Family Book Club
with Tess
August's Book: "One Crazy Summer" by Rita Williams-Garcia
Chapters 9 - 17: "Inseperable - Big Red S"
1. Have you owned anything that was very precious to you, like Fern's doll?
2. Who are the Black Panthers? What do you think their goal is?
3. Do you think Cecile was right to change her name to be a new person? Or do you agree with Delphine about the importance of a name?
4. Would you be offended if you were named after an animal? For me, it would depend on the animal! I think dolphins are beautiful and amazing and Delphine is a cool name.
5. Do you have brothers and/or sisters? Do you fight or do you stand up for each other? Are you the oldest? Do you look out for your younger siblings?
Share your thoughts on the book so far in the comments below!
Join us in discussing "One Crazy Summer" live on Zoom! We'll be meeting at 5 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 31. Sign up for the Zoom program here.
Family Book Club
with Tess
August's Book: "One Crazy Summer" by Rita Williams-Garcia
Chapters 1-8: "Cassius Clay Clouds" to "Glass of Water"
1. Do you know who Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali was? Look him up! Why would Delphine describe the bumpy airplane ride as a "Cassius Clay-left-and-a-right jab"?
2. Have you ever been to California? What would you want to do if you could go?
3. Have you ever flown in a plane? How did you like it?
4. The girls' mother, Cecile, is cold and mean. Do you think she will change by the end of the book?
5. What do you think Cecile is hiding in the kitchen?
6. Remember that this novel takes place in 1968 - 52 years ago! With your parents' permission, look up some history of that year. What was going on in America? Why did the sisters feel they needed to be on their best behavior? Why were there so few other African Americans on the flight? Even the term "Negro" is a word we would not use today. What other differences have you noticed?
Share your thoughts on the book so far in the comments below!
Join us in discussing "One Crazy Summer" live on Zoom! We'll be meeting at 5 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 31. Sign up for the Zoom program here.
Family Book Club
with Tess
Reading Schedule for "One Crazy Summer" by Rita Williams-Garcia
August 3-9: Chapters 1-8 (Cassius Clay Clouds - Glass of Water)
Discussion Questions posted to blog on Monday, Aug. 10
August 10-16: Chapters 9-17 (Inseparable - Big Red 5)
Discussion Questions posted to blog on Monday, Aug. 17
August 17-23: Chapters 18-25 (China Who - San Francisco Treat)
Discussion Questions posted to blog on Monday, Aug. 24
August 24-30: Chapters 26-34 (Wish We Had a Camera - Afua)
Zoom meeting on Monday, Aug. 31 at 5 p.m. Register here: https://bit.ly/3fn9907
Fantastical Reimaginings: Rapunzel
by Nicole S.
Rapunzel, Rapunzel let down your golden hair! Do you remember the story of Rapunzel? A beautiful girl trapped in a tower with nothing to do but tame her long, long, LONG golden locks? Some of you may have watched the Disney story of Rapunzel in the movie “Tangled”. Did you know the original tale of Rapunzel was much darker than its Disney counterpart? And there were no frying pans in the original? “Frying pans – who knew right?!?”
History
Like many of the darker fairy tales, the tale of Rapunzel was published by the Brothers Grimm in 1812. They adapted the story of Rapunzel from Friedrich Schulz, which he had published in 1790. However, all these versions were inspired and adapted from the 1698 fairy tale “Persinette” by Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de La Force.
The Original
The original story of Rapunzel starts with a lonely couple who are desperate for a child of their very own. The couple finally gets their wish and while pregnant, the wife experiences weird cravings and longs for the Rapunzel (type of greens) that grows in their neighbor’s walled garden. She refuses to eat anything else and starts to wither away. The husband finally steals away to the garden and steals the Rapunzel to make a salad for his wife. She eats it but isn’t fully satisfied and asks her husband for more. When the husband attempts to sneak into his neighbor’s garden a second time, his neighbor, who happens to be a sorceress, catches him and accuses him of thievery! The husband begs and pleads with the sorceress who in returns lets him take more of the Rapunzel on one condition: when the baby is born the sorceress gets to claim her. The husband agrees. The wife gives birth to a baby girl who is given to the sorceress and named after the greens, Rapunzel. As Rapunzel and her golden hair grows, she is locked up in a tower with no stairs, no doors and only one window. One day a prince hears her singing and learns how to visit her by using the same chant the sorceress does to have Rapunzel let down her hair to climb. The prince visits Rapunzel many times and they fall in love and he asks her to marry him. As they hatch a plan to escape Rapunzel discovers she is pregnant. The sorceress is furious when she finds out and proceeds to cut Rapunzel’s long hair and banish her into the wilderness. The prince comes back and climbs Rapunzel’s hair only to discover the sorceress has tricked him. After she tells him Rapunzel will never be seen again he leaps/falls from the tower landing in a thorn bush that scratches his eyes and blind him. For many years he wanders the country yearning for his lost love until he eventually finds Rapunzel with twins, a boy and girl. Upon seeing her prince, she cries tears of joy on his face, restoring his vision. He takes Rapunzel and their kids to his kingdom to live happily ever after.
Rapunzel Retellings
So, how much has this classic fairy tale changed over the years? Are the retellings similar or impossibly different? Find out more about similar tales below!
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Disney’s “Tangled”
Available on Hoopla
A more recent retelling of this fairy tale is from Disney in the movie “Tangled”. In this story a queen is pregnant and is starting to die due to sickness. There is a legend of a golden flower somewhere on their kingdom’s island that has said to have healing powers. However, many years before a sorceress discovered the flower first and uses its powers to stay young and beautiful. Eventually the golden flower is discovered by the king’s guards and brought to the queen. She is healed and gives birth to a golden haired baby girl they name Rapunzel. One night the sorceress breaks into the kingdom and steals the baby girl. She hides Rapunzel away in a tower in the middle of the woods and uses the power of the golden flower through Rapunzel’s hair to stay young and beautiful by singing a chant while brushing her hair. As Rapunzel grows up she longs to see the world outside her tower but her mother strictly forbids it. By now, Rapunzel’s hair has grown and grown and her mother uses it to come and go from the tower. One day a thief, Flynn Rider, happens upon the tower while escaping the royal guards for stealing a crown. Rapunzel and Flynn strike a bargain – Flynn will show Rapunzel the world and Rapunzel will give back the crown he stole. Rapunzel explores the kingdom and learns about the traditions of the lanterns the kingdom does in honor of their lost princess. In this version, Rapunzel is a lost princess and her love interest is a thief, not a prince.
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“Cress” by Marissa Meyer
Available on Hoopla as a digital audiobook
This is the third book in the Lunar Chronicles series. Cress has been trapped on a satellite since childhood with net screens as her only company. Thanks to this she has become an amazing hacker and is forced to work for Queen Levana. Her orders though are to track down Cinder and her accomplices. Cress has an opportunity at her freedom but it comes at a high cost. This story is a continuation of Cinder a cyborg mechanic we learn about the first book of the Lunar Chronicles, “Cinder”. Each book focuses on a different fairy tale character with whom Cinder comes into contact.
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“Bitter Greens” by Kate Forsyth
Available on Hoopla as a digital audiobook
French novelist Charlotte-Rose de la Force has been banished from the court of Versailles by the Sun King, Louis XIV, after a series of scandalous love affairs. At the convent, she is comforted by an old nun, Sœur Seraphina, who tells her the tale of a young girl who, a hundred years earlier, is sold by her parents for a handful of bitter greens. After Margherita's father steals parsley from the walled garden of the courtesan Selena Leonelli, he is threatened with having both hands cut off, unless he and his wife relinquish their precious little girl. Selena is the famous red-haired muse of the artist Tiziano, first painted by him in 1512 and still inspiring him at the time of his death. She is at the center of Renaissance life in Venice, a world of beauty and danger, seduction and betrayal, love and superstition. Locked away in a tower, Margherita sings in the hope that someone will hear her. One day, a young man does.
Inspired by Charlotte’s writings that first penned Rapunzel, this retelling weaves historical fiction, fairy tales and romance into one story. The story features narratives from each of the three leading females in the story: Charlotte, Margherita and Selena.
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Now that you know the real story check out these and other Rapunzel retellings on Hoopla!
o “The Golden Braid” by Melanie Dickerson
o “My Name is Rapunzel” by K.C. Hilton
o “Reign of Shadows” by Sophie Jordan
o “Towering” by Alex Flinn
o “Golden Curse” by M. Lynn
“Go. Live your dream.”- Tangled
Picture credits: Disney, Trina Schart Hyman, Hoopla
Family Book Club
with Tess
"The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles" - Part 3 (Chapters 1-8 + Epilogue)
- What is your favorite creature that the Potters and Professor meet in Whangdoodleland?
- Were you afraid they would never make it to the castle?
- Were you surprised that the Prock finally allowed them to meet the Whangdoodle?
- What did you think of the Whangdoodle?
- Did you think the Professor's experiment would work?
- How did you like the ending?
- How did you like the book overall?
Activity: Create your own Whangdoodle creature and send me a picture at [email protected]!
August Family Book Club
August's book is "One Crazy Summer" by Rita Williams-Garcia, a work of historical fiction and the winner of the Newbery Medal Winner & Corretta Scott King Award Winner in 2011.
Summary:
In the summer of 1968, after traveling from Oakland, California to spend a month with the mother they barely know, Delphine and her two younger sisters arrive to a cold welcome as they discover that their mother, a dedicated poet, is resentful of their intrusion and wants them to attend a nearby Black Panther summer camp.
The reading schedule will be posted on Monday, Aug. 3. Be sure to get a copy! Call the Tallyn's Reach Library at 303.627.3050 or visit in person for a physical copy. It is also available as an audiobook via RBDigital Audiobooks and as an eBook via Overdrive (Libby) and HooplaDigital. Access all three digital platforms with your library card.
**Video may contain spoilers**
Join APL staff each week for a discussion of some of their current reads! Each week they will discuss a book from a different genre. Join the discussion live on at Facebook.com/AuroraLibrary each Friday at 1 p.m. (MST) and leave your thoughts in the comments below!
The next discussion will be at 1 p.m. on July 31, 2020 on our Facebook page and will feature "FantasticLand" by Mike Bockoven (available instantly on hoopladigital.com).
Review of "The Last Wish: Introducing the Witcher" by Andrzej Sapkowski
by Nicole S.
Hello again! Like I said before I have been participating in a virtual book club with some of my friends from Wisconsin which has been incredibly enjoyable for me to be able to read other books I normally wouldn’t choose for myself and learning more about my friends’ reading tastes.
After reading two different suspenseful thrillers in a row we decided to dive into the fantasy genre with our next pick - “The Last Wish: Introducing The Witcher” by Andrzej Sapkowski. For those who don’t know this book is actually one of two collections of short stories that paves the way for the Witcher Saga novels surrounding the main character Geralt of Rivia.
This book was originially published in Polish in 1993 with an English translation later in 2007. This book contains six short stories which sheds a little light on Geralt’s many adventures. Having been injured in a battle and while resting at a temple, he is experiencing flashbacks from certain time’s in his life.
These short stories have been adapted to video games, film and a recent television series on Netflix starring Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia.
The character Geralt of Rivia, one of the few remaining witchers on the Continent, is a traveling monster slayer for hire, mutated and trained from an early age to slay deadly beasts. This puts the series of the Witcher in the fantasy genre. “Fantasy is defined as a form of literary genre in which a plot cannot occur in the real world. Its plot usually involves witchcraft or magic, taking place on an undiscovered planet of an unknown world. Its overall theme and setting involve a combination of technology, architecture, and language, which sometimes resemble European medieval ages. The most interesting thing about fantasies is that their plot involves witches, sorcerers, mythical and animal creatures talking like humans, and other things that never happen in real life (https://literarydevices.net/fantasy/)”
For those starting this book who haven’t read or watched any of its adaptations could make getting through the names and places a little difficult. One of the big reasons I wanted to start reading the Witcher novels was due to the first season of the “Witcher” on Netflix. I enjoy reading and watching anything fantasy and the different characters portrayed throughout the show were amazing. My favorite being Geralt of Rivia. Being trained to be a monster hunter from such an early age, Geralt is seen as both highly respected and highly feared. He has a gruff and cold demeanor towards everyone he meets yet at the same time he has a strict moral code when it comes to the monsters he hunts and kills. He is a very complex character and I thought that the books would give more of an insight to how he thinks because it is hard to portray someone’s inner conscience on the screen.
It is recommended to start with “The Last Wish” and even the other short story collection “Sword of Destiny” before diving into first of the “Witcher” novels, “Blood of Elves”. The reason behind this is because the first book in the series precedes the events that occur during the two short story collections. You follow Geralt of Rivia on his quests while meeting some key characters along the way.
If you do end up enjoying the short story collections then continue on and immerse yourself in Geralt’s journey through all six of the Witcher books! Check out the series from APL here.
Once you finish those and need to have more high fantasy novels check out “The Red Knight” by Miles Cameron or ‘”Assassin’s Apprentice” by Robin Hobb.
Check back for my next review of the next book club pick - “Ink and Bone” by Rachel Caine.
Family Book Club
with Tess
July's book is "The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles" by Julie Andrews Edwards. Need a copy? Call 303.627.3050.
Part 2 (Chapters 1 - 8) Questions
- Would you like to meet the Whiffle Bird?
- After the Sidewinder scare, would you want to go back to Whangdoodleland?
- What jokes would you tell to get aboard The Jolly Boat?
- What would you order from the soda fountain?
- When the High-Behind Splintercat came into Lindy's room, did you think he was friendly or that he would turn out to be trouble?
- Lindy was smart to sing along to the Splintercat's song. That way the Professor and her brothers could find her. What would you do to try to escape?
- Make a prediction! The third part of the book is called "Conquer". What do you think will happen next?
Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
**Video may contain spoilers**
Join APL staff each week for a discussion of some of their current reads! Each week they will discuss a book from a different genre. Join the discussion live on at Facebook.com/AuroraLibrary each Friday at 1 p.m. (MST) and leave your thoughts in the comments below!
The next discussion will be at 1 p.m. on July 24, 2020 on our Facebook page and will feature "The Goblin Emperor" by Katherine Addison (available instantly on hoopladigital.com).
Other upcoming titles, all available instantly from hoopla digital, include:
- July 31, "FantasticLand" by Mike Bockoven
Family Book Club
with Tess
July's book is "The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles" by Julie Andrews Edwards. Need a copy? Call 303.627.3050.
Part 1 (Chapters 1 - 6) Questions
- What do you think of Ben, Tom, and Lindy?
- Would you believe in the Whangdoodle if a stranger told you about it?
- How do they officially meet Professor Savant after the zoo?
- Professor Savant says that they can travel to Whangdoodle land only in their imaginations. He is teaching them to be more observant of things around them, like colors. How do you think they will use their imaginations to travel?
- Would you want to go to Whangdoodleland if you had the chance?
Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
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