The Million Dollar Putt

Reviewed by Zach

The Million Dollar Putt by Dan Gutman was the first book I read all the way through by myself. I started it because my mom read all of his Baseball Adventure Series books to me so I know I like Dan Gutman. The book is also set in Hawaii, which I liked because I live in Hawaii.

The story is about a blind kid who loves golfing so his nickname is Bogey. Both of his parents were good golfers, but hand he happens to be really good at it. One day he went to a driving range with his friends and found out he was really good at it. He used to sneak into the golf course and play rounds with Birdie. His dad used to be a professional golfer and his mom too, but his mom died so his dad didn’t want him to golf. Now his dad’s job is diving for golf balls.

My favorite part of the book was the last shot for the million dollar putt. He curves it around this tree with his dad’s advice and he the ball goes through a lot of obstacles and you’ll have to read the book to see if he makes it or not. This is a really great book!

Franny K. Stein--Mad Scientist (book 1 reviewed by Garrett)

Review by Garrett--Sept 2008

I finished the first Franny K. Stein last night. My friend read it 7 times and now he's reading the 2nd one. Franny K. Stein is easy to read for a 4th grader because it has a lot of pictures in the pages. The pictures are funny. The vocabulary is harder than Boxcar Children though, but the Boxcar Children takes longer to read. I like Boxcar Children more because it has more mystery, but Franny K. Stein is more funny than Boxcar Children. I laughed so hard when the little kid peed in his pants.

There is a monster in this book because of one of Franny's experiments and a guy put a pumpkin and another guy spit his gum out and another guys put an old shoe in the garbage can and then one guy put unstable industrial waste in too. Then a monster popped out and it was a cool monster with a pumpkin head on it. He grabbed miss Shelley and climbed the flag pole. Franny asked all the people in her class to bring her all their lunches and then she got the meat and a needle and string and sewed it together and made a meat creature. They also made a pile out of the peanut butter and jelly sandwhiches if Miss Shelley fell. When she fell it was the loudest poof in the world. The next day at school Franny thought that everyone was going to hate her. But right when she came in to the class everyone said hip hip hooray.

The lesson Franny learned was about friendship. She learned how to get along with the people at school. She also learned that she could be herself and it's okay to be a mad scientist.

Hatchet

In Gary Paulsen’s Newberry Honor book, Hatchet, he shows—as opposed to tells--exactly what survival is like as he leads the reader through thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson’s mental and physical struggle for survival after his plane goes down in the middle of the Canadian wilderness.

Hatchet is one of the few, if not only, books that appears on practically every recommended reading list for boys, so I had to find out if this book is worth all the fuss. It definitely is! This realistic fiction is absolutely everything it’s cracked up to be. The book begins with the main, and pretty much only, character, Brian, in a single engine plane on his way to spend summer vacation with his father. Brian’s parents are recently divorced and he harbors a secret about why they split which sets up the internal struggle reflective of the physical struggle he’ll endure after his pilot has a heart attack and dies in mid-flight. Brian’s one saving grace comes ironically from his mother—the target for his bitterness--who gives him a hatchet as a going-away present. The hatchet is what allows Brian to survive.

For the observant reader, the hatchet and all of Brian’s harsh encounters with nature are metaphors for what Paulsen calls “the art of survival,” whether it be “getting through heavy traffic, facing an illness, or living in a rough neighborhood." Paulsen says, “The tools for survival are in all of us, just waiting to be used.” In Hatchet the reader gets to watch as Brian figures out how to dig deep and use those tools.

Paulsen crafts every detail with such painstaking patience that you feel as if you are right inside Brian’s world, the world of nature which is right under our noses and yet as unfamiliar to most of us as outer space. But Brian’s mind is as much the setting as the wilderness, and Paulsen's writing style--short, choppy, incomplete sentences--makes you feel like you're right inside his mind as he works through his challenges. Overall, the novel is crafted so carefully, you not only see it, but hear it, smell it, taste it and feel it all.

One of the greatest achievements of Hatchet is Paulsen’s ability to completely engage readers with a bare-bone plot and a one-man show. There are no glittery gimmicks or over-the-top antics. In fact, when you turn the last page and close the book, I guarantee you’ll miss Brian and his simple, but far from easy, existence in the woods. Luckily, there are several sequals to this novel. Brian's Winter, Brian's River and The Return. (Brian's winter is especially interesting because it continues the story of Hatchet as if the ending never happened).

This book is ultimately about making mistakes, rebuilding, growing, changing and healing. It is the kind of material I want shaping the minds and hearts of my boys.

Miss Lazar is Bizarre--My Wierd School

Reviewed by Garrett in 2007


A.J. told a secret to his best friend,Ryan that he never told anyone before. The secret was that sometimes he would pretend he had to go to the bathroom so he could skip a few minutes of school. I liked that because sometimes I do that too. Even though he didn't have to go to the bathroom he flushed the toilet. Then the water overflowed. He called for help and Miss Lazar (the school custodian) came to the rescue. A.J. got blamed for putting crayons down the toilet even though he didn't do it.

I like the book because Miss Lazar is always using toilet plungers to rescue people. I can't think of anything I don't like about the book.

Mr. Docker is Off his Rocker--My Weird School

Reviewed by Garrett in 2007


Mr Docker is A.J.'s science teacher. A.J. hates science at first, but Mr. Docker is so cool that at the end he thinks science is so cool. Mr. Docker rides into class on a rolling thingie and he eats bugs and accidentally lights his hair on fire. When A.J. and Andrea (he hates Andrea) went outside for recess and Andrea said "guess what?" and then A.J. said, "Your butt!" He says that's the first rule of being a kid. Everytime someone says "guess what?" you should always say "your butt." So then A.J. went on vacation and he forgot to do his science project so Andrea said "you're going to be in trouble!" And A.J. said "So's your face!" He says that's the first rule of being a kid. If someone says something rude to you you should always say "so's your face!" I liked that part cause it was funny. It was awesome.

I liked this book because I think this is the funniest book I ever read. There's nothing I don't like about it. Amen.

The Kid Who Ran for President

Twelve-year-old Judson Moon is running for President of the YOU-nited states of America. This is no joke. His friend and eventual campaign manager, Lane Brainard comes up with the idea and works out all the angles. In typical Dan Gutman style, the campaign is a delightful journey for the reader. The thing about Gutman is that he somehow always makes even the most far-fetched idea seem like it really could happen. He is slick so don’t be fooled by his clever wit and quick laughs because if your kid reads this book he'll be learning a lot about the political system of America without even realizing it.

Franny K. Stein

The Franny K. Stein series by Jim Benton, consisting of 6 books, is a fun read for all elementary school age kids. It appeals to both male and females, as well as reluctant readers and book lovers alike. Zach picked the first one up at a school book fair when he was 8-9 yrs old and we've been Franny fans ever since. Even though the vocabulary was advanced for my boys, it hasn't deterred my boys from ploughing through each book and waiting anxiously for the next one to hit the shelves.

Franny's conflict is that she's a girl. A girl living in a bright and cheery pink house with lovely purple shutters on Daffodil Street. The trouble is there is nothing bright or cheery or lovely about Franny. She's a little girl mad scientist with a spooky, creepy bedroom/laboratory, complete with bats, snakes and spiders, where she builds and creates all kinds of crazy-clever concoctions like zero-gravity dog food and cannibalistic broccoli.

At the beginning of the series Franny is completely misunderstood at her new school. None of the other kids can understand why a girl wouldn't want to play with pretty dolls and eat peanut butter sandwiches. With the help of her new teacher, Miss Shelly, (gotta love that) Franny thinks of an experiment to try to fit in, which results in a totally transformed Franny, a sweet Franny with adorable shoes and cute hair. Thank goodness, in the end, after a whole lot of catastrophe, Franny learns to be herself.

Besides the smart, witty story line there are two things I love about this series: First, the spunky illustrations, also created by Benton, serve as the punch lines to the jokes. They finish Benton's sentences with a smirk. Second, there is a subtle (never heavy handed) moral to each story. Benton knows how to give ordinary conflicts and lessons an extrordinary twist.

If you can't tell, I highly recommend this series.

For more information, check out this link:

http://www.jimbenton.com/franlab.html

Franny K. Stein--The Invisible Fran

Reviewed by Wyatt in 2007

Franny K. Stein has a problem. She built a robot in the science lab, but 3 other kids changed it. They made it come alive and it became really dumb. It started ripping up all the books and slobbering all over the library. Franny tried to stop them, but the robot had a big hand and he smacked her and her tongue was sticking out and her whole body was red. The Robot smacked her like 4 times. Read this book to find out how Franny solves this problem.

What I liked about this book is that she’s a mad scientist and her assistant, it’s weird, but it is a dog and he wants to be a mad scientist and after the Robot died the dog made an oven and this guy in Franny’s class liked pretty and colorful cookies and he made cookies and the dog ate 10 or 5. It made me hungry. They had frosting and sprinkles on them. They looked so good. You should make it. It is so good. My friend gave me one once and it was so good. You should read this book. It’s the best book I read in my life. I’m serious, but maybe not to you. To me, but not you.

My Weird School

As usual, Dan Gutman does not disappoint. I'm a fan of everything he writes, but the My Weird School series is particulary delighful, especially for 8-9 year olds. The wacky teachers at Ella Mentry school are presented through the eyes of a off-beat second grader who wants to be a pro football player, or dirt bike racer because they don’t have to know how to read or write. He thinks school is dumb and boring and all the important things you need to know, like which breakfast cereal tastes best and which shampoo leaves your hair shiniest, you can learn from T.V. The zany principal and teachers will leave you giggling, if not laughing out loud. Gutman capitalizes on the exaggerated gullibility of childhood, making it so fun to eavesdrop on A.J. and his friends as they try to make sense of their world. A world of misperceptions, myths and mystery. A world where the adults are often aware they are being misunderstood, but play along anyway.

One thing I love about Dan Gutman is that he never entertains the reader for the sake of entertainment. In ironic fashion, this series is infused with the joy of learning--the excitement of science, music, art, and even P.E. But it is subtle enough that your kids won’t even know they're learning.

This series is a must-read!