Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Zack R.
4th Period

     Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, By J.K. Rowling, 435 Pages


      This book is the third of seven novels, and it is Harry Potter's third year at Hogwarts, a school for wizards. Like every summer, Harry is staying with his aunt and uncle before school starts. After Harry accidentally inflates a family friend like a balloon with magic, he runs away and ultimately ends up on the bus going into Hogwarts, where Harry faints at the sight of a dementor, which is a creature thatguards the prison Azkaban. During the school year, Harry and his friends Ron and Hermione face many hardships and he makes a new friend in professor Lupin. Meanwhile, an infamous Azkaban prisoner named Sirius Black has escaped which leaves the whole wizard world in fear.

       Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is a great fantasy novel and is exciting from start to finish. It is a logical succession in the series and it ties into the first two novels beautifully. The book did a very good job of depicting Sirius Black as a threat to Hogwarts and it gave the reader a strong impression that he would play a huge role in the book. The author also uses great descriptions that make the reader feel like he or she is right there in the story. For example, the depiction of Hogwarts as a vast castle with endless rooms and corridors made the picture extremely clear. All in all, I recommend this book to anyone who loves fiction novels, as it will open up the reader's imagination.

A Long Way Gone

A Long Way Gone, by Ishmael Beah, 229 pages.

A Long Way Gone  explores the memoirs of a man whose childhood contained brutality and pain only a child soldier endures. From living in a peaceful village with his family in Sierra Leone, to being rushed out, he is separated from his family.  His perspective and life changes forever as soldiers of a rebel army  attack the village and murder anyone in sight. Once escaping the attacks and brutality, he wanders alone through a forest for many months; lonely and hungry.
 When the rebels of another (government) army group catch him, they brainwash him into thinking killing is right. That it is good; it is revenge for his own family and others  that have been killed. Because he has nowhere to turn, nowhere to hide, he is forced into this army. A Long Way Gone is clearly a book of memories and a book that puts you into his world. It is powerful, leaving you off to think about the horrible conditions these children endure.  His words hold much grief, but a hope shines through as well. It shows the explanation, the question so many face, of how children become soldiers. However, as much as it answers the question, it opens a new set of questions to be talked about. This memoir pulls at you while reading, arousing fear and nerves, sadness and a perspective. It’s rawness adds a genuine touch to the book as well, not softening up spots but showing the full situation and the real details. It truly shows the reality that is so hard to vision. 

This memoir is for anyone interested in further opening their mind and curious of the situation and history that occurred in Sierra Leone from a first hand glance. It is also a great book for anyone interested in what child soldiers have to do day in and day out.  It has violence throughout that makes you have to stop the page, but shows you a world that in no other way could you imagine. There is hope in this book, and though hidden at times, is there. 

 Vera P. 

The Bourne Identity

The Bourne Identity, by Robert Ludlum, 523 pages
        This fictional novel about a mysterious spy will leave you speechless and wanting more. The novel starts off with an unidentified man being shot repeatedly, and then falling off a boat into the Mediterranean sea. The injured man is picked up by a small ship, and his wounds are treated by the captain and his shipmates. When the man wakes up he doesn’t remember anything, not even his name Luckily, while the captain was treating the man he found details of a bank account embedded in a secret message in the man’s hip. 
           The man heads to Zurich and opens his account at the bank. He finds out that his name is Jason Bourne and he has over $5 million dollars in his account. As Bourne leaves the bank he is attacked by two men with guns. Without hesitation he subdues his attackers and takes their weapons. He escapes back to his hotel and take a hostage named Marie St. Jacques. They begin getting shot at while they are trying to escape from the hotel. They then make it to the car and drive off.
    The two begin to get along and Jacques becomes more of his accomplice then hostage. Throughout the book the two of them end up in similar situations as the one mentioned above, as they try to piece together Jason’s previous life, and find out who is trying to kill him.The two end up encountering more than they bargained for, and end up uncovering a secret CIA division. 

   Overall the novel is a home run. It is an action packed story that never has a dull moment. Starting at the beginning all the way until the end Bourne evades his killers and bails Jacques out of horrible situations, such as when they were captured and he saves her from being raped and murdered. The only weakness is that some parts are a little unclear because the story moves so fast. You may have to read certain parts more than once to fully understand them. 

The most exciting part of the book was towards the end when Bourne was trying to uncover the Treadstone mansion when he is attacked by Carlos --a hired assassin-- and his men.

There are many major themes throughout the book. Although, I think the biggest one that Ludlum constantly highlights is the the theme of perseverance. No matter what happens Bourne never gives up. He is constantly fighting to find the truth, and uncover the conspiracy.

This is a great book with an amazing story line, I would definitely recommend this book to everyone who is looking for a well written action packed novel.  

                                                                                               

By: Jack D.

                                                                               

 

Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist

Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist, by 

Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson, eBook, 232 Pages

This informative, fact-packed book provides all the information you need to know to close a deal with a venture capitalist and successfully run a startup. The book begins with a foreword by Dick Costolo, The CEO of Twitter, where he explains how useful this book would have been for him when he was starting his first company. He then goes on to reflect about his past business experiences where he shares both his failures and success, and explains how one can lead to the other. After the forward, the Preface explains, in detail, the authors' credentials and gives a quick overview of their 17 years of experience in the venture capital industry. In this section, the reader learns that the book was intended for first time entrepreneurs, MBA students and even lawyers who work for a startup or venture backed company. This section also states that the authors' purpose for writing the book was to educate the reader on all aspects of the startup world by creating a "definitive guide to venture capital deals". They do this by describing the entire process of a venture capital deal, explaining who the key people at a VC firm are and by explaining how a VC firm operates. They purposefully provide information that is unbiased towards the different views of both entrepreneurs and Venture Capitalists.

After this section, the authors jump right into the fundamentals of a term sheet, explaining its purpose, how it evolved and cautioning founders to watch out for the tricks that are usually hidden behind 'legal talk' . Once they define a term that is being described in the book, they give an example of how it would be presented to an entrepreneur and the immediate and future implications it may have for a company, its founders and its employees. In most cases, the book uses vocabulary that is difficult to understand unless the person is a venture capitalist or an MBA student. At the end of each section, the authors do a great job of giving the "Entrepreneur's Perspective" where they provide an overview of the information in simple English, almost like 'Venture Deals for Dummies'. Throughout the book, the authors also include several lessons that they have learned from experience and they explain how the reader can avoid a similar situation in their own startup.
This book isn't just for people who have started a company or are actively involved in the startup scene. Anyone who enjoys business will gain a wealth of information from this book and should be able to successfully raise venture capital, run a startup and protect themselves from the people who prey on inexperienced and vulnerable entrepreneurs.

By: Alex Hennies

The Bad Guys Won!

The Bad Guys Won!, by Jeff Pearlman, 297 pages

            This novel is about the 1986 New York Mets who went on to win the World Series.  Getting there was an easy and hard task due to the personalities of the players.  They were- as what some people called them- a team of party animals.  After every game they went out to a bar and wreaked havoc.  Weather it was in New York or some other city; they were out at night having fun. 

            In spring training the Mets had very high expectations going into the season and were very cocky because of it.  Within twenty days of the regular season, the Mets already made a song called, “Metsmerized”.  The Mets were so full of themselves not even a quarter into the season and they already made a song.  With Doc Gooden, the up and coming pitcher, Gary Carter, the all star catcher, and Daryl Strawberry, the up and coming power hitter, the Mets were a force to be reckon with in the National League.  The season got off to a strong start, as expected and so did the drinking.  Right after games you could walk into the Mets clubhouse and find three fourths of the team drinking and smoking cigarettes.  When there was a day game after a night game, players would stumble into the clubhouse with hangovers and would drink milk to help get it away.  But that isn’t the only thing they used; speed.  Players would use speed in order to get through the game.  As the partying went on, so did the winning.  The Mets ended making the playoffs with the best record in the National League.

            The author did a really good job on showing how the Mets did in the season and talking about certain players problems during the season.  He also did a really exceptional job on showing how much they drank, “As the Mets continued to win, they continued to drink.  And drink. And drink. And drink….” (74). The Mets were not a well liked team that year and Jeff Pearlman got the point across perfectly.  The strong points of the book were also the major themes making the book really interesting to read.  An exciting moment/ sad moment in the book was Daryl Strawberry’s ego rising.  He started to show up later to games with bad hangovers and his play suffered.  People that enjoy baseball will love this book because you get a story about the team on the field and off the field.  Usually sports books are about a season, dynasty, or a single player.  This is a story about the season on and off the field.

          By:  Will T.

The Fault in our Stars

The Fault in our Stars, by John Green, 313 pages.

My first book for third quarter reading was The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green. Green's story follows Hazel Grace Lancaster, a young, teenage girl living with a form of cancer that leaves her with less-than-desirably working lungs. In order to cope with her disease but mostly to appease her constantly worried parents, she attends a weekly support group in a church basement, known as "the heart of Jesus", which she loathes. One day in support group, she notices a new boy whom she later discovers is Augustus Waters, a boy who walks with a prosthetic leg, also caused by cancer. She is captivated by his profoundness but is hesitant to act on her feelings at first. As the two become friends, Hazel is left pondering what her friendship with Augustus really is. Bonded by a similar love of Peter Van Houten's seemingly unfinished An Imperial Affliction, Hazel and Augustus set off to find a true ending to the book. However, the trek to Amsterdam in search of the end brings much more to the two friends than they bargained for and changes the course of their lives forever.

I have been a long time reader of John Green's novels and this one certainly lived up to my expectations. This novel is a little different from his previous novels, written from a girl's perspective. However, Green captures Hazel's point of view without being overly girly or awkwardly genderless. Even in Hazel’s description of Augustus as the “hot boy" (9), Green keeps a sense of balance so that even a male reader could read the passage without squirming in his seat. The novel also has the signature teenage-like humor that is seen throughout Green’s many stories and in our own halls here at Acalanes. For example, when Hazel and Augustus are selling an old swing set online, the ad heading tranforms from "Swing Set Needs Home" to "Lonely, Vaguely Pedophilic Swing Set Seeks the Butts of Children" (123), reflecting not only Green's understanding of teenage interaction, but also making light of the growing friendship between the two characters. Most importantly, though, the novel perfectly describes real life; there aren't always happy endings, but, in the end, our life is all we have, and how choose to spend it sits on our own shoulders. This book is not one for those looking for "action", but rather would appeal more to those who seek a book that forces them to think about the ways people live life and what is taken for granted when it seems nothing is at stake. Green does a fantastic job of penning a novel that will appeal to all walks of life, so long as one is willing to laugh, love and cry along with his very real characters.


Kaitlyn T

HOLES

Holes, by Louis Sachar, 497 pages.

 Holes is a novel about a 13 year old boy named Stanley Yelnats who family is supposedly under a curse caused by his great great grandfather. In the beginning of the book Stanley is accused of stealing a pair of shoes from a charity auction that were donated by a famous baseball player. But Stanley never took the shoes he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. So his punishment is being sent to a juvenile camp called Camp Green Lake. Which is a facility were children of the same age who are forced to dig deep holes every day in the hot sun. They do this because the warden is looking for a treasure that was buried by a thief named kissing Kate Barlow who stole this treasure from Stanley great grandfather. During Stanley stay he begins to make some new friends one of which is a boy named Zero who never talks unless it’s with Stanley. But later on in the novel they begin to become closer friends because Zero doesn’t know how to read so he and Stanley make a deal that if he teaches Zero to read then Zero will help him dig his holes because Zero is the best digger at the camp. As the book continues you start to learn what connects both Stanley and zero together. One of my favorites scenes in the book is when they are taking a break from digging holes and Mr.Sr came to give them their water for the break Stanley was convinces by another juvenile to steal his struck. But as he was driving away he drove the truck into a hole destroying it.

This is good book for readers who enjoy reading a book and keep on gaining new important pieces of information and like everything to not make sense but through all the information you learn while reading it all begins to come together. Holes is a very good book and I recommended to anyone to read because it is fun, entertaining, and surprising at the same time and not many books can offer you that.

Alex Rider Scorpia's Rising by Anthony Horowitz 562 Pages

Teenager Alex Rider has always worked with the British secret service, MI6. Several months ago, he took down an organization by the name of Scorpia. Who are also known as the biggest criminal organization. They are back and they are deadlier, and their target is Alex Rider. Now, Alex must escape and go on another mission, somewhere where he has never been, the Middle East. But, this will be the hardest mission he will ever face, even harder then being shot many times, shooting down from space, and surviving a nuclear explosion. Alex Rider will have to use all his skills in order to escape this mission.

    I believe that this book was just amazing. The literature Horowitz put into this book was amazing. It was very suspenseful, and reminds me of reading a James Bond book. Where he goes into full detail of how strong Alex Rider is mentally and physically, when he beats up three strong assassins, and sees a person close to him die, but still continues to think of an escape route. There are also many exciting events in this book, a big one is when Alex Rider fights his own clone, (Read Point Blank), and kills him with a gun. Even though he is a spy, he has never been given a gun as a weapon.

    I believe Horowitz tried making the ending of this book really suspenseful. Almost as if he was trying to make the reader wonder what is going to happen to Alex Rider. He also set it up for a new book, Yassen, where Yassen, a Russian spy, tells the story of a russian assassin working together with none other than John Rider, Alex Rider’s father. Horowitz definitely wanted the book to end with Alex Rider doing what his dad did in the end. People that enjoy action books and many fight scenes will definetly enjoy this book. Also, people who wonder what the life of a spy is will want to read this book. 

Kevin G

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson (656 pages)

    Steve Jobs, a biography by Walter Isaacson, projects the life of master-mind inventor and visionary, Steve Jobs. The Book begins with Job’s parents, as they seek to have a child and settle in California. They end up adopting a son who they name Steve and eventually, move to Silicon Valley in California. Jobs grew up a very smart boy, working on cars with his dad, studying, and eventually, becoming smarter than both of his parents. The biography then proceeds to describe Steve’s interest in electronics and the friendship he creates with Steve Wozniak, an electrical super-genius who helped him learn more about electrical engineering. The book thoroughly covers his childhood and adolescent experiences, good and bad.
    Although the pages are long and the book is rather thick for my taste, I did enjoy learning about the life of Steve Jobs. His story is different from most successful business owners.  For instance, Jobs got into trouble and dropped out of school, but, this did not stop him from creating one of the most powerful companies in the world. Something I found interesting about the book was that Walter Isaacson, interviewed almost everyone Jobs encountered, even associates he had fired who did not have a lot of positive things to say. Another good aspect of the book is the evolution of Jobs’ ideas and the ideas he uses to contribute to his company. Throughout the book it becomes obvious how his creativeness gets sharper and sharper throughout his fascinating life.
    One of the most memorable parts of the book was learning that the start of some of the most ubiquitous tools, the Apple computer, iPhone, and iPod, occurred when Jobs and Wozniak were tinkering in his garage while in high school. Tinkering in your garage seems like such a simple thing to do, but Jobs was determined enough to make his turn into a vision, and then make it happen. Looking at Jobs’ career and typing this review on an apple computer, it is difficult to believe that that is how it all started.
    The author, Walter Isaacson, did a great job of portraying an accurate picture of Steve Jobs instead of sugar-coating Jobs or his life. Walter interviewed hundreds of people including Jobs himself and quotes them unbiasedly. The interviewees were honest as well, revealing good and bad sides of Jobs and not pulling any punches.
    People who are interested in Apple computers, how creative minds work, or Steve Jobs himself will really enjoy this biography. Although it is very thick, it is worth reading for the interesting stories and details of the rising Apple company and Jobs.

 By: Jack Moran

Soul Surfer

Soul Surfer, by Bethany Hamilton.

Bethany Hamilton is a teenager with a great life and loving friends and family. She lives in Kauai, Hawaii and one day her life drastically changed. She was waiting for a good wave to surf with her best friend Alana. The waves were small that day and while they were sitting on their boards all of a sudden, a shark comes out of nowhere. In an instant the shark bit her arm off and she then found herself focusing on paddling back to shore with one arm, in complete shock. Her mom got the call and couldn’t believe it. While Bethany was in the hospital people were always in her room bringing her things. Her story immediately was heard and interviewers lined out her door to talk with her. She decided that she still wanted to surf but it didn’t come easy. She had to work every day and as soon as she could she was back in the water surfing. She was an inspiration to people all over the world. Throughout her struggle she always had an unconditional faith in god. He was her helper and guided her through everything. Her family was another huge support. They never let her feel sorry for herself. I believe this is a good book for anyone who wants to be inspired.  Readers can relate Bethany’s struggle and her drive to succeed. In the end, I think that you can appreciate more what you have after reading this book and that we can achieve our goals.   Calen O, 222 pages.