Saturdays), once to do my weekly school wrap up, and once to do a NaNo update. I might have time to write some posts ahead of time and publish them through out the month, but if not, I'll be back to regular posting in December.

I know November is still a ways away, and I'll probably post a few more NaNo planning posts before then. In the meantime, I do have some posts planned. I will be reviewing a short story anthology tomorrow, along with my usual school update. Doing those updates has helped me do more, I think, because I don't want to say that I didn't get anything done. I want to tell you about all the amazing work I did. :)

I also have two more posts in the My Favorite Things series coming up in the next few weeks, and another book review coming up sometime next week. I also thought it would be fun to do another homeschooling QA post, so if you have questions about homeschooling (or other things, it doesn't have to be just homeschooling), please let me know so I can get that post started! I'll be asking for questions on Google+ today as well.

Also, this blog now has a twitter account! If you use twitter, follow me @RWGHBlog to be updated when new posts are published, and to hear about books I love, and other fun literary stuff!

Banned Books Week 2013

Today is the beginning of Banned Books Week, and I'm celebrating with a round up of posts I've written in the past about Banned Books. This spring, I did this series about banned books, which came in seven parts:

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four 
Part Five
Part Six
Part Seven

Just a few days ago, I wrote a post about the censorship of a book I particularly like.

Also, check out this fun interactive list of this year's most banned or challenged books. How many have you read? I've read 8 out of the 41 on the list. This list repersents the most banned books of all time. I've read 8 out of 44. Finally, this list is the most challenged books of the 1990's. I've read 28 out of 100 there.

Let me know how many of these commonly banned or challenged books you have read. It makes me so sad to see these lists, because some of my all time favorite books are quite high on many of these lists.

I believe that there will always be people who try to ban or censor books. But remember, knowledge is power. Books are so important. They keep us from becoming like the people of Fahrenheit 451 (a favorite, often challenged, book of mine): empty, and tied up constantly with the most trivial of matters. They did not care about life, because they saw no meaning in it. There was no point that they could see because they knew nothing but the small constraint they had created for themselves. Books give us the power to see beyond our own time and space. They allow us to travel the world, and through time. They help us find meaning.

I don't believe is forcing books on people, and if people do not wish to read these books, they should not read them. I don't, however, think it is at all appropriate for these people to tell me what I can and can not read. That is a decision for me to make.

*This post contains affiliate links.

Some Thoughs On Books, YA Lit, and Censorship {Eleanor and Park}

Earlier this morning, I opened up my blog reader, as I so often do, and found this post. The post (which is from one of my favorite websites), talks about lots of interesting and fun things, but there were a few things which stood out to me. Go look over that post, and then read what I have to say. I'll quote it a little, but I don't want to steal their thunder.

The Parents Action League of Minnesota's Anoka-Hennepin school district is working to ban Eleanor & Park—a book supposedly “littered with extreme profanity and age-inappropriate subject matter”—from the high school reading list. Here’s what author Rainbow Rowell had to say about the situation. NPR even weighed in on the issue.

This is the section I want to talk about.  Now, please go read each of the three links. The first from a school district explaining why they wish to ban Eleanor and Park, and book that I read, loved, and reviewed, this spring. The second is an interview with the author, and the third is an NPR book critic's very thoughtful comments on the issue. I'm not going to just reitrate what they said, though that would be easy to do. Instead, I'm going to discuss this issue from another point of view: as a teenager, the exact group of people these ADULTS say should not be reading this book.

The first complaint these people had was about the profanity. Honestly, it really didn't bother me. Swearing is something that I'm used to seeing in books, but that does not mean that I like it, or never mind. There are plenty of books that I have read that used swearing as a tool, to show that they were cool, or to emphasize a point, and I don't like that. The profanity in Eleanor and Park is honest and real. It feels real, and makes a subtle point about the teens at the high school.

The second complain is about the story. They say that it is inappropriate for teens to read about the events in the book. It didn't bother me. More then that, these things that people complain about are some of what I liked the best about this book. It feels REAL. I don't want to read about sugar coated teens who never drink, or swear, or have sex, and who have perfect home lives. Why? Those people aren't real. They feel fake. Eleanor is an amazing character. Yeah, her situation sucks big time, but she makes it through. Her relationship with Park is heartbreakingly sweet, and yet so sad, and all so, so real.

For me, the real bottom line is that I don't think books should be banned. I don't think anybody should be required to read Eleanor and Park, but I think anybody should be able to. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and for the parents who wrote that article don't want their kids to read this book, it is their right to enforce that in their own home. But I think that that book should still be available to all those teens to wish to read and enjoy this book.

On an unrelated note, that same FYA article linkd to this awesome list of the 25 best YA books featuring LGBTQ teens. I've only read 5, but there really are some pretty great books on that list if you're looking for something to read.

Homeschool Fridays: September 16-20, 2013 {Week 3}

Wow, it's the end of the third week of our school year already! I ended last week a bit behind, and I'm ending this week the same way. Luckily, I actually did a little more then a week's work, so I'm less behind then I was. As confusing as that sounds, it means that progress is being made! In these posts I'm going to focus more on the topics I'm covering, and the things I'm learning rather then the number of lessons or chapters I completed.

History: Middle Ages
History has been tough this week. I have read all but about 30 pages of Beowulf, and I hope to have it finished this afternoon. The version I'm reading is a very literal translation, and I've found it to be a bit of a struggle to understand. I also did a little research on Germanic tribes (Goths, Vandals, ect.), and did a small writing project. I also had a map on the Viking expansion to complete, but unfortunately, I don't think that's likely to get done this week. Next week, I hope to do the map, write an essay on the Christian vs. pagan influences in Beowulf, and begin the textbook reading on the spread of Islam.

Earth Science
I did a LOT of science this week, and am finally finished with all the intro stuff, and the section on maps. Hopefully that means things will start getting a little more interesting next week.

English, Vocab, Rhetoric
For English, I was a bit stalled out at the beginning of the week, and am still a lesson behind. Vocabulary is pretty easy, though I still have a a few paragraphs to write for this weeks review assignment. Rhetoric was a VERY long lesson on definitions, which I only did about a third of. Since there are only 25 lessons in the book, I can affoard to slow down and spread these long lessons out over several weeks.

Math and Spanish
For math, I'm just plodding along. I'm about a lesson behind where I want to be, but I'm not too worries about that. For Spanish, I did some number practice, and learned a lot of pronunciation rules.

That's it for this week! I have a lot of other thing I want to talk about today, but I think I'm going to make them into a separate post. Expect another post later this morning!

My Favorite Things: Blogs

This post is kicking off a series I'm calling "My Favorite Things." Since I already talk a lot about books and stuff on here, this is going to be a chance for me to talk more about some of my favorite things I don't usually discuss. Today, it's blogs, and over the next few weeks I have plans for posts on computer games, YouTube channels, and basically all the other fun stuff I do that takes up too much of my time. :)

Today, I'm going to highlight a few blogs I like to read. Honestly, I have way too many blogs that I check on regularly, and many more then that in my RSS feeder. Because of that, I was pretty worried when Google Reader was retired, but I've since been using Feedly, which works okay, though I don't love it.

I'm going to separate these blogs into categories, since I tend to read blogs for a few reasons: homeschooling blogs, blogs of people I know, and reading or writing blogs. Some of the blogs of homeschool families I follow have very different values and beliefs then my family, which is one reason I find them so interesting to follow. Also, many of the blogs of people I know are actually homeschooling families.

Blogs of People I Know

A Baker's Dozen and Apollo XIV

A Time for Every Purpose

Boots Before Corset

The Smog Blog

Book and Writing Blogs/Websites

The Office of Letters and Light

History of the (Whole) World

Read More! (this one almost fit in the people I know category, but I decided to leave it here.)

Pretentious Title

Forever Young Adult

Go Teen Writers!
 
Homeschool Blogs

Life In a Shoe

Large Families on Purpose


As I said before, I read MANY blogs, but these are some of the highlights. What blogs do you read?

Bites: Ten Tales of Vampires {Book Review}

Today I'm reviewing Bites: Ten Tales of Vampires, a collection of ten short stories featuring, you guessed it, vampires! While I read each story, I jotted down some thoughts, reactions, and feelings, some of which I will share with you after I talk a little about the anthology as a whole.

As you might know, I'm a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Angel fan, so I've got a bit of a soft spot for a well done vampire story. I do feel that the sparkly vamps have taken over a bit recently in a way I'm not fond of, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect with this book.

What I found was a terrific amount of variety. While none of the vamps in this anthology sparkled, there were a few stories, particularly Tangled Dreams by Liv Rancourt that reminded me of that variety of vampire. On the whole, I liked how different all the stories where, and the very unique mythologies many of these authors created within this not exactly new genre.

My very favorite story has to be Reality Bites by Jim Bernheimer. It was funny, but felt real, and good, distinctive characters. A close second was Why I Won't Read Song of Solomon by Douglas Kolacki. It featured a totally different variety of vampire (hint: they don't drink blood), which was refreshing, and the ending felt so, so human. I also really enjoyed Night Train by Rayne Hall, which had a wonderful writing style, and a surprise ending I enjoyed.

Since there are some many different authors here, my few critiques are about individual stories, not the book as a whole. The Fledgling Doubt  by Lana Bange was a story I wanted to like, but found too confusing. It is a story that would have benefited from a little back story.

If you find the vampire genre interesting, but are perhaps not sure what to think of the modern vampire novels, I would give this story a try. Most of the stories are relatively tame, but remember, this is a vampire anthology, so there is going to be blood and death, though two of them: The Dhampir's Kiss by Carole Ann Moleti and Exile by April Grey, include sexual content some may not wish to read.

I have a lot of fun post planned for the next few weeks, so stay tuned!

  I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Lord of the Rings

This is not going to be a book review, or a movie review. It's just going to be a collection of thoughts I have after watching most of the LOTR movies in about 12 hours. I was at a super fun sleep over with some friends where we planned on watching all of them. I, unfortunately, starting feeling pretty sick during the beginning of Return of the King, and missed a lot of the 1st half because I wasn't able to concentrate, and the noise and lights where making me more nauseous. I ended up going home half way through the movie, as I kept feeling worse. I still feel a little out of it, though I feel a lot better. So, my thoughts aren't really going to include the last movie, since I kind of phased out/missed it entirely.

Anyway, my friend has the extended movie version, which meant that the three movies were a total of 11 hours! Yeah, it's a lot. I did find that watching them continuously like that is a different experience then watching them over the course of a few days or a week (which is what I have done before).

First thing is that I have never seen the extended version before (the one we have at home is the normal version), and I didn't really notice any differences. I think it was really just the same, but more. Longer battle scenes, more scenes panning out over the scenery, ect.

Random thoughts and movie images:

1. I'd forgotten how old Aregorn was! I had thought he was as old as he looked (thirties, forties), not 87!

2. Orlando Bloome is super cute, even with long blond hair and pointy ears:

Though I will say that I think he's cuter like this:

3. Well, that got off topic... Also, I can't seem to fix the formatting so that there isn't so much space there. Annoying.

4. Okay, I think I should just quit with this. This wasn't much of a LOTR themed blog post like I intended, but that's okay. I haven't actually eaten anything since a few bites of cake at about 11:00 pm last night (what with feeling sick and all. When I don't feel well, my appetite goes away completely), but I probably should.

Homeschool Friday: Sept. 9-13, 2013

This is the first week in my new HF series. I'm going to quickly go over each school subject, and talk about what I've done, and what I hope to do next week. Just so you know, most weeks will have much longer posts. I'm heading to a friends' house for a sleep over in a few hours, so I don't have a lot of time. I also didn't do too much in school this week, so this post is going to be more about goals. Also, which subjects I cover will change week to week, depending on if I did anything interesting. I'm not including English this week, for example, because all I did was two lesson on paragraphs in the book. Not interesting.


History
For history this week, I did a map of the Barbarian Kingdoms, and did some research on some of the tribes (the Burgundians, the Visigoths, the Ostrogoths, ect.). I also started reading the introduction to Beowulf. My goal for next week: Finish Beowulf.

Earth Science
I didn't get as much done here as I would have liked. I am going over the different types of Earth Science (Geology, Astronomy, Meteorology, ect.), but I only did about half of what I would have liked. My goal for next week is to do four lessons (a lot, but doable).

Spanish
This was my very first week of Spanish, and I only did some basic stuff. I learned some phrases like "Hello" "Goodbye" "How are you?" "My name is..." and the numbers. Next week should be more of the same.

Other Subjects
I did one lesson out of my Rhetoric book, which was quite interesting (it was about the four idols of Francis Bacon). I actually hope to write a blog post about it soon. Latin has been a struggle to find time to do, but I hope to dedicate more time to it next week. I got a bit stuck on one math lesson this week, so I didn't do as much as I would have liked, but I think I just need to watch the lesson again, and give the problems another try. My goal is to do five lessons next week.


Well, there you go. Is this boring, or do you find it interesting? I would like to know. Also, I know I've been talking about lesson and things with out explaining what curriculum it is, which might be confusing if you're actually trying to follow it (are you?). My goal is that every week to talk about he curriculum for one subject, along with everything else.

I've got to go attempt to get some school done before heading off for a fun party at my friend's house (the goal is to watch all the LOTR movies in a little less then 24 hours, and hopefully have time to sleep and eat. Impossible? Time will tell.).

Life Update! {More Blog Stuff, School, Books, and the Future}

Today, I'm just here to post a quick update on what I've been up to. I'm going to divide this post into sections for easier writing, and hopefully, reading.

Bloggy Stuff!

Let's start out with some semi-serious stuff. First of all, I'm realizing that a few things about how I've been blogging just aren't sustainable. First of all, Homeschool Fridays have been kind of a bust. I often don't get around to posting them, and I always feel like they are not as well written out as I would like. As a result of this, the "Graduating Highschool" part of my blog is going to become more literal. While I still intend to post about homeschooling related stuff the way I have in the past, I have a whole new format coming up that I hope will work a little better.

This all new Homeschool Fridays, which will be kicking off tomorrow, will be weekly school updates. I'm going to go through each subject (as it makes sense to do so),  and talk a little about what I did, what I didn't do, and what I hope to do next week. If you're a homeschooling family (particularly with younger kids), maybe you can get some ideas, and you can see how a particular curriculum or method works in a real life situation. My main goal with this, however, are a little more personal. I hope that this will help keep me accountable, and I want it to be a record of my sophomore year of high school.

If you're not sure how this is going to work, come back tomorrow to find out. My current plan is to try this out for a month, and see how it goes. If it's not working out, maybe I need to find a different way of doing homeschool posts.

Books

I love writing book reviews, and in fact, it's my favorite part of this blog. This fall, I hope to review every book I read. That might not mean a lot of book reviews, however, since I just started A Game of Thrones on Monday. I'm loving it so far, but it's not a short book. And, when I finish it, there are four more that all seem to be that size, or maybe larger. I don't know how long it'll take me to get through them, but be warned, there might not be a lot of review coming up.

To help compensate, I'm going to try to post reviews (or at least thoughts) on books I'm reading for school.

The Future

Maybe this should have come under the Blog Stuff heading, but I think it makes more sense here. I have a few long term plans and thoughts about this blog at the moment. The first of those is that I have a few sponsored book reviews coming up in the next few weeks, which is a lot of fun. I like doing those, because we (the company and I) both win. While I don't get paid, I get a new book or other cool product free to review, and they get some publicity.

I also have some exciting plans for the blog in 2014 that I might be talking more about soon.

Also, here are some posts to look out for soon:

Two sponsored book reviews.
A writing post (it's been WAY too long since I did one of those).
A HF post tomorrow.
A post about blogs I read.
A review of the tv series Angel.
Some NaNo prep posts (I can't believe it's already time to do those!).

Twelve Years Ago Today...

Twelve years ago today, I was three years old. I wasn't old enough to understand, or really even to remember that day, but I was the perfect age to remember the aftermath. I think that when something terrible happens, such as 9/11, we all have a different perception of it. Obviously, adults are going to remember that day differently then kids, and kids of different ages will remember different things.

For those my age, those who were toddlers then, we don't have that memory of that day like those older then us. But, at the same time, it's far more immediate to us then it is to kids who weren't even born yet.

For me, 9/11 is not something I ever remember learning about. I have heard people talk about how to tell their kids about it, and that never happened to me. It was always something that was there, it was part of life. It's not just something to read about in a textbook for me, it's something that is still too immediate for that.

We live in a post 9/11 world, a world where we are all too quick to think the worst of people. Those my age, who are teenagers now, becoming young adults, were all young kids 12 years ago. We grew  up in the aftermath. We grew up in a world of fear. We can't just dismiss all the people who are afraid, because we grew up in a world that taught us that fear was the best option. And, when we really try to think about why we are so afraid, we remember all the people who died. The fear is not with out reason.

Today is a day to remember all of those people who died that day, and to remember all the people they left behind. It's a day to remember why we, as a country, are so afraid, and to remember that fear has its time and place, but that it should not consume us. We should spend not today worrying about what might be, but rather remembering what was.

Today we need to tell every person who lost a loved one that day: We have not forgotten.

Back to School! {link up}

Today, I'm participating in the September Let's Homeschool Highschool blog hop! This month's theme is Back to School, which is great, since I was already planning on writing a post on this general topic.

This year, the new school year isn't as exciting for me as at has been some years. There isn't much new curriculum, but there are still new topics. With the classical method, you come back to each main history and science topic every four years, so I am doing things this year that I haven't done since 6th grade. If you're familiar with the classical method, you know which topics I'm doing this year. :)

Here's a quick overview of what I'm studying this year. I'm not going to talk curriculum now, since that will come later, in the the subject by subject HF posts. For history this year, I'm doing Middle Ages. It's so sad for me to think that this is my last rotation! I'll never study Ancients again! This is my last chance with the Middle Ages! :) For science, I'm doing Earth Science. This being the last time for science just isn't as sad to me, especially since I'll probably have to take many of the sciences again in college. :) I'm still doing some grammar and vocabulary, and all my writing and literature is integrated with history. I'm still in Algebra 2, but I'm hoping to work through that pretty quickly so that I can start Geometry part way through the year. I'm also doing Rhetoric, having finished Logic last year. I'll also be starting Spanish, and continuing with Latin.

I started school on Monday, which means that I've done almost a full week of school. I've done everything but Spanish, since my book got ordered a bit late. It's supposed to arrive today, though, so I'll be able to start it up pretty soon.

Really, 10th grade isn't that different then 9th grade. It'll be a lot of the same curriculum, and a lot of the same schedule. In some ways, though, this will be my last year of totally homeschooling. In 11th grade, I can start taking classes at the community college, as part of Running Start. While I don't plan on going there full time, I'll still be a college student, which means I won't really be 100% homeschooled anymore. It's kind of bittersweet to think about.

Well, whatever happens this year, I'm glad to have had a pretty good start to the year!

Parnucklians for Chocolate by B. H. James

Today I'm reviewing Parnucklian for Chocolate by B. H. James. This book is one of the most wonderful, yet strangest books I've read in a long time. I'd like to credit Forever Young Adult for this review. With out their review, I'd never have heard about it in the first place! While FYA is obviously written primarily for adults who enjoy YA books, I have found to be an invaluable resource for all YA book and movie related everything as a 15 year old.

Amazon.com Plot Summary

As a small child, Josiah believed that his father’s absence could be explained by the simple fact that he was a high ranking alien official on the planet Parnuckle. It explained so much else, too, like why Josiah should eat nothing but chocolate (Parnucklians eat nothing but chocolate), and why he should be proud of and idolize his father, the Keymaster of Gozer, even though they’d never met.

But as time goes on and the gaps in this mythology widen, Josiah is faced with two possibilities: either it’s all very real or it’s all very pretend. This betrayal comes into sharper focus when, three weeks before his sixteenth birthday, Josiah is released back into his mother’s care after two years in a group home. His mother is about to marry Johnson Davis, and when Josiah, his mother, Johnson Davis, and his daughter Bree Davis—a prematurely mature girl with her own history of parental betrayal—attempt to live together as an all-American nuclear family, the myths underpinning all of their lives come chaotically and absurdly unspooled.
My Review

The characters are fantastic, but very strange. Some characters, like Josiah, we know a lot about, while others, like his mother, we know very little about. We never even learn her name. What is so unique about the characters in this book is that you know about them only what Josiah knows. Our experience of any of them is entirely his. We have little to no extra knowledge.

The plot is good. I would say that of my triad (characters, plot, writing) this one will have to be my least favorite, though it is in no way bad. That's how good this book is! The book is less of a story, and more of a journey. Through out it, questions will continually come in to your mind, and they will very slowly start to be answered. Questions like: Is this scifi, or is Josiah just crazy. Is Josiah crazy, or his mother, or both? Later it will simply be: Is every character in this book TOTALLY INSANE?! Then it will calm down, and you will ask yourself: Why? Why did all of that happen?

The writing is by far the best part of this book. Some parts of it are arguablly incorrect grammatically, but I didn't care. This is a first for me. I get annoyed at the absence of the Oxford comma! A sentence (this is not actually from the book, it is just a sentence that could have been in the book), such as this one would normally drive me crazy: Johnson Davis and Josiah's mother took Johnson Davis' car to the store while Bree and Josiah stayed behind in Johnson Davis' house. But instead, it was a big part of what I loved about the book. It gave it a voice that was incredibly unique, and it made the characters different. Josiah's mother is only ever refered to as Josiah's mother, and Johnson Davis is always Johnson Davis.

Who Should Read It?

I'd recommend this book to teens or adults who enjoy a well written coming of age story. Or those who have a thing for really, really weird books. There is definitely swearing and sex, so if that's an issue for you, be warned. I'd give this book five stars!