An Inductive Leap too far...

     In The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, the character Katniss goes through the process capturing her enemies, the Careers, by surprise. The Careers trapped Katniss in a tree, forcing her to live up there until she could escape without them realizing. When the Careers were asleep, Rue advises Katniss to cut down a hornet's nest hanging directly above where the Careers were laying. "The nest, Katniss, the nest!" (Collins, 149) Katniss proceeds to do so without acknowledging that by doing so, she is putting herself in danger. Not realizing that there was a chance of her being stung presented illogical thinking. Although there was logical thinking behind cutting down the hornet's nest (distracting the Careers, and therefore giving Katniss time to escape), Katniss was thinking illogically. Katniss suffered three stings as the result of cutting the hornet's nest down from the tree. This occurrence had an impact on the plot of the story. Katniss very well could have starved to death or been killed if she hadn't escaped from the tree. This would have changed the entire story line because Katniss would have been eliminated from the Hunger Games, appose to winning the games. It also would have effected Peeta and Katniss's relationship. Katniss had thought that Peeta had become allies with her enemy the Careers, which created tension between the two of them. At any point, if Katniss wouldn't have escaped, one of them could have killed the other. Although Katniss's inductive leap too far may seem to be an unimportant event in the novel, it is one of the many experiences that allowed Katniss to win the Hunger Games!

Style

Ghent, Natale. All The Way Home. 

     In the novel, All The Way Home, there is a good use of pathos. Pathos is quality in art or literature that creates a sense of emotion in the reader, often one of pity or sympathy. In All The Way Home, Nat's family is struggling finacially. Nat's mother didn't make much money to start off with, but when she got too sick to work anymore, what was already a problem finacially turned into an even worse problem. Nat, being the oldest child of him and his two sisters, Queenie and Cal, felt like he should take matters into his own hands. "We're going to loose the house if we don't pay the bills. Do you want to live on the streets, Queenie? We are poor. Nothing's ever going to get better." (98, Ghent) This quote uses pathos to make you feel sympathy for the characters. It makes it clear that the family is poor, and that they are going to loose all that they have if they don't start paying their bills. For me as a reader, I think that pathos is a significant stylistic device for an author to use because it gets me involved with the characters and the circumstance. All The Way Home is a story of a stuggling family, which does not make it a very happy story... Natale Ghent uses pathos frequently to create that sense of emotion.

Social Issues

     "Uglies," by Scott Westerfeld has to do with the social issue, discrimination. In the novel, everyone who is under age sixteen is considered "an ugly" and lives in Uglyville. In Uglyville, they live with minimal living essentials: they live in cheap shacks, wear shabby, worn- down clothes, and are convinced that they're life is pretty much worthless until their sixteenth birthday. On their sixteenth birthday, the uglies go through surgery to become pretty. Once they're changed over completely, they move into a whole different way of living: the life of luxery. This is discrimination against the way people look. Basically, it's saying that your life is useless unless you're pretty. When in reality, everybody is different and no matter who we are or what we look like, we should embrace what we have and live our life all the same. 

Define and Describe a Character

Gatins, John. Dreamer. Print. 

     In the novel, Dreamer, the main character, Cale Crane, is determined, strong- willed, and a dreamer. A determined person is one who will not give up until they get what they want. A determined person can also be hard- working and forceful, but is generally not disinterested or lazy. Although the injured race horse is said to be so worthless that it should just be put down, Cale beleives that Sonador can make a comeback, and get back into racing. She's determined to take care of the horse until it is healthy enough to do so, and sure enough, she does exactly that. Cale is strong- willed. A strong-willed person is one who has a powerful will. A strong-willed person is headstrong and obstinate, but is not spineless and weak. While nursing Sonador back to health, no one is supporting her, even her father, Ben Crane, has no faith in the horse making a comeback. But Cale does believe that she can, and doesn't let anyone or anything hold her back from being proved wrong. Lastly, Cale is a dreamer. A person that is considered a dreamer is one who lives in a world of fantasy, one who is impractical and unrealistic, but is generally not a hoper or an idealist. It is very rare that a horse that breaks their foreleg will recover. So, by Cale believing that Sonador can make a recovery, she is being unrealistic.

Significance of...

Ghent, Natale. No Small Thing. Harper Collins Publishers Ltd. September 16, 2004. Print.

     The novel, No Small Thing, uses suspense in many ways. Natale Ghent leaves you wondering what's going to happen next in various scenes throughout the novel. The main character, Nathaniel, can't believe his luck when he finds an add for a free pony in the paper! Nat knows that things are hard for his mother: his dad walked out on her four years ago and she's been physically ill ever since, but, him and his sisters, Cid and Queenie, believe that the pony would help bring their family closer together! His mother does let them keep the pony, but throughout the novel there is much crisis between Nat and his mother about keeping it. Because they are a very poor family, his mother rather the little money they do have be spent on something more useful than a pony. Because of this crisis, at any point in the novel they could loose their pony, and as the reader, you get the impression they will in a few scenes. This creates suspense because you start to feel for the characters in the novel. For example, you feel how empty Nat feels without his father, and how the pony fills that hole in his heart. So when his mother suggests getting rid of the pony, you also feel the hurt that Nat is feeling. "You're a good boy, Smokey. I won't take you back no matter what Ma says." (Ghent, 56) This line in the novel just shows that there is crisis between Nat and his mother when it comes to keeping Smokey, and that Nat is determined to keep him no matter what.
     The setting of No Small Thing also creates suspense. The location of the barn is kind of in a stranded location. So, when the barn catches on fire, there's no one around to see it, or save it. The other borders at the barn are all very strange people, which makes the barn even spookier than it already is. The sketchy characters creates suspense because you can never tell how they will react to different situations. "I let my eyes adjust for a second, and a big, red- faced man with a baseball cap comes into view. It's not Ted Henry. Except for the cap he look sand sounds like hairy gorilla." (Ghent, 64) This quote describes Nat's first impression of one of the other borders at the barn. Nat didn't have a very good first impression of this man, and his opinions of the same man only got worse with time. You could never tell how "the gorilla," was going to react, which created suspense. 

Identify and Sort

     The five main elements of the novel, Uglies, are foreshadowing, crises, setting, conflict and theme. The most important of these five elements is foreshadowing. The author of Uglies, Scott Westerfeld, uses foreshadowing throughout the novel. Tally meets a new friend in Uglyville named Shay, and the two become quite close. They begin to get to know each other better and share stories about old friends and just their lives in general. Peris, who was Tally's best friend before he became pretty, was mentioned many times in Tally's stories. For example, "The two of them had only used a penknife when they'd cut themselves and held hands." (Westerfeld, 25) This is one of the many memories Tally brings up about Peris.When Shay leaves to go to the Smoke, Tally is left alone, once again, in Uglyville. Tally has a huge decision to make at this point: follow in Shay's footsteps and move to the Smoke, or remain where she is now and turn pretty. Tally began to have flashbacks to when she and Peris were together. As much as she wanted to go with Shay, Peris was her one best friend, and she could not betray him. The foreshadowing used in Uglies allows you to uncover more about the characters. For instance, as the reader, we barely know Peris. But when Tally flashes back to memories with Peris, you start to discover certain things about him. In all of Tally's flashbacks, she went to Peris for advice, and from that I got that he was a good friend to talk to, and that he has good advice. The foreshadowing used also lets you get into Tally's head a little bit more because we know about how she was brought up, which may have an impact on where she decides to stay in the end. Overall, foreshadowing is the most important element because it effectively creates suspense in the novel, Uglies.

Identify

     A 'good book' must have qualities that make it good. For me, three qualities that make a 'good book' are entertaining, fiction, and has an interesting story- line. I would classify the novel, Uglies, by Scott Westerfeld as a 'good book' because it consists of the three main qualities I look for in a novel. Firstly, it is entertaining. Scott Westerfeld included a lot of action in the novel: the tours the two main characters would take to get from Uglyville, where they were growing up and living to a new town called the Smoke which took 10 days to get to on hover-boards. Secondly, its fiction. I love fiction books because they broaden your imagination and makes you imagine things that wouldn't normally happen in real life. In Uglies, people are sorted into worlds by their appearance. For example, all of the "Uglies" live in Uglyville and all of the "Pretties" live in Little Pretty Town. Lastly, the novel has an interesting story line. Mostly because it's fiction, I found that the whole idea of the novel was interesting. The details Scott Westerfeld used to describe the situations that occurred gave the novel much suspense, and left you wanting to continue reading. Overall, the qualities Scott Westerfeld included in the novel, Uglies, made it a 'good book.'

Westerfeld, Scott. Uglies. New York, Simon & Schuster.2005. Print.