Book Review: A Walk To Remember by Nicholas Sparks

Book Title: A Walk To Remember

Author: Nicholas Sparks

Britni’s Blog Score: 10 miracles out of 10

Britni’s Blog Rating: Recommended for teenage readers.

I thought that it was only fitting that I review a romance for Valentine’s Day. A Walk To Remember by Nicholas Sparks is one of the more recent classics and also one of the best romances that I’ve read.

The Plot. Landon Carter looks back to forty years ago, to the time when he fell in love with the last girl in the world he thought he’d ever fall for—Jamie Sullivan, the minister’s daughter.

The Cast. Seventeen-year-old Landon is a senior at Beaufort High. He’s seen as a good student by his teachers and a fairly responsible kid by his mother, but he doesn’t have any real aspirations for himself. Landon puts in the minimum amount of energy in life, doing only what he has to do to get through, and he cares too much about what is high school friends think about him.

Jamie is quite the opposite of him. The daughter of the preacher, she wears unflattering clothes with no makeup, she carries a Bible with her school books, and she doesn’t take part in the social drama of high school. She’s an outcast with no friends and she’s made fun of by her schoolmates, including Landon at first.

When Jamie and Landon begin spending time together, she changes him. She sees more in him than he sees in himself. Her faith in him, coupled with the fact that she holds him to a higher standard than anyone else in his life does, pushes him to become a better person. He finds himself secretly adding money to her fundraising efforts and caring about people that he felt immature apathy towards.

The Message. Sparks shows in this well-crafted romance the difference that one person can make to another. Landon never saw himself becoming such a caring young man. He never thought he’d be setting high standards and goals for himself. But the role that Jamie plays in his life helps him to become better in so many ways. Love can change a person in miraculous ways.

My Recommendation. This is a very clean romance story. There’s no sex in it and almost no swearing, so I think that it’s suitable for younger readers as well as older ones. This was the first Nicholas Sparks book that I’d read; I must have been about seven or eight the first time I read it.

My Notes. This book is one of my favorites not only for the characters, but for the emotions that leap off of the page to touch your heart. When I was reading this book, I felt all kinds of emotional ups and downs with each turn of the page and each new revelation.

In Conclusion. A Walk To Remember was a beautifully written romance novel that puts a twist on typical expectations. Written from the male perspective and playing with the stereotype of a good girl falling for a bad boy, this book is one of my favorites.

And what better time to read this novel than during the Valentine’s season?

Movie Review: Here Comes the Boom

Movie Title: Here Comes the Boom
Distributor: Sony Pictures
Director: Frank Coraci
Writers: Allan Loeb, Kevin James
Cast: Kevin James, Henry Winkler, Salma Hayek, Bas Rutten, Charice
Britni's Blog Score: 9 MMA fighters out of 10
Britni's Blog Rating: Recommended for families

When I saw the trailer for Here Comes the Boom, I expected to be amused and entertained as I watched the film. What I didn't realize was how strong the story was going to be, though, and how many powerful messages would be hidden between scenes of physical comedy. I'd underestimated just how moving this movie would be.

The Plot. High school teacher Scott Voss (James) isn't great at his job. He's not even good at his job. And he hasn't been for a very long time. Worse yet, he hardly cares that he's so bad at his job. The man who was named teacher of the year a decade ago now shows up late to class and then refuses to answer the questions of any students who actually care about their education. When one Malia (Charice) tries to get a straight answer on information contained in her textbook, Scott shuts her down. He tells her that the chances of her using anything she learns in his class are probably zero, anyway.

But Scott's co-worker Marty Streb (Winkler) does care. He cares about his under-funded music class and he teaches it with a passion that's contagious. But when the school is forced to scale back their budget, cutting the music program and putting Marty out of a job, Scott stands up and says something, knowing that he can't let his friend, who's about to have a new addition to his family, lose his job.

But when a citizenship class taught by Scott, private music lessons given by Marty, and bake sales held by school nurse Bella (Hayek) aren't getting them anywhere near the fifty grand needed to keep the program open, Scott hatches an insane plan. He's gonna fight in the MMA--and he's gonna lose.

The Characters. Each of the characters in this movie carries his or her own charm. They're all quirky and funny and they contribute so much to the viewing pleasure of this movie.

The Message. As Voss teaches a biology class, he talks about microbiology and stagnant cells, paraphrasing Sir Isaac Newton's laws. The way he puts it, "A cell that is not in motion is not a productive member of the system." And the other cells will then copy that stagnant cell. Before you know what's happening, the system starts to die.

Well, this is what's happened to the system of Voss's school. Teachers who don't care have just been pushing students along through school like they're herding cattle. But all that decays, says Voss, can be restored.

He teaches his students that even a system that seems to be dead will be healed when the cells start to work together again. And then he sets out to prove this principle by doing everything in his power to save the school's music program. He shows that one person can make a difference by being the change that he wants to see in the school system. And through self-sacrifice, he does indeed heal the system.

The movie is also very pro-arts. The movie supports the need for these extra-curriculars in education with the repeated quote "Without music, life would be a mistake."

The Team. The stars of this movie are hilarious and moving. We get to watch Scott and Marty as they train to lose the MMA championship. We get to see Bella tackle Scott on what he calls "the weirdest date ever". We get to see Niko (Rutten) and his quirky friends have an all-out food fight. Every one of this movies leads are so full of humor and heart that they bring their characters to life for us to laugh at and learn from.

James did an excellent job in writing this movie, and his co-stars shined as they helped him portray in on-screen.

My Recommendation. Here Comes the Boom was such a fun movie to watch and it's perfectly suited to families. It's message is inspiring and shows us all that we can make a difference.

I suggest that parents of young children allow this movie at their own discretion. As its plot hinges around the UFC and MMA in general, there's a lot of on-screen violence. Scott is pummeled beyond his senses during fights, and we see some of his post-fight injuries, including a dislocated shoulder that Bella has to pull back into place. Scott's training sessions can be a bit brutal at times, too.

My Notes. I personally loved this movie. It was funny, inspiring, and entertaining. I love the positive messages affirmed in it, and I enjoyed the sense of humor carried throughout.

In Conclusion. This movie was brilliantly written so that there was never a dull moment. The talented cast, writers, and production team created a movie featuring a hilarious journey and an inspiring message told through the vehicle of altogether lovable characters. The feats performed are incredible and the adventure was memorable, and there were plenty of laughs along the way. Inspirational and funny, this comedy definitely brings the boom.

Writing Tip: Unearthing Your Novel's Potential

You've been digging holes for hours, days, months. You've done all of the research that you could, you've put in the time and effort. Your years of hard work have finally got you something tangible. It's your finished draft. It could be a trilobite short story. Or it could be that you've got the literary equivalent of a tyrannosaurus rex on your hands. Whatever you've written, it's like you've won the lottery it's so good.

Well, except for those two characters that you never connected to any action in the plot.  Oh, yeah, and what was with the way you just stopped in chapter seven? You never resolved anything! You changed the subject and piled on chapter after chapter building on that shaky foundation. Plus, we still don't know what happened to the great uncle's yorkie. Well, now's the time for revision. Not literally now. At least finish reading this post first. Then you can get to work fixing that precious, yet disastrous, rough draft.

And I've got a revision process that will give your dead dino an extreme makeover. I'm no literary scholar, I just have a working method. No, I'm not a paleontologist, either. I got all I know about dinosaurs from Michael Crichton. My revision excavation philosophy is to work my way down through the layers from the largest chunks of text to the smallest. From the skull to the phalanges, if you will. If you'll just humor me for a few minutes, I think we could unearth something incredible together.

You know that you've got something amazing just waiting to be released. But where the heck do you start? Step one of your novel excavation includes dividing your book into manageable pieces, labeling each division, and rearranging your scenes.

It's widely suggested that you don't revise your novel immediately after drafting it. Everything's still too fresh in your mind and you're probably still too emotionally connected to the things in your story to adequately judge your own work. I like to send drafts to fellow writers for Beta reviews while I shift my focus. When I return to my novel, I'm mentally prepared to dive into the work ahead of me.

First, label each chapter and scene; describe what's happening in each scene and who the major players are. When you're done, start cutting anything that's not necessary. Filler scenes (Sheryl and Grandma's five pages of copyright-prohibited karaoke) and filler characters (that man Sheryl describes in detail and never thinks about again) have got to go. If it doesn't benefit your story, it bogs it down.

It's important to give your readers everything in the proper order. Avoid info dumps at the beginning of your novel. Spreading them out across the coming chapters is much more efficient and will make for a better read. Build up to epic battle scenes or scandalous reveals. Rather than coming to them early into the story, just hint at them and delay the payoff. The longer readers have to wait, the more suspense builds. Reorder your story to create the most entertaining and coherent pattern.

Wow, this is it. You've made it to the beautiful treasure that you've been anticipating. Wait a minute. But this is just a pile of dirty bones and rocks. Don't worry. You can fix it. Each scene needs to have its own conflict, a peak, and an opening hook. Your scene's conflict can be anything keeping a character from their goals. Everything doesn't need to be resolved by the end of each scene, of course, but each scene requires a clear beginning, middle, and end. The peak, or the scene's climax, will often come near the end. Everything else should point toward that peak.

You need to draw readers into each scene. Open with a hook, just as you would open your novel with a frantic run through the woods or the dissolve of a marriage. Your audience will only stick around if you grab their attention.

This mess is starting to look like an actual dinosaur! Now it's time to drop your shovel and get a brush so you can zero in on the details. Delete the fluff. You don't need all of those extra sentences you wrote when you were desperate to fill the page. Reorder sentences within your paragraphs, placing the most important ones at the beginnings and ends. According to the primacy/recency principle, people most remember the first and last items in a set. And you want those stellar sentences to stand out.

That was a lot of work, but you're still not done. Now you're swapping that brush for a dental pick, because you need to clean the cracks in the skull and the spaces between those foot bones. By this point you're probably exhausted, but you're hopefully really excited, too. You're so close to seeing your project complete. When you're rewording, be concise. It's better to say something in 1,000 strong words than 5,000 boring or redundant ones. Cut out excessive modifiers; make your verbs and nouns more powerful instead. Lean toward active instead of passive voice. Proofread sentences for errors and rework them for style. You want to get your message to pack a punch.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that just because your story is revised, it's complete. Read, revise, repeat.You polish those bones! It will often take quite a few drafts to get your novel ready for publication. When you think that you've refined your novel to its peak, there's likely still room for improvement. Send it off to a set of Beta readers. They can give you a perspective other than your own and they won't be as hesitant in killing your darlings. Continue this cycle until you've attained the highest point of novel perfection.

The revision process can be a lot like the excavation of a prehistoric treasure. When you put the time and effort into releasing the potential that your novel holds, it can become invaluable. It takes a lot of hard work to write and revise a book, but it's worth it when you hold the finished product in your hands and feel an overwhelming sense of accomplishment.

Book Review: Number the Stars by Lois Lowry

Book Title: Number the Stars
Author: Lois Lowry
Britni's Blog Score: 9 brave children out of 10
Britni's Blog Rating: Recommended for all ages

I've decided to review Lois Lowry's classic book Number the Stars. I read this book as required reading years ago, probably back in junior high. And I remember being glued to it, turning page after page to see what was going to happen next. I recently purchased an ebook copy and reread it. It was exactly as I remember.

The plot itself is simple, but it's the enormous weight that each plot point carries that makes this book special to me. Since first reading this book I've carried vivid memories of the dramatic scenes and bold actions and the strong emotions they made me feel. I had to experience those emotions and watch those scenes unfold all over again, so I did.

The Plot. Ten-year-old Annemarie Johansen and her best friend Ellen Rosen live in 1943 Denmark. The Nazi soldiers that stand on many street corners have been there for so long that they've become less noticeable than the street signs. Until the night that a member of the Danish Resistance breaks curfew to bring them the news. The news that Nazis are closing Jewish-owned shops and hunting down members of the Rosen's synagogue. Ellen is left with the Johansens, who pretend for her own safety that she's their daughter, while her parents flee the city. Annemarie and her family set out on a mission to save the Rosens by participating in the underground railroad of the Danish Resistance to smuggle the Jews to Sweden, where they'll be safe from the war. Annemarie must learn the true meaning of bravery in order to save the lives of those she loves.

The Cast. Annemarie, though young, is brave and selfless. Understanding that her cause is greater than she is, she's willing to risk her life to save the people she cares about. That courage would be admirable in anyone, but it's even more impressive and convicting when being displayed in a ten-year-old girl.  The ongoing war and the dangers to her friends force Annemarie to grow up quickly, as we see in her perceptive nature, intelligence, and courage.

Annemarie is surrounded by adults young and old who've dedicated themselves to protecting the Jews and defying the Nazis. Mama, Papa, Uncle Henrik, and Peter all sacrifice themselves for the freedom of the Jews.

The Message. Beyond the lessons taught through these fictional characters is the historical lesson. Set in Denmark during World War II, Number the Stars gives us a realistic glimpse into what it was like for many families at that time. Lowry does an excellent job of illustrating a historical reality that was based on the real life experiences of Holocaust survivors.

My Recommendation. In my opinion, this book is suitable for everyone. Even though its style and POV make it easily digestible to young children, it's also something that will have an impact on older readers. I'm nineteen and I bought the book so I could read it again after years of just remembering it from my school reading list.

I recommend that young children of about ten and under either read with a parent/teacher or read on their own and discuss it. It may be difficult for them to understand without some adult guidance or outside resources.

My Notes. Telling the story of the Holocaust from the perspective of a young girl gives the story a POV that I found particularly interesting the first time around. Her observations are simple and child-like, which multiplies the wisdom of her statements.

In Conclusion. One of the reasons that I couldn't put the book down either time that I read it was the courage that was displayed by ordinary people. The adults in Annemarie's life help to rescue victims of persecution by personally taking those victims to safety. And Annemarie herself must risk her life in order to save her best friends family, as well as her own. These characters, much like the real unsung heroes of World War II, show us that you don't have to be anything extraordinary in order to do extraordinary things. Time after time, these characters selflessly defend their friends, family, and country. And I find that inspiring.

Even more inspiring is that, though this novel and its cast are fictional, it tells the true story of so many families during World War II who were torn apart and sent to concentration camps or who sacrificed their own lives to protect those who were being persecuted.

Though, before rereading it recently, I'd barely touched the book in years, the memories of events of the story were seared into my mind. That's why I came back to read it again. I wanted to relive those moments with Annemarie and the other characters.