Review : Of Mice and Men

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

General information about John Steinbeck

John Steinbeck (1902/California-1968/New York) was probably one of the most successful US-writers. Born in California, he soon discovered his literary talent and started writing about his experiences in life in short stories or later also in novels. Taking part in World War II as a reporter about what occurred during this cruel time, he is considered a writer about the American Dream. The American Dream, which aims at lasting peace and wealth for everyone, has often been part of his stories.  After failing to achieve a degree at Stanford University he had to make a living as a migrant worker, which took two hard years, so you could say that he included a lot of personal experiences and facets of contemporary American life  in Of mice and men'.

Short summary of Of Mice and Men

In the middle of beautiful California in the 1930s we get to know our main characters, George and Lennie. George, quite a  small guy who is pretty intelligent and skilled, and his friend Lennie, an unskilled and retarded, but tall guy, are moving around in California from farm to farm because there is no other choice for them to make a living. Both of them have lost their old jobs because of Lennie's break-downs, who just cannot get his act together. But both are good friends and used to each other. So it would not be easy for them to just give up their friendship. Dreaming of a better future there is nothing else for them but to look for work where they could make some money from harvesting the crops. Having found quite a convenient farm with bunks for them, their dream of their own piece of land with rabbits and mice seems to come closer. Even if there have been some embarrassing incidents, they never give up  hope to save as much money as  is necessary for realizing their dream. Having arrived at the farm, they realize that they have to work hard, be disciplined and even suffer. Every day they have to get up at a certain time, otherwise they will not get any food. Everything works out at first, but Lennie, who always dwells on his dream of his own home with small and cute pets seems to demolish everything with his uncontrolled behaviour. Lennie is getting more unpopular because he does not respond to the workers' (such as Slim and Curley) questions and  always looks straight at George, who often does not know how to react and behave towards Lennie. When the farm owner's son Curley, an aggressive guy who used to respect George at first because of his muscles and his body, asks George why he goes around with such a shy guy, George has to defend himself. The conflicts hit their peak, when Curley's attractive wife, a discontent girl nobody talks to, offers Lennie to touch her soft hair. Lennie, being crazy about soft things such as small mice and puppy-dogs, does not stop when Curley's wife tries to tear his hand off after a while. Accidentally, he hurts her so badly that she dies afterwards. Everybody could blame Lennie for having killed the wife. The rest of the farm, who has spent their time at a party nearby hears the noise and arrives soon. Will Lennie be punished and above all, how?? Will Lennie also be killed?? Will George, who has always tried to be a support to him, still defend him?? Will it cross their plan of buying a house in which even their roommate Candy would invest 350 dollars? Lennie escapes to a place near the bank of the river Salinas....

What is special about this book

The plot of  'Of Mice and Men''only consists of a few places such as the river, some days at the farm and interaction with characters outside the farm. So,all in all, only a short period is covered in only 113 pages. Although the story is not divided into separatel chapters with  headlines, the simplicity of the words and the American slang (young people's language) make the book fun to read. You can always identify with the speakersand know exactly their positions. The classic novel is more or less presented by a 3^rd person narrator who seems to have planned everything in a screenplay. Also the description of the landscape at the beginning (e.g. with maple trees, lizards and golden rivers) illustrate the story and create an interesting story. There are some sentences you have two read twice, but the majority, above all, when Lennie talks, is very easy to understand.

What I really liked about the novel

What was really amazing to me was that it is a story about true friendship and that you can easily imagine American life back then. Despite all the conflicts they face, it is difficult to attack George and Lennie because they stand together and support each other as far as possible.

Both of them have to live with disciplined and strong workers and it is nice to see how they take part in the daily chores there. The work they have to do only succeeds if there is enough crop in the end. They have to share their abilities and everyone is needed. Even Crooks, a dark-skinned worker who is often ignored in a time of racial segregation, is needed because of his strength.

In addition, the book is easy to read and logical because you can always comprehend the action.

Review : Five people you meet in heaven

Five people you meet in heaven by Mitch Albom

Five People You Meet In Heaven is a book written by Mitch Albom, which was published in 2003. It was also listed in The New York Times Best Sellers list and remained there for 95 weeks.

Five People You Meet In Heaven tells the story of Eddie, an 83-year old veteran whose job it was to keep the rides at Ruby Pier, an amusement park, safe.

The story starts off with Eddie at Ruby Pier experiencing the last moments of his life. He was resting on a chair when he suddenly heard screams and realized that a cart of one of the rides was loose. After the riders were saved he figured that the cart was about to fall down. He saw a young girl he had already met before standing under the falling cart and tried to save her, so he ran to her. While saving her he died.

And at this moment his journey begins. Eddie arrives in heaven and he meets several people who have all played an important role in his life. However, he does not know much about them or what they have done. So now these people will reveal important facts that he did not know about his life, causing him to learn and think about his life again.

The language of this book is relatively simple and easily comprehensible. The story is divided into several parts (eg. flashbacks or important moments of Eddie's life), causing the main plot to be interrupted a few times. Even though the story is easy to understand, it is not suitable for younger kids to read because of some violent events that are described in a few flashbacks. Throughout the story the reader will get to know the main character, Eddie, better after learning about his history and the experiences he had to go through.

The author first had the idea of writing this book when his uncle, whom this book is dedicated to, told him how he imagined heaven.  His ideas, which are described in this book, are not only lessons that Eddie has to learn but those are lessons that everyone should have at least heard of and thought about since they may be helpful to understand specific things better and to get along with your fellow humans.

"Everyone has an idea of heaven, as do most religions, and they should all be respected. The version represented here is only a guess, a wish, in some ways, that my uncle, and others like him - people who felt unimportant here on earth - realize, finally, how much they mattered and how much they were loved." - Mitch Albom

Review : The (un) arranged marriage

The (un)arranged marriage by Bali Rai

The book ‘the (un) arranged marriage’ by Bali Rai tells the story of a 13 year-old boy named Manjit (in the book they call him Manny), son of a Punjabi family who lives in Leicester in the UK. Manjit has got a black friend called Ady, with whom he does really crazy things like stealing or skipping classes or smoking. Manjit’s father does not like his friend Ady, with the consequence that father and son fight almost every day. Sometimes he even hits him. A cause for his aggressivity is probably his alcohol consumption. Furthermore his biggest wish is, that Manjit gets married with 17 years, like his both brothers, to a woman he hasn’t ever met. To show his father the rejection about the forced marriage, he stays away from home all day and spends a lot of time with Ady and his girlfriend Sarah. Sarah’s best friend Lisa becomes Manjit’s girlfriend after a while. Time passes and the relationship between Manjit and his parents gets worse, Lisa’s parents accept him, in contrast to Manjit’s parents, who don’t know about this relationship. For a Punjabi boy it’s forbidden to have a girlfriend if they’re not married even if she’s white.

For his father, the only solution is to take Manjit to India where he learns to be a ‘real’ Punjabi. After six weeks, his family left him alone there pretending to go to the airport to look if they can get back their passports because they’ve been ‘stolen’. When his uncle Jag finds out what they’ve done to him, he helps him getting out of this situation. He has been also an outcast of the Punjabi family because he worked outside of India and didn’t get married to an Indian girl too. The first thing what happens when Manjit gets back to England is a really hard welcome home, his father hits him again. The next time, like two months he just stays in his room and doesn’t go out anymore. Finally he accepts the forced marriage because he sees this fact as the only escape from his family. The day of his 17^th birthday everything is prepared for the wedding…

Bali Rai, the author of this book is born in 1971 in Leicester, UK. He’s son of an Indian family which immigrated to the UK. Until now he wrote five books, the (un)arranged marriage, his first one which was published in 2001 and translated into 8 languages,The Crew, Rani & Sukh,The Whisper, The last Taboo and the Angel Collector.

In my opinion this book is a success, it’s written really interesting and with full of sentiments. The reader is able to understand the thoughts or feelings of the narrator and it’s easy to understand his message.

Review : Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire by Vikas Swarup

The international bestseller, written by Vikas Swarup,“Slumdog Millionaire“ is about the life of a young indian orphan man called Ram Mohammed Thomas. Because of the fact that he is an orphan, he was not at school, so he is not very educated.

He decides to participate on a TV show called “ Who Will Win A Billion? “. Of course nobody could imagine that he will win, because he is just a servant in a bar. But he does, he wins one billion rupees ( currency of India)!

The next day the police arrests him, because they are sure that he cheated on the show. At the police station they torture him, because Ram does not admit how he cheated on the game. Suddenly a young indian woman appears and says that she is Rams lawyer and that the police has no rights to put him into jail. She takes him to her house and wants him to explain how he won on the TV show.

Ram tells her that ist was luck that he won. Every question that they asked him on the show he knowed only because of his huge life experiences. The whole night he talkes about his life and how the questions are connected with his life, to proof that he is inguilty. Will he have to go to prison? And who is the mythical lawyer in fact? You will get to know if you read this amazing book ;)

Every chapture in the story is about one question in the show. At the end of the book you expirienced the life of an orphan boy, who managed his life without any help, just himself and his problems he had to face to become lucky. None of us could imagine to expirience something like that!

The book shows you a modern India and it also contains interessting historical facts.

In a nutshell the story is about friendship, love, luck, destiny and aims. It shows you that every wish can come true, you only have to believe in it and hold on your dreams.

I liked the book veeeeery much, because it is such a rousing story!

I think it is also interessting to watch the film “Slumdog Millionaire” made by Danny Boyle.

I recommend this book for teenagers up to15 years old, because the story contains some cruel and violent moments.

Vikas Swarup was born 1963 in Allahabad (India). Apart from being author of the bestsellers “ Slumdog Millionaire” and “ Q and A” he is an indian diplomat.

Review : Slam

Slam by Nick Hornby

Slam is a novel written by the famous English author Nick Hornby, who was born in Great Britain on 17th April, 1957. The books he is best known for are Fever Pitch from 1992, High Fidelity from 1995 and About a Boy from 1998. Slam was published in 2007 and it deals with the small and big problems of teenagers. The book is written from the perspective of a fifteen-year-old boy called Sam.

The main character of the story is 15-year-old Sam. He loves skateboarding and lives together with his 32-year-old mother in Islington. His life is not very special or exciting, except that he talks to his poster of Tony Hawk to reflect on his problems.

One evening his mum wants him to come with her to the birthday party of her friend Andrea, because she thinks that Sam could get along well with Andrea's 16-year-old daughter Alicia. Sam and Alicia like each other from the first moment so they decide to go to the cinema the next evening. But instead of watching a film they go to Alicia's house and have sex. They fall in love and are very happy together, but one day they break off because their relationship does not feel exciting any more.

After a few days Alicia begins to worry about being pregnant. When she tells Sam about it he is so shocked that he switches off his mobile and goes home while Alicia is buying a pregnancy test. After that he is suddenly whizzed into the future by the Tony Hawk on the poster, where he lives together with Alicia and their son called "Roof" for one day. When he comes back to his real time, Alicia tells him that the result of the pregnancy test was positive. Although Sam already knows this from his trip to the future, he is surprised and does not know what to say, but Alicia is sure about keeping the baby.

The next day Sam and Alicia talk to Alicia's parents. They are angry at first, but when they realize that Alicia really wants to keep the baby, they have to accept it. After a long conversation they go to Sam's mum together. And by this news Sam is breaking her heart. She is very disappointed, because she has always worried about her son being a father at the age of 16. But in the end she wants to support and help Sam to deal with the situation.

Sam and Alicia spend a lot of time together in the next few months. They even visit prenatal classes and fall in love again.

On September 11th Alicia goes to hospital because of her contractions and on September 12th she gives birth to Rufus. On the next day Sam moves to Alicia's house, because they want to live together as a family. Soon they notice that everything is very exhausting, for example waking up about five times a night because of the crying baby. One day Sam talks to his dad, who has never really been interested in him. But that day he helps Sam to realize that he does not love Alicia any more. Sam wants to avoid telling Alicia about this, so he says that he thinks they live in different worlds and that they are not compatible. Alicia cries and he leaves her house.

At the end of the book Sam is whizzed into the future again, where he has a new girlfriend called Alex and Alicia has a new boyfriend called Carl. They have dinner together and everything is fine.

I think the book is very interesting, because it deals with important problems of teenagers.

Review : PUSH

PUSH by Sapphire

Author: Sapphire is the author of American Dreams, a collection of poetry which was cited by Publishers Weekly as “One of the strongest debut collections of the nineties”. Push, her novel, won the Book-of-the-Month Club Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction, the Black Caucus of the American Library Association´s First Novelist Award, and, in Great Britain, the Mind Book of the Year Award. Push was named by the Village Voice and Time Out New York as one of the top ten books of 1996. Push was nominated for an NAACP Image Award in the category of Outstanding Literary Work of Fiction. About her most recent book of poetry Poets and Writers Magazine wrote: “With her soul on the line in each verse, her latest collection, Black Wings & Blind Angels, retains Sapphire´s incendiary power to win hearts and singe minds.”

Sapphire´s work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, The Black Scholar, Spin and Bomb. In February of 2007 Arizona State University presented PUSHing Boundaries, PUSHing Art: A Symposium on the Works of Sapphire. Sapphire´s work has been translated into eleven languages and has been adapted for stage in the United States and Europe. Precious, the film adaption of her novel, won the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Awards in the U.S. dramatic competition at Sundance (2009).

I read the book “PUSH“ by Sapphire. It´s about a girl, called Clairecee Precious Jones, who tells something about her agonizing life.

The story starts when she is 16 years old. At this time she already has a child by her father, who kept raping her for a long time. She was 13 when her first child was born, a girl who has down syndrome. Her name is Little Mongo (because of her illness). But Little Mongo was taken away from her and lives with Precious’ grandmother.

Besides, she was kicked out of school and her mother hates her and treats her badly.
And now, 3 years later, the same things are about to happen again.

Again she´s pregnant. Again by her father. And again she has to leave school.
But this time she will not give away her child when he´s born, she wants to bring him up herself!
And she has decided to go to a new school, called Each One Teach One, an alternative school, where she wants to pass her GED, the equivalent to the high-school certificate, to have some education.

In her new class there are girls having had similar experiences, or even worse, to hers. Precious makes friends with some of them. Her new teacher, Ms Rain, gets to know Precious really closely as time goes by and is like her best friend and confidant in the end. She helps Precious to feel better, pushes her and wants her to know that she´s someone special.

When her second child, a boy, is born, she is 17 years old. She names him Abdul James Louis Jones because this name has a special meaning to her.

A few days later she leaves home with Abdul and moves into “ ½ way house”. She also starts a therapy to cope with all the dreadful things that have happened to her.

By this time she has already lost contact with her mother, up until the time when her mum, who usually never leaves her apartment, comes to “½ way house” to tell her that her father has died.

He had the AIDS virus.

These words change her life. What will now happen to her? And to her children? Are any of them infected, too? And if so, how long will they still be alive?

If you want to know how this story ends, read this gripping book! (:

I would recommend this book because it’s written in a really exciting manner. I could identify well with Precious and understand her feelings and her doubts. Some scenes are quite horrifying  and it´s hard to believe that all this happened to an innocent girl (Sapphire’s novel contains some autobiographical elements). But you can´t stop reading because you always want to know what happens next. There are some very shocking parts that are described in minute detail and imagining these situations made me shudder with disgust, because for me it´s inconceivable how a father could do this to his own daughter. There were also scenes that were very sad and that brought tears to my eyes. But with every sentence and every scene you realize that you can consider yourself lucky that you are not in such an agonizing situation. Reading this book set me thinking and made me realize that I should be satisfied with my life.

The book was not so easy to read because the author uses colloquial language and sometimes you don’t really know what it means, but gradually you get used to it.  The book also contains many swear words, which comes as a shock at first, but in my opinion they make the book authentic because they reflect the situation perfectly well and show Precious’ feelings at a particular moment. Sometimes the action is interrupted and the narrator provides a look back at Precious’ earlier life, and this “switching” is a little bit confusing at first, but after some time you get used to this, too.

In the final analysis, I really recommend this great book, but because of its horrifying content, I would not recommend it to pupils under 16!

Review : Give a boy a gun

Give a boy a gun by Todd Strasser

Todd Strasser is a famous American author who wrote a lot of famous books for young adults like the wave, which is very famous, especially in Germany. He is also known by the name Morton Rhue and T.S.Rue. His topics for his novels/books are always controversial topics like bullying at school, Nazism and school shootings.

The book I’m writing a recommendation about is called “Give a boy a gun” by this famous author Todd Strasser, which tells a story about two teenagers, one called Brendan and the other one called Gary. They are getting bullied a lot in school and about two years later, they had enough of all the bullying and planned a school massacre where they intended to take revenge on those people, who had made their life not worth living. They were seeking for revenge and they wanted to take their own life as well after they had taken their revenge on them. I will not spoil the ending or go any further into detail because there are a lot of details which would spoil or would take away the atmosphere, but this book is really emotional and it really has a deep message in it. At some points it will make you think about this topic or it will  sound shocking to you and you really start to feel sympathetic for the characters. A really interesting thing about this book is the writing-style. It consists of small statements from people, friends, families and teachers, who are connected to the main characters, but it still has its order. There are also little quotes, facts, statistics and information about guns and school massacres, which were really interesting to read. But the greatness in this book lies in the ability to express feelings and thoughts about the characters . You get to know  how bullied people feel and even how the people who bully others feel and you get to know the reasons why the do it or why people would start a school massacre. I did not find the book very difficult to read. There were not any difficult words, which you had to google or to look up in a dictionary  and it only has 200 pages . In my opinion this book is a must read for everyone who is interested in psychological books  with an interesting writing style. Even I had a lot of fun reading this book even though I do not read books that often because it makes you feel sympathetic for the characters and you really want to know their reason for doing such kind of thing. It also  makes you think about this topic a lot and because of that this story will stick to your mind .

I think everyone has experienced some kind of bullying in their life whether it is being bullied or bully others. That is why people with that experience, who read this book , can somehow relate to it. What you gain after reading this book is the ability to respect other people much more and it will change your way of treating other people.

I highly recommend this book to anyone, who is at least 16 years old because of the use of swear words and the violence and to those who like topics about a topic which is still discussed a lot, nowadays.