Bowen’s Comments (group member since Feb 17, 2015)

Bowen’s comments from the UWABooks group.

Gaiman's Neverwhere is written in the way of a movie. As in a movie, the novel is structured in segments to arouse readers' suspense. In content, the supposed good people turn out to be bad and characters who die return to life unexpectedly. All these help to trigger readers' interests. Though the plots of the novel maybe not thrilling enough to fascinate adult readers, it is very suitable for teenage readers and can be very appealing to them.

So inspiring! Alice Hoffman's The Ice Queen starts with the sentence "Be careful what you wish for" which is the opening sentence and theme of the movie Into the Woods. And the sentence "The cold has never bothered me" at the very end of this book is the key sentence of the movie Frozen 's theme song. ​

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a story with rich imaginations. It opens a beautifully-designed fantasy world to both kids and adults. One of the features of the book that catches my attention is Alice's constant consumption of food. This feature may resemble the kids' real act of frequent eating during the boat trip with Carroll but it also has a deep meaning. In the story, the change of body size caused by eating changes the way that Alice is treated in the wonderland greatly; this symbolizes the cruel fact that in human society, a large number of people judge and treat others only by their power and status.

It was so beautiful! Closing the book after finishing the last paragraph, all I could see was an angel so pure in the holy water. Things go well for everyone in the end leaving the readers a sweet memory.

This book has the similar theme with Darcey's other books which is damaged people trying to find God through the contact with other damaged people in a confusing world. But there are also two differences. First, the contact with other damaged people in Darcey's other books is mainly sex, but this book almost leaves the sex part out. Second, the theme of searching God in this book is much more apparent than the other books.

This is certainly Darcey's another successful book which guarantees her readers a good time and memory. What's more, it is also the perfect book for the parents who don't care enough about their kids. I suppose it can be difficult for anyone to hold the tears when reading about the little girl trying to find a job of tickling men with a feather with no idea of what the job really is; and their dream with the money is to go to Disney World!

This book gives an insight of the soldiers' mind in a war. The fear of death is bad enough already and when combined with confusion it is almost unbearable. The novel gives an answer to the purpose of Vietnam war which is to win and this is also the purpose of most wars. If you win, it is an decent war, if you lose, then it is an disgusting war. But to win is not an acceptable purpose for the soldiers to sacrifice their lives; it is only the purpose of the politicians who use the soldiers as chess pieces. It is evil to start a war because it makes the lives of both soldiers and innocent citizens miserable. And it is everyone's will and responsibility to maintain a world peace.