 | Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Alexandre Dumas |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 12 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 12 and up |
| Genre: | Fiction |
| Year of publication: | 1844 |
Gifted guy takes his devastating revenge. | |
| Similar books | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Count of Monte Cristo,The | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Helen DeWitt |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups |
| Genre: | Fiction, parenting |
| Year of publication: | 2000 |
This hilarious novel starts as a not-quite-five year old's mother gets so sick of answering his questions that she promises to teach him Japanese after he's read the Odyssey in the original Greek. Which he does. Should be required reading for parents of gifted toddlers, but parents of gifted toddlers probably wouldn't have the time. An excerpt. | |
| Similar books | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Last Samurai, The | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Lisa Yee |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 12 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 8 and up |
| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2003 |
A must-read for gifted girls, especially those in middle school or grade-skipped into high school. Eleven-year old Millicent Min will be a senior in high school in the fall, but at the beginning of the summer we read about, she is teacher's pet in a community college poetry class and students ranging in age from high school age through college take advantage of her as a tutor but don't treat her as a friend. "Sooo sad!", my 10 year old sighs, empathetically. Lisa Yee claims to not have skipped five grades in school, but she certainly understands what many of the issues that might confront a sensitive, gifted, 11-year old high school senior might be. | |
The plot is NOT what makes this book so good. Even my daughter, who is usually not keen to guess plot twists, figured out early on what many would be. (And said, "foreshadowing".) No matter -- the characters are spot-on. My daughter rated this a 4 out of 5, but that was because, "it ended". An interesting thread of questions it raised for her started with "Is there such a thing as an average IQ?", proceeded to "And how do you know what someone's IQ is?", to "Do you know MY IQ?", to "What IS my IQ?".... | |
| Similar books | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Millicent Min, Girl Genius | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Jerry Spinelli |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 12 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 8 and up |
| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2000 |
An amazing fiction book that confronts the issue of a gifted child trying to fit in. My 10 yo and I loved this VERY sad but VERY funny and VERY true novel. We read it to each other this summer, alternating chapters, and every time my older daughter caught us, she'd hang out and listen. Stargirl is a brilliant and highly eccentric high school girl. The novel is written in the narrative voice of the boy who loves Stargirl with and for all her eccentricities and yet despite himself wants her to fit in at school so he can fit in too. | |
As this book points out, to a great extent, being eccentric is a choice and it does have a profound influence on how other students treat one. OTOH, NOT being eccentric can really isolate a person from herself. | |
| Similar books | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Stargirl | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Stephanie S. Tolan |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 8 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 8 and up |
| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2002 |
Joyous, involving story about a family of stereotypically gifted but stereotypically self-involved Artistes and the stereotypically Troubled Youth who benefits by becoming swept up in their passionate pursuit of Art. Stephanie Tolan takes wonderful advantage of the fact that we all know the Sound of Music so well we can hear the music in our heads, and those stereotypical personality types move the story along efficiently and with great humor. The characters themselves know they are stereotypical; and their self-awareness is one of the things that saves them and the story. Not a great book, but one we are very glad to have read. We particularly LOVED the way butterflies weave the various plot elements together. Excellent portrayal of the joys of homeschooling. -- Emily Berk | |
| Similar books | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Surviving the Applewhites | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Zilpha Keatly Snyder |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 8 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 8 and up |
| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 1966 |
Twelve-year old boy learns to use and appreciate his gifts. A soothsayer once told Harry that his was "... a rare gift, and his magic will be of a special kind." Now, many years later, it is summer in San Francisco. It's possible that Harry has heard that same voice intone the words "The air is absolutely heavy with possibilities." Or maybe he dreamed them. Because he performed a good deed, twelve-year old Harry (interesting name, isn't it? -- my daughter thought so!) receives a gift. As such gifts often do, this one is bestowed with limitations. Harry must never be caught displaying the gift "publicly" lest the giver of the gift be harmed. | |
My 9 year old loved this story about how Harry learns to take advantage of the gifts with which he's been born and the gift he receives. Zilpha Keatley Snyder has written MANY books! And all of the ones we have read have held our interest. Black and Blue Magic is based in the San Francisco Bay Area; we really enjoyed the geographic "cameos". The 9 year old says, "I am SO glad I read this book!" Much resonance, I thought, with the plight of gifted kids: to use their gifts but to use them in such a way that they do not attract undue attention. And also, that what others might imagine to be the way a gift is to be used may not actually be the way the one who has the gift might choose to use it. -- Emily Berk | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Black and Blue Magic | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Zilpha Keatly Snyder |
| Illustrator: | Alton Raible |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Sophisticated readers |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 12 and up |
| Genre: | Dystopian/religious |
| Year of publication: | 1975 |
Issues sometimes arise for gifted readers who become infatuated with books written by authors who write for both adults and children and/or with books that are in series that are unevenly targeted. Below the Root, which is a book my 9 yr. old adored, is a prime example. Because she reacts very poorly to unhappy endings, we had decided to recommend against her reading certain novels. So, for example, after significant discussion, we decided that Lois Lowry's The Giver was too intense for her, for now at least. But she had loved Zilpha Keatley Snyder's The Egypt Game, and the illustration (by Alton Raible) on the back cover of Below the Root made us yearn to read the book, even though our resident teenager warned against it. So we decided to read Below the Root together. | |
Well, there are some very scary moments in this dystopian novel. In fact, towards the end of the book, we decided that we could not read it too close to bedtime because it might not end happily. But, as it turned out, in this volume of the trilogy, Snyder never manages to become as pessimistic as Lois Lowry. Unfortunately, the story of Raamo, gifted with empathy and abilities that many others of his society don't share, doesn't exactly end in Below the Root. Or, at least, my nine year old didn't feel that it ended with the finality she would have liked. Or, maybe, she wanted the book to go on and on because the environment it describes is SO compelling. As we've come to expect from Zilpha Keatley Snyder, in Below the Root she imagines (mostly) well-rounded, thoughtful characters who inhabit a strange but consistent and believable reality. And, as with other Snyder plots, this one is involving and (mostly) unpredictable. Says the nine-year old, "How come they don't make great books like this into movies? A movie of this book would be so much better than Harry Potter." So then we had to read AND ALL BETWEEN, not exactly a sequel -- it overlaps the time and takes place in a dystopia that borders that of Below the Root. And All Between is a much darker book than Below the Root in many ways. Whereas Below the Root takes place in the tree canopy, And All Between mostly takes place underground. And, And All Between expands in depth on the theme of how the corruption of the religious elite can corrupt an entire society. But And All Between doesn't end the story either, so then we had to proceed to Until the Celebration. My child became very, very angry with the protagonist who kind of gave in to his own death. And very, very angry with the author who "let" her read so many pages to just have the protagonist "throw his life away". Too bad -- the message in all as far as I can tell is that demonizing the Other can have bad consequences for those who do the demonizing. Sounds pretty pertinent these days, huh?--Emily | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Below the Root | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Author: | Ayn Rand |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | Children 12 and up |
| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | Children 12 and up |
| Genre: | Fiction |
| Year of publication: | 1957 |
Not well written, which is not exactly beside the point, given the topic. | |
I am not opposed to high word counts, and I certainly find Rand's IDEAS powerful and she presents them using plots that are innovative and highlight her points nicely. (Unlike, for example, Nancy Kress' writing in Beggars in Spain.) On the other hand, no one can claim that Atlas Shrugged is well written. Has she ever described any female heroine as being other than beautiful and thin? Is there a word for the right-wing equivalent of Socialist Realism? Do any of her heroes have flaws? Do any of her villains have any redeeming characteristics? Rand really did need a good editor. Like, for example, those 60 or so pages of John Galt's harangue in Atlas Shrugged. Trees are sometimes better used for shade rather than pulp, don't you think? Contrasts kind of nicely with books like Crime and Punishment and Brothers Karamazov, in which the ideas are actually extremely lame (but are considered not to be lame by most), but the plots are quite compelling AND the words are powerful and spare, even though Brothers K. is quite weighty. Or, Ender's Game? There's a more well-rounded brilliant person for you, don't you think? And it IS so much more -- concise? Or Ender's Shadow, even better! | |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Atlas Shrugged | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Tweet |
| Tell friends about this blog entry | |
| Branwen: | I have no idea what your powers might be, my son. I only know that God didn’t give them to you without expecting you to use them. … | |
| Emrys: | But I didn’t ask for powers! | |
| Branwen: | Nor did I. … But with every gift comes the risk that others may not understand it. … | |
| Emrys: | Don’t you sometimes wish … [t]hat you didn’t have your gifts? That you weren’t so different? … | |
| Branwen: | Of course. | |
| — T.A. Baron, The Lost Years of Merlin |