Thursday, April 2, 2009
A Summer to Die By Lois Lowry Book Review by Liezl Escaño Lopez
This was the famous line that the narrator, Meg Chalmers, utters often in the story.
“A Summer to Die” written by Lois Lowry was often suspected to be a biography of her sister but as the author says some of it were true but the rest were fiction. This was her first book before she wrote her famous trilogy “The Giver”,"Gathering Blue," and "The Messenger."
The story mainly discusses a usual sister’s relationship and how a family accepts the reality about the death of their loved one.
Margaret “Meg” Chalmers narrates the story expressing how she envies her older sister Molly Chalmers who seemed to get all the attention and beauty while she gets the left over. A common issue between siblings. They frequently argues on anything practically because they are really different, Molly being the happy, easy girl like her Mom and Meg being the serious deep person like her Dad.
As their father seeks for a quiet place to write his book, the family has to move to the country where a big change is waiting ahead of them, leaving their house in town where they had grown up. Adjusting to their new environment and neighbors, Meg seemed to have a difficulty to adapt while her sister Molly already gained new friends as well as new boyfriend who is member of the varsity in school. But Meg found a friend in the presence of Will who is the owner of their house. Meg being interested in photography his father built him a darkroom where she can develop whatever her camera captures. Meg and Will share same interest.
Ordinary days have passed. Everyone is busy in their own business, Mother busy sewing her quilt, Dad finishing his book, Molly having fun with her friends and Meg focused on her darkroom until one night everything is about to change. One suspicious night, Meg woke up and saw her sister drowned in her own blood. Their parents brought Molly at the hospital while Meg was left at home still bothered and scared of what she just saw.
Molly went back to home but the old Molly was gone and seemed to be a stranger as time prolongs. She is losing her hair gradually due to the pills she is taking. A new couple who was about to have a child occupied the near house beside the Chalmer’s house. The upcoming baby and her new found interest in flowers seemed to lighten up Molly. Meg unaware of everything of what really is going on was about to discover that her sister whom she envy the most is about to die because of a disease named Leukemia. These were the time that the family went through difficult stage because they are just to lose a loved one. Accepting the reality was hard for the family. And the day came when Molly finally closed her eyes and never wake up. They went back to town and left all their memories in the country.
In the end of this story the narrator realizes how beautiful she is and that only happy and good memories are those will be left behind by Molly.
This story was really heart-warming because it depicts reality about true issues between sisters and the difficulty in accepting the lost of loved one.
As someone who seemed to relate from the story in particular on how Meg envies her sister, I can really say that this story is great showing the beauty of life and how family faces together the trial. Indeed, only those happy and good memories will be remembered and those are the ones that heal the wounded and emptied heart of the left ones.
Summer To Die by Lois Lowry: A Book Review
Lois Lowry has written of over 20 novels and winner of the Newbery Medal twice. This native of Hawaii has become a favorite of both children and young adults. She has tackled a number of topics in her literature including adoption, mental illness, cancer, the Holocaust and futuristic societies. Whatever the theme, Lowry portrays realistic life experiences to her audience.
In her books, Lois Lowry throws her characters and readers into many thought-provoking situations. The contemporary young adult reader is compelled to confront society with all of its imperfections. Lois Lowry told Contemporary Authors that she measures her success as an author by her ability to "help adolescents answer their own questions about life, identity and human relationships." She wrote the novel “A Summer to Die” in Boston. MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1977.
The story is about Margaret and Molly Chalmers, siblings of different characteristics. Their father is an English professor at a university who wishes to find a house that will help him finish the book he was writing about dialects that he claims will shake the world of literature. Their family relocates to a small country house where the sickness of Molly started.
The owner of the house the family is renting lives down the road in a smaller house on the same property. The sisters soon establish a rapport with the elderly Will Banks, who learns about photography with Meg and teaches Molly about the abundant wildflowers covering the estate. A few months after coming to the country, Molly begins having constant nosebleeds the doctor blames on the cold weather. Unfortunately, he wasn't aware of the underlying cause, and it is not until Molly's bed is soaked in blood that she is rushed to the hospital and diagnosed with the ultimately fatal disease leukemia. She seems to recover slightly, though the pills she's taking are causing her hair to fall out.
Shortly thereafter, Ben Brady and a pregnant Maria Abbott, who the townspeople assume incorrectly that they are not married, arrive to make the third Banks house their home, and all the inhabitants of the property enjoy each other's company for a while. Then the unthinkable happens, and Molly is rushed back to the hospital. She asks Meg to tell the baby to wait to be born until she comes home, and Meg obliges her, and also asks the baby to be born in the daytime since she's been invited to take pictures of the birth. They named it Happy William Abbot-Brady. In the end, Molly dies and the family moves back to the city. Through it all, and with help from those who love her, Meg finds the jealousy she once had for her sister has changed into pure love, and eventually she must choose to accept that bad things happen to good people. In the end, she does.
Lois Lowry writes with compassion and understanding of a difficult topic, the death of a sibling. Lowry's older sister died of cancer, although she was older than the character in the book when she passed away. She used her experience to write a beautiful novel about siblings’ quarrel that is very usual today.
A Summer To Die talks about the death of adolescents because of incurable disease. It also reflects the importance of life. Molly died but a new life rose with Happy William Brady, the baby of Ben and Maria. The author used simple style of writing with jokes that makes it appealing to the readers like “saying it three times fast.” As the summer wanes, Meg is learning that their differences aren't all that large and starts to get along with Molly. Before they really have a chance to become friends, Molly dies. That is the saddest part of the whole novel. I would highly recommend this for the young adult reader, especially as a first novel about death. It presents it in a gentle way, so as not to scare them. You will feel Meg's sorrow as if it were your own, but you will also feel her hope and healing as she realizes life will go on.
JOAN B. MALTO
Monday, March 16, 2009
A BOOK REVIEW ON LAURA ESQUIREL’S LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE
A BOOK REVIEW ON LAURA ESQUIREL’S LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE
by Alexi Erlyn Sta ana Carlos
IV- Sir Isaac Newton
I. Introduction
Like Water for Chocolate is a novel in Monthly installments with Recipes, romances and home remedies written by Laura Esquirel, who is originally a scriptwriter and was nominated for the Ariel Award for best screenplay by the Mexican Academy of Motion Pictures for her screenplay Chido One. The film version of Like Water for Chocolate swept the Ariel Awards in 1992 and went on in 1993 to become the biggest grossing foreign film ever released in the United States . In 1994, Like Water for Chocolate is given annually by the American Booksellers Association to the book the members of the organization most enjoyed hand-selling.
With more than two million copies in print, Like Water for chocolate has taken its place alongside such beloved first novels as The Joy Lack Club and How to Make an American Quilt as a treasured part of America ’s literary memory.
II. Summary of the Content
“A tall tale, fairy tale, soap- opera romance, Mexican cookbook, and home- remedy handbook rolled into one.”
Tita De La Garza is the main character. Pedro Muzquiz is Tita's lover, marries Rosaura to be closer to Tita. Mama Elena is Tita's cruel and controlling mother. Gertrudis De La Garza is Tita's older sister, illegitimate daughter, she runs away with a soldier. Rosaura De La Garza is Tita's oldest sister, marries Pedro. Dr. John Brown- the family doctor, falls in love with Tita, has a son from a previous marriage. Nacha is the family cook, like a mother to Tita. Chencha is the family maid. Roberto Muzquiz- son of Pedro and Rosaura, dies young. Esperanza Muzquiz- daughter of Pedro and Rosaura, marries Alex. Alex Brown- son of John Brown, marries Esperanza. Nicolas- the manager of the ranch. Juan Alejandrez is the captain who took Gertrudis. Jesus Martinez is Chencha's first love and husband.
Based on the best-selling novel by Laura Esquival, this internationally popular romantic fable from Mexico centers on a young woman who discovers that her cooking has magical effects. The tale's heroine, Tita, is the youngest of three daughters in a traditional Mexican family. Bound by tradition to remain unmarried while caring for her aging mother, Tita nevertheless falls in love with a handsome young man named Pedro. Pedro returns her affection, but he cannot overcome her family's disapproval, and he instead marries Tita's elder sister. The lovestruck young woman is brutally disappointed, and her sadness has such force that it infects her cooking: all who eat it her feel her heartbreak with the same intensity. This newly discovered power continues to manifest itself after the wedding, as Tita and Pedro, overcome by their denied love, embark on a secret affair. Director Alfonso Arau, Esquival's husband at the time, presents the acts of love and cooking with the same glossy, sensual sheen. Indeed, despite occasional digressions into a magical realist tone, the film often takes on the gloss of Hollywood romance. This combination of traditional melodrama and exotic fairy tale proved extremely popular with audiences, particularly in the United States , where it became one of the highest grossing foreign language films at the time.
Emotional Oppression It is evident, especially in the first few chapters, that Tita has been emotionally oppressed by her dictator-like mother. She is forced to hold in her emotions, thus creating a "dampness" within her that does not allow the matches within her soul to light. Tita has hot, earth-shaking sex with Pedro at the end of the story and, in reference to the story of inner matches Dr.Brown told her earlier, their lust and sexual needs were so strong that she lighted all of Pedro's "inner matches"; he died from the raw emotion of it all. In her agony, she swallowed some "matches" and lit them with memories of him. She sparked, causing the bed they were having sex on to be set on fire. In the end, everything on the ranch (except for the animals because they had all run away when they sensed what was coming, and Tita's recipe book) burned down, but the souls of Pedro and Tita were transported to a special place, a place before birth. There they could finally be together without anyone judging or stopping them.
Self Growth At the beginning of the novel, Tita was a generally submissive young lady. She feared her mother and her mother's actions, hardly ever daring to disobey for fear of another brutal beating. However, as time passes, Tita finds herself to have a voice that she must use. The climax of this theme could be said to be the part in chapter five (the month of May, if one isn't going by chapters) when Tita stands up to her mother and runs out of the house. By the end of the novel, though Tita is a humble woman, she certainly is not the submissive and fearful girl she once was.
Tradition Tita and Pedro are not allowed to love because of the De La Garza tradition that states that the youngest daughter (Tita) must take care of the mother until the day she dies. The book also lists out many tradition of the Mexican culture, such as traditional recipes.
III. Analysis of the Text
Beautifully executed in the Latin storytelling tradition of magic realism, Like Water for Chocolate is a romantic drama that ultimately falls back into a Cinderella myth. Director Alfonso Arau shows the domestic chores and duties of the ranch with a commonplace realism, occasionally lapsing into fantasy sequences for the surreal events that are being cooked up. In one instance, the long-suffering Tita (Lumi Cavazos) rides away with a mile-long blanket dragging behind her, a product of her lovesick nights spent knitting. The mother is appropriately wicked, as is the sister, and Tita views her prince charming, Pedro (Mario Leonardi), as the only escape from her lifelong servitude. Like the oven-warmed kitchen where most of the action is set, the photography is warm and glowing. The connection between food and sex is well developed, in several banquets and dinners proving both memorable and humorous. Filled with characters simmering with passion and jealousy, Like Water for Chocolate lives up to its title, which refers to a method of making hot cocoa by adding chocolate to boiling water. Although heavier topics such as death, ghosts, and revolutionary war arise, the story is overall lighthearted and adheres to Hollywood romantic sensibilities.
IV. Evaluation of the Text
The book has left out a mystical story that definitely charmed the palate and the heart.
“Like Water for Chocolate is deceptively simply wonderful. It is a story of love, sex, war, and the sweep of Mexican history that belongs to human.”
In Like Water for Chocolate, Esquivel extends the religious-mythical themes of magic realism to the everyday world of the domestic realm of a female-dominated household. Though not a story of the battles, great figures, and moral challenges generally associated with the epic form, Esquivel elevates this story of women, and one woman in particular, to such proportions. This strategy leads the reader to explore the feminist properties of Like Water For Chocolate, which are evident in the depictions of Tita's struggle to gain independence and develop her identity, and also in the fact that this struggle is depicted at all. In creating this female-centered cast of characters, Esquivel imagines a world in which men are physically present only occasionally, though the legacy of sexism and the confinement of women to the domestic sphere persist. Esquivel does not offer her readers the vision of a utopian sisterhood, but rather insight into the way women are restricted by standards of societal propriety perpetuated by other women.
[x.x] Conquering the Verge [x.x]
"Tita was literally `like water for chocolate' - she was on the verge of boiling over."
Eventually, Roberto died and Mama Elena blamed it to Tita. that made Tita went a bit crazy and Dr. John Brown was the one to take her in and give her a very good care. This made Tita fell for Dr. John but not entirely in love with him for her heart only belonged to Pedro. Still, she had agreed to marry Dr. Brown. Overfilled with joy, Dr. Brown decided to fetch her only living aunt for her to attend their wedding.
Dr. Brown and Tita got married. Some time after. Rosaura has given birth to a girl, Esperanza and with her misscarriage to that baby, she is never to get pregnant again. Tita was very pitiful to the baby for she was afraid that Esperanza will suffer what she suffered with Mama Elena before she died - having served her mother until her mother died without anyone to help you, alone and helpless, hopeless from you only love - just because of a astupid tradition. Tita was right, Rosaura planned to contnue the tradition. But Esperanza fell in love with Ale Brown, Dr. John Brown's son from his first wife. Tita did everything she could to fight for the right of Esperanza to be happy with Alex and she was triumphant in doing so for Rosaura died from some unexplainable reason.
On the night of Esperanza and Alex's marriage, Pedro and Tita became too vulnerable to the lust they felt that evening and they made love in the dark room they had visited for several times already and unfortunately, Pedro dies the instant they were on the climax of having each other's spirit. Tita followed him and sparks were seen from the ranch. The other people to saw it thought it was fireworks celebrating Esperanza and Alex's wedding but it went on for too long. When Ezperanza and Alex went home, all they saw was ashes covering the whole land area of the ranch and a cookbook containing all Tita and the De La Garza's family.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
A BOOK REVIEW ON NICHOLAS SPARKS’ NIGHTS IN RODANTHE
A BOOK REVIEW ON NICHOLAS
By John Michael Padullon
IV- Sir Isaac Newton
I. Introduction
“Nights in Rodanthe,” the latest screen adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks story, is a picture smothered in syrupy excess. It shows a moving reminder that love is possible at any age, at any time, and often comes when we least expect it.
Gere, meanwhile, is the stereotypical pop-culture surgeon - all skill and no heart. When one of his patients dies during a procedure, he has a nurse deliver the news to the family. That coldness results in the final alienation of his son, who's also a doctor.
Traveling to the Outer Banks to regroup and to fulfill an obligation, Gere gets a room at the inn, and is its sole guest as storm warnings escalate. Connections ensue.
Unfortunately, the characters are little more than cardboard cutouts crudely designed to manipulate viewers, crushing the hope that "Nights" could be that rare big-screen creature - an enjoyable romance featuring mature actors.
In his feature-film directorial debut, George C. Wolfe, whose résumé includes award-winning TV and theater projects ("Lackawanna Blues," "Angels in
II. Summary of content
Emotionally guarded divorcée Adrienne (Lane) and troubled physician Paul (Gere) are brought together one fateful week when she agrees to house-sit a friend’s B and B on
The story revolves on love and how it makes a person aware of the entire possible thing that could happen tomorrow. This has surely made readers mark up about how love changes a person’s will, how it helps us realize that we do such things only to give the one we love the best thing we can give for we never know when they would leave.
III. Analysis of text
Nights in Rodanthe is written with apparent indication of emotions that you can feel what is being expressed. As Paul and Adrienne shows their love for one another, you can feel the sincerity and passion of what they are trying to prove for the thought are always straight to express, at the same time, to let the readers evaluate readily the lines of inspiration
The characters inevitably experience The Big Contradiction. Namely, that love is fleeting - and it is eternal.
Having read some of his other book’s plot- I can vouch that they are to tear duct what milking machine is to cow udder. Rodanthe is a reliably steamy stormy sultry story about Inner Change at the Outer Banks where strangers become intimates. More specifically, where Paul Flanner, emotionally detached doctor, creatively unlocks Adrienne Willis, thwarted artist, as she shows him how to attach.
IV. Evaluation of text
In NIGHTS IN RODANTHE Nicholas
"Nights in Rodanthe" is typical fare -- a weepy romance dealing with love, death and other unstoppable forces of nature -- that has been turned into a tasteful melodrama courtesy of the easy chemistry between its two leads.
It is a touching love story that will bring a tear to your eye and a smile on your lips. Nicholas Sparks has captured the hearts of millions of readers, and Nights in Rodanthe is a perfect example of why. His books aren't deep and complicated. Instead, they are an easy read to take you away from reality for a brief time. This was, indeed, enjoyable and moving.