Karen Wu > Recent Status Updates

In this book, there is an afterlife. More specifically, there are two places you could go when you die: a good place and a bad place. You get into the bad place if you die by suicide, so in this moral universe, suicide is considered wrong.

This book is targeted to older audiences. It talks about the effects of poverty and a violent household has on a young person's ability to succeed in life, something most little kids probably wouldn't understand or be interested in. However, older people and teens could serve to learn a lot about human nature from this book.

Blue is one of the recurring colors in the book. The society that the main character lives in cannot make the color blue. Blue represents wisdom and knowledge, and the society lacking blue means that they lack wisdom and knowledge. At the end of the book, the main character gets the color blue, meaning that she has become wise.

The red apple in The Giver represents disorder, sunrise, and birth. After Jonas begins to see the colors and receive the memories, his perception of the world is thrown into disorder. It symbolizes the rebirth of society, and sunrise also symbolizes rebirth. Fiona's hair is red because Jonas cares for her, and also had dreams about her. The blue eyes of the potential Receivers prepresent depth, knowledge, and truth.

I think that The Giver will be a rebirth story. In the society that they live in, everything is assigned to everyone from jobs to family. Jonas will see memories from the past, and he will probably realize that the way things are aren't the best, since nobody gets to make decisions for themselves. Then not only Jonas himself will change, but he will want to change the society too, so it would be a rebirth story.

The conflict in this book is a character vs. society conflict. The white-dominated society is determined to keep the schools segregated, but the main character and her friends are trying to go to the previously-white school.

One of the symbolic archetypes in my book is between Heaven and Hell. One of the main characters, Josh, goes underground into the Pearl Catacombs with the bad guy. This symbolizes that he is being lured away from goodness and into evil. However, near the end of the book, he, his sister, and their friends go to the roof of Notre Dame to fight the bad guys. This symbolizes that he is at peace and has embraced goodness.

I believe that this story is a character v. self story. There are many moral questions. For example, Jisun is an activist, while Namin is not concerned with that matter. However, Jisun comes from a rich family, while Namin, despite only being concerned about school, needs to succeed in order to raise her family out of poverty. The struggles these characters make with themselves fall into character v. self.

One of the main characters in this book, Jisun, follows the archetype of a "hero." She is a underground student activist that works against the authoritarian government. Jisun also tries to do what is morally right. For example, when she discovers that her friend Namin's brother has been given away because he had cerebral palsy, she asks Namin about him and encourages Namin to go see him.

I chose to read this book because it sounded very interesting. The book generated suspense because the back cover hinted at a dark secret that I wanted to find out. One of the reviews on the cover said that the book would make me question my one family's credibility, which intrigued me. What in the story would make me wary of my own family?

I think that this book is meant for teens and preteens based on the characters and topics. The main characters in this book are all either teens or not age-specific, which makes them easier to relate to for the teen and preteen readers. The book also deals with the topic of death and loss. Our reading books often teach us about the same things, because we need to start learning how to deal with it.

I think that my book is plot driven, because the entire book happened because of a single event, a royal family being kidnapped. The rest of the book is all about trying to find them. However, I do not believe that my book is character driven because the two main characters don't seem to be changing yet in a way that affects their choices that affects the story.

This series is fictional, and it is told in chronological order. There are no dates in the beginning of each chapter, though there is a small illustration. The chapters have no names, and there are no flashbacks. It is told from the perspective of a single person, Call, which, in my opinion, makes it biased. The book is told in a fast-paced, action-packed manner, which makes it highly enjoyable.

Anna was a highly dynamic character. At the start of the book, she was submissive and let her freedom be violated by the GDR (East Germany). However, at the end of the book, she chose to escape from the GDR and go to West Germany, despite the risks. Fritz was a more static character. At the beginning of the book, he was a hardworking and loyal son and brother. At the end of the book, he was pretty much the same way.

The setting of this story is in Turkey, when they were the Ottoman Empire, and is closely tied to the events that occur. This was about the prosecution of Christian Armenians at the hands of the Muslim Turks. Had this story been set in places such as the US, there clearly would have been no such prosecution, as those places are predominately Christian. If this story was set today, there would be no Ottoman Empire.

I wonder why Lucy, the main character's mom, never really appeared to Simon, the main character, despite the fact that the dead relatives of others visited and manifested before them. Maybe it was because Simon was too oblivious to notice. That could be the case, since she did technically appear to him once, but he thought it was someone else. Maybe after that time, she could not manifest again.

An unsympathetic character in this book is the Humdrum. It constantly tries to hurt the main character, Simon, and causes trouble for him. I think that one of the characters, Baz, is a sympathetic character. Baz, despite having flaws, has a dead mother, whom he wants to avenge. This makes me care about him. His family isn't always supportive of him. This also makes me sympathetic towards him.

Da'ru is an unsympathetic character. She messes with other people, so I hate her. Silas is strange. While he is a cold-blooded killer, he never kills for fun. Silas can't die, due to Da'ru, a fact that he despises, because of the pain he must endure. He teams up with the main character because he wants death and revenge against Da'ru. Because his life was messed up, I think he is a sympathetic character.

This book is very interesting and descriptive. I can visualize all of the scenes, and it gets right into the action.