Writting Assignment 1, My First Crush

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 9

Due: 3/31/08

First Crush

Everyone’s had a first crush. Whether it was in kindergarten or middle school you’ve had one. Mine was in the fourth grade, and his name was Nick. He lived in my neighborhood and went to my school. We were friends, but not even really good friends. I don’t really know why I liked him in the first place, but I still did.

We rode the bus together and I normally sat behind him with my best-friend-forever, Vanessa. The day I told her that I liked him she said that she liked his best friend, George, sitting in front of us too, and she wanted me to talk to him so that she could talk to his friend. I freaked out, and said that I didn’t want to. We fought about me going to talk to him, and me not wanting to until we got to school and finally she pushed me into him. I said hi and he said hi back, then I walked, well ran away. That was the first time that I was really, really, really nervous around him. I had horrible butterflies at lunch when I saw him, and on the ride home I made Vanessa sit further back with me. For the next few days I kept trying to talk to him, but everything single time I tried I just got to nervous and couldn’t think of what to say, so most of the time we sat smiling awkwardly at each other. Then one day I told Vanessa to go sit without me and I decided to talk to him. I walked up to him and he was sitting alone, because George was sick, and I told him that I like him, and that I thought he was nice and stuff like that. And on the ride home I sat next to him and we held hands. I think Shakespeare said best what I was thinking that afternoon. “O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do” (act one, scene).

The next day it was raining all day, really hard, so we didn’t go outside for recess like normal so I thought a lot about what had happened the day before. I couldn’t quite wrap my head around what had happened the day before. I saw him walking to the bus, but I saw something else in front of him, a giant puddle. I was so mad for some reason, I know now I really had no reason to be mad. I think mostly I was just frustrated with myself that I never could find anything to say. I couldn’t even make out the right word for how mad I was. I was fluster and worried and didn’t know what to do. So I stared at the puddle because I was already in front of him. And right when he was walking past the puddle I ran and jumped into it. It splashed everywhere, it was fantastic. He was completely soaked in it. My pants were wet all the up the leg too, but it was ok, the look on his face when got onto the bus. He was shocked and soaked when he took his regular seat next to friend.

When I sat next to Vanessa she looked just as shocked as him and she asked “What was that for?”

And the only words I could find were “He just wouldn’t kiss me.”

Book Report 2, Touching Spirit Bear

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Art 9

Due: 4/15/07

Touching Spirit Bear

Touching Spirit Bear is an almost heartbreaking tale about Cole Matthews, a trouble teenager, who is full of anger. After he beats Peter Driscal, a classmate, he is awaiting trial when his Parole officer, Garvey, talks to him about Circle Justice. Circle Justice is a program for teenagers who are fighting with the law. If the members of Circle Justice agree that the offender is willing to change they will let them go and help out the community. They aren’t so sure about Cole because he has offended the law so many times that they think he can’t change. He lies his way through everything because even being stuck on an island in the middle of nowhere is better then jail time. And that’s exactly what he ends up getting an island in the middle of Alaska.

Once Cole meets up with Edwin, a Native American tribe leader, and Garvey on the island he is left alone for the day. Cole burns down the cabin built for him and he tries to escape but tide won’t let him, so he waits and then sees a Spirit Bear, a great white bear hardly ever seen, and is attack, because he attacks it. After being left for dead and going through his own mind, he sees the Spirit Bear again. He is not afraid of it just lonely and dying, he doesn’t try to harm it. As it stands over him he reaches up and touches its matted coat. Cole loses the use of his left arm and it is hard for him to walk. He talks to Circle Justice again and only Edwin saves him. Once he returns to the island he is different, but his anger remains. He learns to deal with anger, but also the consequences of life. Like in the beginning of the book when Edwin said “Nobody’s going to baby-sit you out here. If you eat you’ll live. If not, you’ll die. This land can provide for you for you or kill you.” But everything that happens makes him really think about his life. Even though he had and abusive father, and a mother that ignores him he is able to move on, forgive and forget.

I think this book is an amazing read. Ben Mikaelsen really knows how to write, and how to put together a story. In this book it seems like time can stop or drag on just they way Cole is feeling it. It is a book I recommend you read.

Book Report 1, The Blood Red Horse

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Art 9

March 25, 2008

Blood Red Horse

The Blood Red Horse is a fantastically engaging book that starts out about a girl named Eleanor, two boys named William and Gavin, and their Father, Sir Thomas de Granville, about their life in Hartslove, England in 1185. But after getting a few chapters into the book you find out that it’s really about a smaller glowing red horse named Hosanna, and how it seems to affect everyone that knows him. After Hosanna is almost killed and sent to the abbey, then returned to William then prepared to be a war horse for the Holy Wars, which mainly in chapter seven, it switches for a chapter about a young boy named Kamil.

I think Kamil is one reason I really love this book. He is personality my favorite character by far, because his past is different and it effects every aspects of his character. He lives in the Holy Lands as the sultan’s, Saladin, successor since he was orphaned when he was nine years old, five years before. Kamil has sought revenge for his parents murderer, the with the tear drop birth mark on his face. But when it was time that he could Kamil for some reason was unable to take the knights blood. After a few chapters when William, Gavin, and Sir Thomas had sent out for the Holy Lands, Kamil becomes their enemy, and when William loses Hosanna to him he plays a major part in the book. I think at the very end of the book, at the end of the War when he becomes a friend the William is when you see the truest part of him.

I loved the way that Hosanna was the symbolism put behind most of the book. He represented the right thing to do when unjust was happened all around. Like when the soldiers where executing the Muslim prisoners at Acre and Hosanna wouldn’t move and let William join in the battle. I think Hosanna also represents that bloodshed is wrong because Kamil says to the sultan “Have you noticed how the color of blood clashes with the red horse’s coat?” But mainly I think Hosanna represents that no matter who takes care of him, that person is worthy and human no matter what they have done.

The one thing that I didn’t like about the book was the ending. After they return home to Hartslove, without their father, King Richard is captured in a Spanish prison. Constable Piers de Scabious who is supposed to look after the castle and Ellie in Sir Thomas’ absence is horribly ruining Ellie’s reputation so she will marry him and he can have her land, and Gavin is a knight with his sword arm.

Overall it was an amazing book with great details and storyline. That definitely leaves room for more of the story to be told in the second book “Green Jasper”. I love the fact that it is a very controversial book and talks about things that some others teenage books would touch with a ten foot pole. I love it and enjoy K. M. Grant’s writing skills.