Sold is a book by Patricia McCormick about a girl from India named Lakshmi who is sold in child prostitution. She has to pay off a “debt” to her “boss” through prostitution. One night, when their TV doesn’t work the younger girls ask Monica and Shilpa to tell them stories of movies. After the stories all of the girls ask many questions about the movies, but Lakshmi only wants to know one thing.

“I have only one question:

‘How do Monica and Shilpa know about the movies?’

I whisper to Shahanna. 

‘Sometimes Mumtaz lets the good-earning girls go to the movies,’ she says.” (p.166)

Lakshmi and the other girls don’t have access to things we take for granted in our childhood. The girls couldn’t go to the movies, or even outside, they also didn’t have parents. Parents are probably the thing we take for granted the most, I’m sure that many of us don’t understand or ever think about what it would be like without them. I definitely couldn’t imagine living without parents or having to live in fear, and not being able to go outside. Lakshmi lives in a reality we couldn’t fathom because of the privilege we have to live in such a friendly, safe place. We end up taking simple things like our parents and homes for granted because we don’t see the lives that people like Lakshmi are forced to live, without parents and any sign of hope. Overall, Lakshmi is stripped of many things we would consider rights, and definitely all of our enjoyments we have.

Ishmael has come back from New York City, where he met his future “mother” Laura Sims, who is a storyteller he met from the conference. He is beginning to ease his way back into school, however, the children are afraid of him and Mohamed because they were child soldiers. This becomes irrelevant anyhow because in May of 1997 the rebels and government soldiers stage a coup and overthrow the civilian government, total chaos ensues. His uncle falls ill and eventually dies, and Ishmael can’t stop thinking that he doesn’t think he can live through civil war again.

“The gunshots didn’t cease for the next five months; they became the new sound of the city. In the morning, families sat on their verandas and held their children close, staring at the city streets where gunmen roamed in groups, looting, raping, and killing people at will.” (p.206)

Ishmael and Lakshmi share the same problem, having to live the majority of their childhoods out in fear, and without a family. They are both forced to do mentally scarring things, which will leave lifelong impacts on both of them. Much like Lakshmi, Ishmael lives with constant fear, and limited ability to do anything. Ishmael has to live with the threat of being shot day and night, something we take for granted (at least the safety of our own home). Their childhoods have been full of traumatic experiences and were without various things that we in Marin think nothing of. Ishmael was unable to call Laura for a long time, and Lakshmi was rarely able to go outside. They both were forced to endure stressful and difficult childhoods, without many things we would consider as everyday items or basic abilities.

In a Long Way Gone, the use of metaphors was very useful in helping to understand Ishmael’s view on the war. He says towards the end of the book when a mother tells the story about the hunter who must decide whether he will shoot a monkey which would kill his mother, or let it live and kill his Father. He says his answer was to shoot it so that other people wouldn’t have to make the same mistake. I believe that this means that if he were to have the choice to end the suffering for future families like his, but it would take the sacrifice of himself or his family he would take it for the benefit of those future families.

Christopher got home early from school, so he decided to watch Blue Planet and he left his notebook with all of the detective work in it on the counter. His dad got home and found the notebook and Christopher realized what was about to happen. Christopher’s dad was very mad, and he started yelling. This made Christopher scared, so he screamed and hit his dad and couldn’t remember the rest. Once he “was switched back on again” his dad took his notebook and put it in the garbage. A couple of days later, after Christopher and his dad made up Christopher went back into the garbage bin to look for his book, but it wasn’t there. He searched around the house and eventually found it in a box in his dad’s room, making sure it looked exactly the same. “Then I saw that there was another box underneath the toolbox, so I lifted the toolbox out of the cupboard. The other box was an old cardboard box called a shirt box because people used to buy shirts in them. And when I opened the shirt box I saw my book was inside it.” Christopher is very clever sometimes, he actually frequently does stuff like this, like going around and investigating people. He can sometimes be quite a troublemaker. I do the same thing though, whenever I get in trouble and lose my electronics I would always try to use Find My iPhone to find them. I’d also try to sneak out of my room when I’m on timeout and go find something to do. When I was younger, I’d do things like what Christopher is doing a lot. The writing in this passage makes it seem like a detective novel, the way he specifically describes all of the places he searches and tries to reason out where his book could be. His first-person description makes it seem like Sherlock Holmes, one of his favorite characters, detecting in a house. There is also added suspense because of how the author keeps writing that Christopher thinks he hears his dad’s car. I was mostly looking for a way to entertain myself and defy my parents. Christopher becomes a full-blown detective and tries to solve the case of the missing book using intuition. He must really enjoy all of this detective work. 

Christopher finds out his mom isn’t really dead, but she left to live in London because she didn’t feel needed anymore. He finds this out by finding letters his mom wrote to him that his dad had kept hidden from him. When Christopher’s dad finds him with the letters he decides that he will no longer keep any more secrets from Christopher and tells him he killed Wellington, his neighbor’s dog. This makes Christopher very confused and scared. He gets so scared he decides he must run away from his dad and go live with his mom in London. He goes on a huge adventure, while simultaneously running from the police. He makes it to his mom’s apartment, but later on, his mom decides that she has to leave because she no longer loves her husband. They end up going back to Swindon, where Christopher’s dad lives and his mom finds a small apartment. He still has to stay with his Dad though sometimes, which scares him because he can’t trust his dad. His dad attempts to apologize but Christopher still doesn’t know what to do. “You don’t have to say anything, not right now. You just have to think about it. And, um . . . I’ve got you a present. To show you that I really mean what I say. And to say sorry. And because . . . well, you’ll see what I mean.” (p.213) Christopher seems to be very tentative when it comes to trusting people. This is very similar to how he doesn’t like strangers, in fact, I’m sure they are related. He basically acts like his dad is a stranger because to him, his dad is a stranger. Christopher must be really hard to gain the trust of, especially if he won’t trust his own dad, even if he apologized so many times. This happens to me sometimes, not to the same degree, but if one of my own parents gets really mad they’ll usually apologize, even if I completely deserved it. The difference between us is that Christopher rarely forgives people. For me, however, I will just forgive my parents and get on with it, although I can’t be lied to so extremely. The way Christopher is portrayed makes it seem like he cares more about the fact that his dad killed the dog rather than hid the fact that his mother left him. Even how the passage is written shows how Christopher really views his dad as a stranger because he cannot trust him. Christopher is a very hard person to get to know, mainly because he has trust issues. He also is very scared of people he doesn’t trust, I guess that he could be considered very timid.

Christopher is quite random at times, and this is one of those times. There is really no context for this chapter of the book. Before this, however, he was told he wasn’t allowed to do any more detective work by his father so I am assuming he has just gone off into one of the small places where he goes to think as he mentions in the book so that he can be by himself. “I think I would make a very good astronaut. To be a good astronaut you have to be intelligent and I’m intelligent. You also have to understand how machines work and I’m good at understanding how machines work. You also have to be someone who would like being on their own in a tiny spacecraft thousands and thousands of miles away from the surface of the earth and not panic or get claustrophobia or homesick or insane. And I really like little spaces, so long as there is no one else in them with me.” (p.50) When I was younger I used to love the thought of being an astronaut, I loved space so much I would watch NASA TV when I got home from school. Although being an astronaut is no longer my preferred career I’m definitely still fascinated by space and astronomy. The reasons Christopher gave for wanting to become an astronaut would probably be the negatives for me, claustrophobia is never something I’d thought of but it does seem quite awful, think about staying in a tiny space for months at a time miles away from the closest human not living with you, and all of the chances where something could go wrong, it honestly sounds like constant paranoia, to be honest. I suppose he would enjoy all of those things however because of things like how he doesn’t like strangers and there definitely wouldn’t be any strangers in space. I’d also like to think that Christopher would enjoy the repetitiveness and preciseness of living in space because of the fact that he likes everything exactly the same. He won’t even let the furniture be moved an inch or his head begins to hurt. The way the passage is written reads as if these were all positive reasons for living in space however they clearly are very negative, and pretty horrible to imagine.  Living in a place for that long also seems like it would be quite boring, especially seeing the same people and doing the same things, astronauts must find it hard to stay sane in space for long periods of time.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time is by Mark Haddon. The book takes place in a little town in England. In that town, there is a kid with special needs named Christopher. Christopher used to live with his father and mother, but his mother died a few years ago. He loves to do math. He knows all the countries in the world and their capitals and every prime number up to 7,057. Christopher doesn’t understand emotions very well, however. One night he discovers his neighbor’s dog stabbed to death, which makes him sad because he likes dogs. He does what he thought to be the most logical thing and began hugging it, except his neighbor Mrs. Shears came out and saw him and the dog, which made it look like he had killed him. When the police came he got very frustrated with them and decided to hit one of the officers, so he was taken to the station and his dad had to come bail him out. Once he got home Christopher decides to investigate the murder of the dog because he enjoys murder mysteries, the only bad part is that he has to speak with strangers. “I do not like strangers because I do not like people I have never met before. They are hard to understand.” (34) Christopher’s fear of talking to strangers makes sense. The first person point of view makes it easier to understand what Christopher feels like when he interacts with a stranger, for example, the book shows how the real reasons he doesn’t like strangers, and how he gets to feel comfortable around new people, it really helps to understand how he feels because third-person point of view wouldn’t be as accurate. This shows that Christopher is very shy and irritable, he clearly doesn’t like new people, and it says that he will someone who he doesn’t’ know if they touch him.  Last week I had to go sell tickets to support the basketball team and it could’ve been better. I felt it was a little awkward going to people’s houses and asking them for money, even if it was for the basketball team, especially people you don’t. The worst part is going inside a gate and knocking on the door of a house with a long walkway because those are the houses where you’re really invading people’s privacy. The difference between Christopher and my phobia of talking to strangers is for me I would consider it awkward/embarrassing, especially when asking for money, while if Christopher sees a stranger he might begin to feel sick or get very angry or scared. He might possibly run away or hit them. 

I started reading in first grade because I skipped kindergarten, so I was a little bit behind in my reading in the beginning. I learned to read in an ordinary way just a little later than most. I remember coming into my first day of first grade and sitting next to a girl who was already miles ahead of me in reading, reciting the alphabet and reading smaller words off the whiteboard, and my mom told me later that she was extremely worried for me after that, although it all turned out fine. We started out very simple by reading many simple books, I specifically remember reading tons of Magic Treehouse books as a little kid. My reading throughout first grade progressed well, but I remember always having trouble pronouncing Es probably the most confusing letter in the English language, after the first grade I had basically become an independent reader.

The first and probably most memorable books I’ve ever read by myself was called Busytown by Richard Scarry, my favorite part was finding this little yellow bug that was hidden on each page. During elementary school, my fondest memories of books were reading all of Rick Riordan’s greek mythology books, I loved those, and reading the entire Harry Potter series. Now that I am older I have read a lot less than a used to, and almost never recreationally, and sadly I think it is mostly to do with my phone. When I was in 4-6th grade reading was one of my favorite activities, I would read almost every night, staying up past my parents which was a big deal at the time. Overall, my favorite books I’ve read would have probably been The Boy at the End of the World, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. We had to read the Boy at the End of the World in school, but I loved it so much and I was so disappointed that there was no sequel, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was just my favorite book of all time, I really have no preference when it comes to Harry Potter, but if I had to I would pick Order of the Phoenix. These books greatly improved my views on reading, but as I get older I’ve really just been less interested in books because I have never really found anything as interesting. School was a place where reading was an enjoyable thing, but now I am impartial to it. 

Reading has always been seen as beneficial to me, but not always interesting. There will be times where I may not like the book I am reading, but I know it is improving learning. Although, I do feel that if book is very hard to read it may be good for me but much less interesting. Reading is a very crucial part of my education, if it were not for reading I would definitely not be able to do so many of the things I do today. My life would be severely different essentially. I have always been a relatively enthusiastic reader, and I never considered myself someone who hates reading, but I hope that as I get older I enjoy reading again as much as I used to.

1. Night by Elie Wiesel
2. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
3. Sixth Man by Andre Iguodala
4. The Hammer of Thor by Rick Riordan
5. The Dark Prophecy by Rick Riordan
6. The Burning Maze by Rick Riordan
7. The Outsiders by S.E Hinton
8. The Giver by Lois Lowry
9. Hit Count by Chris Lynch
10. Genius by Leopoldo Gout
11. The Assassin’s Curse by Kevin Sands
12. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
13. The Mark of the Plague by Kevin Sands
14. The Blackthorn Key by Kevin Sands

Trevor is pulled over while driving one of his stepdad’s junk cars which doesn’t have an ownership title and without an ownership title he has no way to prove the car is his and the police cannot verify who’s car it is. The police believe the car is stolen especially with all of the carjackings that were happening in South Africa at that time it was almost commonplace. This means that Trevor has to go to jail and await his bail hearing unless he called his parents, but he decided that it would be smarter not to and play it off like nothing had happened so that he wouldn’t get spanked by his mother. “I figured that if I was in jail people were going to assume I was the kind of colored person who ends up in jail, a violent criminal. So I played it up. I put on this character; I played the stereotype.” I can definitely relate to Trevor and his tough act, specifically playing sports, before the game everyone acts incredibly tough. Players of any sport can all say that they have done this at least once. Although Trevor is doing this in a much different situation, which he plays up as a major deal, but it doesn’t really seem like he is in major trouble with anyone. He seems to think he is, however. This is very much like previously in the book, when he refers to himself as a chameleon, but instead of changing color he is changing his personality. I can admit to making myself seem tougher or cooler than I really am before a basketball game. During warm ups, everyone wants to make themselves seem as good as they can possibly seem, it’s basically customary in the AAU basketball world, which is the travel basketball association, and to be completely honest it never really works but everyone still puffs out their chest and puts on their “cool jacket”. In fact, it’s almost made fun of by kids because it really is silly how useless doing something like that is, but it really is the nature of a teenager.

Trevor is in high school now and he is looking for a source of income. He realizes that he is one of the fastest kids in the school and the cafeteria only has a certain amount of good food and people don’t want to wait in line and waste their lunchtime. He decides to charge people and take orders of food from them. He begins to make a lot of money from that but hears about some people making bootleg CDs and he wants in. He joins them only as a partner and a middleman but eventually, he is given a CD writer and becomes the sole operator. “‘Trevor,’ he told me, ‘You have been a loyal partner.’ And as thanks, he bequeathed unto me his CD writer. At the time, black people barely had access to computers, let’s start there. But a CD writer? That was the stuff of lore. It was mythical. The day Andrew gave it to me, he changed my life. Thanks to him, I now controlled production, sales distribution-I had everything I needed to lock down the bootleg business.” Trevor reminds me a lot of myself, although I didn’t do illegal things in order to make money, I definitely have decided to create a business in order to make some extra money whether it’s a lemonade stand or selling something on eBay I love to be entrepreneurial like Trevor is with his CD business. Over the years I have sold many things, mostly lemonade stands, and various other little things, but I have recently sold a computer on eBay that I added things to. Trevor is a little more reckless when it comes to his business, but he and I both have the same ambition to make money and also get a kick out of being an entrepreneur. I love computers as well as him so it’s nice to see someone who is so well-versed with computers like Trevor, it’s pretty cool to see that someone else also likes to mess around with computers and knows a lot about them as well.

This DJ stand is to represent what Trevor does to make money in his spare time.

Trevor is thinking about asking someone to be his valentine for the first time. At Catholic School they didn’t celebrate Valentine’s Day, so all he knew about it was that Cupid shoots you with an arrow to make you fall in love. At H.A Jack Valentine’s Day was an important day for the school, so because of its newfound importance, Trevor decides to ask Maylene, the only colored girl in the school, to be his valentine. All the girls at the school had decided that they were perfect for each other and that meant that he must ask her to be his valentine, even though he later realized that the only reason they were considered perfect is because they looked similar and they were the only two people like that in the school. He had no idea what to do, however. “I didn’t know the first thing about having a girlfriend. I had to be taught the whole love bureaucracy of the school. There was this thing where you don’t actually talk straight to the person.” This event is so hilariously accurate to what it is like at school. Trevor describes his experience exactly how it would be on a real Valentine’s Day. If I were to describe how it’s like to ask someone even to be your Valentine it would be identical to this. People in school take things like this incredibly serious and essentially it is a bureaucratic affair. Anything similar to this at our school would be enacted exactly how it is described, with all the friends talking to friends and formality. The way relationships work at school is hilariously serious and important, anything that has to do with relationships becomes the talk of the grade by the end of the day and most times anything like this is ended by the end of the day. School relationships are exaggerated and taken really to an insanely high level of importance.

This picture of Cupid is to represent Valentine’s Day and what Trevor thinks Valentine’s Day is.

Trevor Noah is a half-white half-black boy born in South Africa during a time known as apartheid. Apartheid was the extreme segregation of black African people in South Africa by the white African people of South Africa known as the Afrikaaners. Trevor’s mom wanted to have a child with a white man however, even though it was illegal at the time for that to happen, but she did it anyway. When Trevor was a child he was taught many different languages in order to fit in better. He learned to speak English, Zulu, Xhosa, Tswana, and Afrikaans in order to help him fit in with the people he was with and potentially get himself out of bad situations. Depending on who he was around he would speak their language with the exact same accent in order to make them think he was like them. “I became a chameleon. My color didn’t change, but I could change your perception of my color. If you spoke to me in Zulu, I replied to you in Zulu. If you spoke to me in Tswana, I replied to you in Tswana. Maybe I didn’t look like you, but if I spoke like you, I was you.” (p.56) I feel like I do this a lot, not to the same degree of extremity, but on a smaller scale. For example, I have a ton of friends who love sports, so when I am with them I talk about sports, and fantasy leagues, I’ll also play sports with them. I also have a friend who loves coding, so when I am with him we talk about coding and computer things, and I code stuff with him. If I were to just talk about sports with my coding friend or just talk about coding with my friends who love sports they would become uninterested and probably not as good friends. There are also certain things that I couldn’t say to a teacher that I would say to my friends. Just like how Trevor would never speak in Xhosa around Zulu people, I would never say certain things and act in certain ways around different people.