Getting Away with Murder: The True Story of the Emmett Till Case

This book was very difficult for me to get through.  It truly brought that portion of the nation's history, horrific as it may be, to life.  As a person who grew up in this country after the Civil Rights Movement, it is difficult for me to fathom this horrific event occurring.  

I have never known a segregated society...I have never known what it is like to be anything but free to go about my life and do as I please...I have always had friends from multiple races and ethnicity.  

Reading this book was almost surreal for me as I tried to imagine that this event took place only 53 years ago in my own country.  This book helped me see just how far we have come and yet, I realized just how far we have to go to overcome ideals of inequality in our country.  Who are we to judge in this manner?

This is a book that I would only use in a high school setting with students mature enough to truly understand and handle the content.  The subject matter is so very important for students to understand that it deserves the utmost respect.  For so many of our students, the Civil Rights Movement began with Rosa Parks' bold stand on that bus in Montgomery, Alabama, but the truth is that the roots go far deeper than a seat on a bus.  As a nation, we tend to gloss over that part of history.  We would like to be able to forget that dark side of our past; yet it is always there.  

I would probably use this book in a unit about the Civil Rights Movement, where it most definitely has a rightful place.   I might also consider using it in an English class on non-fiction.  This book, unlike other history books, told a story instead of reading in a very clinical way with just the facts.  Crowe helped paint a picture for us as readers of a Deep South we have only heard rumored.  I really liked that he set the stage for the time and did not just give the facts.  A story like this is difficult to imagine in the times we live where we like to think that justice is done. In many cases, the reader needs more information about the social and political climate of the times in order to understand the significance of this terrible event.  He helped me understand a time in our history that I have previously only been able to picture from an extremely clinical perspective.

Persepolis

As I began reading this book, I was struck by how little I know about the Middle East. I know, quite simply, what I have heard on the news over the years. I do not remember studying the recent history of that part of the world in school at all - ancient history, yes, but not recent history. For that reason, I had no background knowledge to refer to. As she talked about events, I often found myself lost as to exactly what was going on and I ended up re-reading quite a bit.

I was particularly struck by this author's choice of the graphic novel to tell this story. I believe it was an amazing format for this type of story, but it surprised me. When I think of graphic novels, I think of comic strips (yes I said it!), and I think of fun fictional stories. I do not think of a country's history through the eyes of one of its own children. I do not think of displaying wars and their costs. As I said earlier, I believe this was an amazing format for this story, primarily because it allows the author to convey emotion in ways other than words. We get to see people's facial expressions and their joy and fear. This format helps us better understand the components other than just the facts.

The illustrations made this book for me. The black and white/2-dimensional illustrations were vivid and poignant in telling the story. I felt like it helped convey a sort of distance from the story and helped show that these were memories. The illustrations conveyed so much emotion in a very emotionless way (if that makes sense). So often we depend on color to help express emotion (ie. red for anger, blue for calm, etc.) With only black and white illustrations, we were left to feel for ourselves. It was very interesting to me.

As I read this book, I could not help but compare it to Diary of Anne Frank, possibly because it is about a girl growing up in a war ravaged country telling her story. But aside from that, there is an honesty in this story that you only find in stories told from this point of view. We see that children from other countries grow up just like we do though our experiences vary greatly.

As many of my classmates have said, if this book were to be used in the classroom, it would need to be accompanied by some historical information. I also believe that it is appropriate primarily for older students.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

This book cracked me up!! I laughed from the very first "this is not a diary" to the very last "Class Clown" picture. Junior high school is one of those times in my life (as I am sure it is for many of you) that I never wish to relive...in fact my daughter is only 3 months old and I already dread that time in her life. BUT...this book made all of those experiences more humorous. What this book does is put those dreaded experiences into a new perspective - one that can be laughed through. Middle school is hard for just about everyone because you go through so many changes at different speeds and it is difficult to cope with. I think boys and girls alike would be drawn to this book. What I like so much about the book is that just about everyone can identify with something in it. We recognize ourselves in the pages. For adults, it helps us gain insight into our students' lives by helping us remember what we went through. For students, they recognize their current situation and find someone to identify with.

Though I doubt Jeff Kinney is currently a middle school student, he truly captures the words, thoughts, and mindset of students at that age. He portrays many of the fears of embarassment, humiliation, self-centeredness, "girl cooties" and any other kind of cooties with amazing accuracy. The voice and perspective are masterfully written. The illustrations are also tremendous. I found myself looking forward to the illustrations of the events, because they were so detailed and added more understanding of the text (and, of course, they were hilarious!).

I believe this book could be used in any classroom from 5th grade on up. In fact, my copy is headed to my husband's 5th grade classroom tomorrow.

Daisy Kutter: The Last Train

I loved this book!! Which surprised me a little. Though my husband loves them, I have never really gotten into the comic book genre. Like Amy says in her blog, I generally have my own picture in my head of the characters and the story. I was so pleasantly surprised with this book though. I loved that the illustrations told just as much of the story as the dialogue did. "Reading" the illustrations took a little bit of getting used to at the beginning of the book. I think we are so used to just reading dialogue and skipping over the pictures, because normally they are just reitterating what is being written about, that taking time to actually pay attention to the illustrations was difficult at first, but well worth it as the story went on. This book was also remarkably good at developing the characters with very few words. I was able to really get into the story and felt like I knew Daisy personally by the end of the book.

It was interesting, because my husband (who is a 5th grade math teacher) read this book with me and we had a great discussion about ways it could be used in the classroom. Obviously you can teach all of the same conceptual ideas about stories with this book (ie. plot, story/character development, etc.). One thing that he mentioned though was that this format of book would be wonderful to use with struggling readers. My husband is severely Dyslexic (to the point that he was told by his teachers that he would never graduate from high school) and yet he loved and would actually read comic books. One of the reasons he loves comic books so much is because of the fact that you get to "read" the illustrations. With other books, my husband would easily give up, becuase he spent all of his time trying to decipher the words instead of comprehending the story, A person does not necessarily have to be a great reader to read and comprehend a book like this one, because the story is told jointly with words and pictures. It is not 153 pages of deciphering words. This type of book would probably attract students like my husband who struggle with reading and would be a phenomenal tool for developing those reading skills.

I also believe that this story appeals to both boys and girls, but might attract more boys than other more traditional books would, even with a strong, independent female as the main character. However, I think there was some language in the story that would make it inappropriate for younger readers.