If you’re struggling with life, this is the book to read. Even though I’m young, I like to think that I’ve gone through a mid life crisis or two. This book help evaluate through life and give you guidance on how to live it to the fullest in my humble opinion.
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Summary:
Being overwhelmed with how his life has turned out, Mitch Albom revisits his favorite professor. Mitch feels like his life is on a boring cycle and can’t seem to get out of the funk. After his professor agrees to be interviewed, they create an undying bond that continues throughout the book. As Morrie continues to help Mitch decided what’s important, he also helps the reader with each chapter.
Reviews:
One of the reasons why this isn’t ranked higher is because it got really emotional for me. That’s not something I like to admit, but many people on GoodReads also think that this book is really good too. Here are some comments:
So i didn’t realise this book was actually nonfiction until after i’d just finished reading it.. and now my feelings are all over the place!! This was a beautiful story, I would definitely recommend reading it if you haven’t already.
I have never written a review like this before but this book truly inspired me.
I didn’t know this book was a memoir when I picked up this book. I wasn’t even consciously looking for this book. It’s one of the books in my sister’s collection. I picked it up because I needed some kind of motivation/inspiration to live life again with zeal. But what this book offered me was something I wasn’t expecting from it.
This book broke me. It was raw, thought provoking, heart breaking and real.
Loved it. So, so sad and yet so uplifting at the same time.
Tuesdays With Morrie definitely makes you look around and realise how lucky you are and that you should make the most of life while you still can.
Random Remarks:
Like previously stated, this is a memoir which means this book really happened. Pictured to the left is the author and main “character” of the book too. He has learned how to live his life to the fullest thanks to Morrie. He reflects on his past before and after in several videos and clips of him reading the memoir as well. If you’re seriously struggling to pick up a book or continue to push through life, please pick up this book.
For this speech, things were a little tricky. How do you really explain why you should pass a class? Overall I think I used good evidence and story telling to convince the audience. I think my eye contact is very strong, but I think I stumbled over my words a bit due to the pressure I was feeling behind the speech. However, I do think there’s a lot of emotion and realness in my tone. When I say I’m going to take what I learned in this class with me throughout my future experiences, I’m not joking and I think the audience can tell that. I did speak with my hands a lot and I don’t know if that’s a distraction or helps prove my emphasis, so I’m hoping for some feedback on that. I think the organization was good for the most part, talking about the last 6 weeks, what I learned, how I improved, the help from peers, etc. I know though that it could still use some work and there’s always room for improvement. However, I’m glad with how this speech turned out.
These types of books are my top recommended novels for anyone to read. They are real life journals found written and nonfiction that have been turned into novels. They change the names in the novel so you cannot look up anyone mentioned to read about their life or get any medical papers. The medical papers are even included in the novel, but all important information is blacked out.
Summary:
A written diary from true life events, follows a girl named Ana who is struggling with learning how to control her life. An avid runner and sports player, she learns that the one thing she can control is her weight and her eating habits. This diary travels around what it is like to live with anorexia and how mentally draining it is to heal from learning that what you are isn’t good enough.
Reviews:
I love how raw this diary is and how accurate it can be. Although some people disagree with the accuracy, people have to remember that every case is different. Here are some reviews from GoodReads:
It was so sad. I couldn’t put it down because I kept anticipating the end, but I DIDN’T KNOW IT ENDED LIKE THAT!
Omg this story was just as amazing as go ask Alice. I read this in a span of five hours and was rooting for the main character the whole time. It’s a very disturbing realistic view into anorexia and how it is a disease that affects girls every day.
I had read Go Ask Alice a couple years ago and decided to try out another book from the other “Anonymous” author collection. I am so glad I did. Like Go Ask Alice, this is the main character’s journal, which started off as a food/feeling journal. It is interesting to see what she wrote, her weight changes, and the evolution of her disorder.
To be honest I don’t know where to start about this book. Just the fact that it was written by an anonymous authour just makes you so much more intrigued to read it. I myself have struggled with anorexia nervosa since the age of 11 and just seeing that what I felt and thought happens to a lot of people sure made me feel like I wasn’t the odd one out.
I thought this one was pretty good! It didn’t fully describe what I felt when I was going through anorexia and it didn’t really describe how I feel now but I think the ‘anorexia experience’ is different for everyone.
Anorexia is becoming a leading eating disorder in today’s society. With the beauty standards surfacing around social media, the one thought that passes a majority of young girls mind is to stop eating. It’s easy and it’s call restrictive type in the anorexia category. Most people attend a rehab clinic to help understand ways to become better, but you never fully recover and it’s something you have to deal with for life. It’s a constant battle that you have to overcome as you continue to learn how to deal with the diagnosis. You can read more about anorexia in Health Observation.
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Final Thoughts:
Although I loved this novel, it can be dangerous for young readers or anyone with a trigger. However, with the ending, hopefully it provides enough caution and awareness for young people to understand that it’s not a simple fix to fall in line with social media or life in general.
This chapter was extremely helpful with our last speech. I was really struggling with finding my voice in this speech because although it’s something I care about deeply, growing up in a small and mostly religious town, a lot of people didn’t and despised it. I’m not going to lie after reading this chapter and looking back at my dry run, I have a lot to change and also in confidence. Out of the whole chapter, my biggest takeaway was on page 171, “Success in persuasive speaking requires attention to the human psychology.” The other section of this chapter that I found Bothe helpful and interesting was “Appeal to Emotion.” If I can use my emotions and the audience that I can provide a powerful persuasive speech. Within that section it states, “Infusing parts of the speech with repetition and parallelism, which creates rhythm and drama, also arouses emotion.” Sometimes I fear that I do that too much, but it’s obviously a key aspect in persuasive speeches. Obviously I can’t state everything I enjoyed in this chapter, but those are definitely the key portions I will remember.
Ch. 24
First off this chapter talked about claims and how there are all sorts of different types of claims. I never knew that, I just thought a claim was a claim and that that was all there was to it. This was also one of the first chapters that used examples that I could relate to and connect with. In one of the examples they used the phrase that “Nikes are superior to other brands of shoes because everyone wears Nikes” (186). I know that wasn’t a good example, but it sparked off inspiration form one of my previous classes where we had to convince the audience that our company we chose was the best company out there. It made it easier for my brain to understand the aspect behind being persuasive in a manner I never thought of. This chapter also makes it extremely obvious that there are so many ways to set up a persuasive speech. Once I was done reading it was information overload in my brain, but after letting it soak in, I realize I have options when it comes to my organization and set up.
Looking back at the last four speeches, I think I improved on every speech between the dry run and the final. However, I personally saw the most growth with Speech 3 between the dry run and the final. When “teaching” a mastered skill in my dry run, I was very rushed and tried to get as much information in as possible. Instead of teaching anything, I just talked about the topic. This was also one of the speeches that I received the best feedback and advice that helped me decide where I wanted to go with the final. It was mention that I narrow down to a couple moves and explain them or even demonstrate them. It helped my speech take a turn for the better because it sparked the dance teacher part of my brain into creating a lesson plan within my outline. In the final, I slowed down my words, gave out important tips and tricks, elaborated on moves, and showed the costume. Before it was just a jumbled mess in my opinion and wasn’t really a video that was teaching something. I had to take the final video multiple times because I was critiquing myself a little too harshly. For me my specific good moments would be when I mention bending your knees and then describing two simple dance steps (1.32-2.18). I know this may sound silly, but I also adjusted the format of my video by propping my phone up vertically. With my phone being horizontal in the dry run, it cut off my movement and made me step farther away from the camera. This resulted in a strain of tone and volume because I couldn’t tell how loud was too loud. In the dry run, I think setting the phone up vertically helped the set up feel more like an instructional video. I didn’t do that in the dry run and I think that was one of the most important things missing from it. Obviously looking back it now there are still things I would change and alter to this day, but I’m happy with the improvement between the two videos.
I actually read this novel for a class and it pointed out some serious issues that are present in our country. It’s a graphic novel which is probably why it’s not a perfect ten. I’m not a big fan of graphic novels personally but I know other people are.
This novel is beautifully written with an unexpected twist.
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Summary:
This graphic novel written by Gene Luen Yang, follows three storylines in one completed piece of work. You have Jin Yang a young Chinese American student moves to a new school, noticing that he is the outsider. He gets bullied everyday for not being a white American, but he feels like it gets worse when he falls in love with an “All-American” gal. In attempt to fit in he has to overcome the racism he faces each and everyday.
In storyline two, you follow the Monkey King and his journey through life. It derives from an old Chinese fable that the author was told growing up. He struggles with greediness and power, trying to prove himself in superiority compared to all the other elders and gods. Ultimately he tries to become the one and only greatest of all gods.
Storyline three follows a teenager named Danny who’s cousin Chin-Kee comes to visit. Chin-Kee represents the ultimate worst Chinese stereotypes wrapped into one character. Essentially things like his accent, intelligence, and even clothing makes Danny feel like his life is quickly being ruined. As you continue the novel, you see how these three storyline eventually fall in line with each other.
Many people believe that this graphic novel has a resounding and loud message behind each page. You can read multiple ratings on GoodReads, but I will list a few below:
A unique message and vivid writing – I loved how he was able to weave together three stories in such a short story!
And for once in my life I was pretty happy about being awake in the early morning hours because I realized rather quickly that American Born Chinese is one of the best graphic novels I’ve read so far.
Both books are about the immigrant experience, a topic difficult to write about in ways that are (more or less) politically correct but not too obvious and predictable.
Quite a quirky book, but it benefits from it. It does it’s own thing and completely does it well. The themes were powerful and well delivered: I loved seeing the three different stories comment on racism, but more than that, self acceptance.
Man this hit me in the feels. This would have been a momentous book for me as a pre-teen. I totally identified with Jin Wang and in him recognized the need to fit in as a second generation Asian surrounded by a majority of white peers and the undercurrent of Asian stereotypes that still bubbled to the surface from Long Duk Dong to William Hung. It is a coming of age story that explores this overwhelming need to fit in while wresting with a larger cultural identity.
Apparent Themes:
This graphic novel focuses on racism and self-acceptance. The systematic racism that has dripped through generation after generation has not disappeared over the years. In fact, racism towards Asians has increased dramatically over the last year or so. Due to some of the things that our former President, Donald J. Trump, said made people believe that all Asians were the root of the pandemic.
Hate crimes towards Asian have skyrocketed recently, but not all of them are being labeled hate crimes. According the The NY Times, prosecutors and police claim that there is usually not enough evidence to prove racist motives, but there is for attempted murder or murder in general.
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You can look up any petitions or fundraisers being held to stop the hate crimes that are on the monumental rise.
Final Thoughts:
This novel was a whirlwind, but an excellently written one. In fact, there were multiple points that have occurred to me in my lifetime too. Although I am not of any Asian decent, I was born in Japan and lived there for a couple years. Growing up in a small town, once people heard that news, they would make snide racist remarks, pull their eyes so they would stretch, and mock the culture. It was painful growing up at times and I was white American. I cannot begin to imagine how painful and confusing it can be for Chinese Americans to be bullied and harassed for their culture.
This Jodi Picoult novel was good. That’s the only word I can use to describe this novel. It wasn’t amazing, but it wasn’t boring either. The best way to put it is it was somewhere in the middle. Although I tend to love Jodi Picoult’s writing style and topics she chooses, there was a missing spark in this novel. I still enjoyed it for the most part though.
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Overview:
Alex Rivers, a famous celebrity superstar of an actor, is married to Cassie Barrett, a renowned anthropologist. They were the couple who seemed to have it all. But Cassie gets amnesia, unsure of who she is, where she is, or who to consider family. Their relationship gives away a rough bumpy road as she struggles through trying to remember the past she has forgotten. The question to ask yourself while reading this novel, “What will happen next?”
Reviews:
Out of all the Jodi Picoult books, the reviews given for this novel are by far the worst I’ve ever seen. I would say that my rating is being generous compared to some of the others. You can read all the ratings on GoodReads, but here are a few I can list for you:
I have to say Jodi Picoult is not my thing. After I read this book I feel like I am having amnesia just like the main character. Do not remember much of what is going on with this book.
I typically love Jodi Picoult novels but this one was a huge let down. She typically focuses on relevant topics and is able to capture the details of everyday life along with the real emotions her characters are dealing with; but Picture Perfect was nothing but a bad romance novel. Her portrayal of the wife battering is shallow and unrealistic. The little that she touches on Native American issues is interesting, but again, there’s no real substance to anything in this novel.
This was, by far, the WORST book I ever read.
Alas, I always tout Picoult as an authur of “good reads” but this one is BADD….It can be compared to the paperback grocery store “bodice-busters”. The story idea is OK, but the writing is? ? ? Where was the editor? The only good part was when the Native Americans were in the read. Don’t go for this one.
I was initially intrigued by this story: amnesia, a suspicious situation involving a movie star, a hot cop… but what I was left with was a main character who defined herself by the men in her life.
I had so many problems with this book. It really upset me that that Jodi Piccoult took the very intense subject matter of domestic violence and set it up through such an unrealistic premise
Domestic Violence:
Domestic Violence is a serious problem in the United States. It is a problem that grew much larger during quarantine with people in abusive relationships forced to stay inside with no means of escape. The fact sheet below is provided by Statistics at NCADV where you can find a breakdown of each state and every form of domestic violence across the globe.
Domestic Violence is usually a topic that remains hidden due to fear instilled in the victim. Some people are blinded by love and passion while others claw to escape and some become numb to the abuse. Domestic Violence can also take shape in three forms: Mental, Physical, and Emotional.
Mental abuse is usually playing mind games with the victim and practically training them to view themselves as lesser then. Through mental abuse they can gain a whole other level of control, which is what most abusers desire.
Through emotional abuse, the abuser uses your emotions against you to feel weak and believe that in order for you to survive, you need to keep them around. This could also include verbal abuse and being able to manipulate your emotions about certain topics as well.
Finally physical abuse is pretty straightforward. It tends to be exactly what you think, punches, kicks, burning, guns can even be involved, and any other form of physical violence against the victims body.
Domestic Violence is another topic that is pushed pretty far under the rug, but we need the survivors and the victims still struggling to know that we are all there for them.
Final Thoughts:
Like I have mentioned before, Jodi Picoult usually touches on some pretty sensitive topics in her writing. She barely touches on the problem of pushing Native Americans out of their land, but it seemed clunky and weirdly placed within this story. She also didn’t do a spectacular job of making a strong woman character for this role. However, the reason why this book received its rating was because some of the portrayal was rather accurate. For the most part it was subpar, but I don’t think I could bring myself to lower the rating anymore.
Out of all the speeches we have done so far, I think Speech 4 was my best speech given in my personal opinion. I can see the improvement on things, like maintaining eye contact, making sure there are pauses to insert emphasis, and speaking rather clearly compared to my others. As for my seriousness in this speech, I don’t think it’s too much since most of it is a serious topic. However, I believe that my personality fluctuates and the seriousness is balanced with a joke here or there to cause a lightheartedness to the topic.
One thing I personally still want to improve on is my organization. I think the beginning of this speech is really well organized, but the end kind of loses me a bit. I don’t realize it until I watch it back, and even then it stumps me because I’m not too sure how to make it any better. Continuing forward for the last two weeks, I really think I need to focus on the organization of my speeches and maybe start out in the outline to the progress from there.
Chapter 25 was really interesting for me to read because I call every single speech a speech. There isn’t a fancy word or title in my head to describe that speech like this chapter mentioned. Learning the ins and outs of what goes into each speech in order for it to be labeled that way was something I had never learned before.
I watch a lot of Comedy Central’s roast specials, so it was mind boggling for me to understand that a roast is a speech. My brain understands it, but doesn’t want to if that makes sense. The section that I found really intriguing was the one about eulogies. They had the quick tip section at the bottom labeled “Commemorate Life- Not Death.” I feel like when some people write eulogies they focus too much on the sadness of the present versus the happiness of the past life. I wasn’t expecting the book to point out something like that, which was shocking to say the least.
Since I can’t write about every single section, I will definitely take away the differences in each speech and always remember the pro tip if I ever have to write a eulogy too.
Jodi Picoult is an amazing author. She puts out numerous pieces on devastating topics or ones that are hard to digest. For me this book hit every note, but I wasn’t a big fan of the ending. I just think I cared too much about some of the characters. The one thing that always makes Jodi Picoult such a good author, is the way she can fluctuate between each character’s perspective and still make the storyline cohesive.
I have yet to meet someone who is not a fan of Jodi Picoult books. Her topics are everything I want to cover as an aspiring author and keep it as real and honest as she does at all.
Reviews:
Many people on GoodReads leave highly rated reviews. Here are what some people have said about this novel:
I haven’t read a book affected me so deeply, shook me to the core, made me scream! The high tension story telling of school shootings, the earth shattering, soul shaking events aftermath the tragedy, all those young people’s intense traumas, thought provoking perspectives, shocking revelations!
This was an incredible book! I was so engrossed in it and the ending..Oh my! I absolutely find this book devastating and fascinating. This is easily my new favorite Jodi Picoult book. It is sad and eye opening on the truth and expanse of bullying. Once again Picoult weaves in a story of more controversial topics and slays it.
Wow! This book really makes you think!! I suggest it to everyone!
Exceptionally written novel that shows us what’s in the mind of a fictional school shooter, what led him to commit the crime, and how his actions affect the lives of his family and friends. Picoult is a master at character development.
Although most of them are positive reviews, there are also some extremely ones:
This is what I have come to understand about Jodi Picoult. She takes a controversial or emotionally-charged topic. School shootings. Childhood leukemia. Amish people. Then she centers that topic around terribly cliched characters and cranks the schmaltz meter to 11.
Is there a shelf for a book I have to stop reading because I can’t stand something about it? In this case, that the writer is a machine that swallows magazines whole and spews out a topic of the month.
I’ve only read a couple of Picoult’s books, and quite frankly didn’t like them. I decided to read this one as I have a bit of a strange fascination with the incidences of school shootings, and although I wasn’t expecting anything great my lowered expectations still didn’t elevate my opinion of this novel.
You know what I HATE about Jodi Picoult? She always has a FANTASTIC plot idea, and then screws the whole thing up by tying everything up with a freaking pretty bow for the last 20 pages of the book.
It’s very obvious that the reviews for this novel are extremely mixed. There are some reviews that strictly bash Jodi Picoult instead of the novel itself, but each to their own.
Columbine:
Like previously mentioned, Picoult did a lot of information hunting before writing this novel. She investigated the Columbine shooting and reached out to parents as a means of understanding the problem as much as she could.
Columbine was one of the first school shooting massacres that devastated the world. There are still terrifying and shocking videos of the two kids in the cafeteria that circle the web from the day of the shooting. To read more about Columbine in depth, you can visit Columbine High School Shooting on the History webpage.
Here are some facts that I can give. It happened on April 20th, 1999 in Littleton, Colorado. Two kids, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, sadly murdered 13 children and wounded 20 other individuals. During the 10 year anniversary of the tragic event, several parents spoke out to honor the fallen and some parents even created TED talks to others who have faced similar events on how to cope.
School Shootings:
This country has a serious problem when it comes to school shootings, and mass shootings in general. Over quarantine in 2020, it was the only year where school shootings did not happen.
CNN created an amazing article about the cold hearted facts and numbers of school shootings over the years. Their headline was “10 Years, 180 School Shootings, 356 Victims.” Some people like to argue that over ten years, that really isn’t that big of a number, but it indeed is. CNN’s article provides detailed graphs and statistics to better read and understand what has truly happened in the last ten years. They report that, “More school shootings happen on Friday and during the afternoon.” Again this is an intelligently written article from CNN that provides easy to read information.
One of the biggest reasons why some schools are targeted are because they are an EASY target. Teachers and other members within a school are not allowed to carry a concealed weapon, nor any weapon for that matter onto the premises. This allows some attackers to understand that a school is a weak spot. During my debate class, this topic was very heavy. Should a teacher be able to bring a concealed weapon to school if they have a license to carry? Now I’m not going to answer that for you, but otherwise think of it as food for thought.
Gun control is a prevalent concern throughout the past years. There have been several authors to write about it and it always seems to be thrown into some political debate. However, I think everyone needs to consider the damage that has happened over the last ten years according to CNN.
Final Thoughts:
For me personally, I enjoyed this book. I love that Jodi switches perspectives in her novels because it allows the reader to become more invested in each character. Even though some other readers may disagree, I thought it was a very powerful piece.
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