Jade Green by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (2001)
Casual readers will transform into “all-night readers” once they get their hands on this book. Packed with murder, false assumptions, family secrets, some romantic moments, and loads of chilling suspense and cliffhangers, Jade Green by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor will capture and engage its young adult audience as this book flies off the shelves. Readers experience its thrilling creepiness along with main character Judith, 15, an orphan who recently moved into her uncle’s house in the late 1800s. Soon, after hearing about a mysterious Jade Green who died there, strange occurrences begin happening to Judith. She brought a green object... which her uncle deliberately told Judith not to do. Now, she suffers the intolerable consequences. Naylor excellently crafts the supernatural scenes of a haunting hand while still reinforcing the plot. Just like something haunts Judith, this gothic romance will haunt readers as well. Naylor, a Newberry Award-winning author, has written over 100 books. Jade Green has been banned in the US because of sexual content for a low readability level, 5.6. Although Judith fears the hand of Jade Green, in the end, this hand does not present the danger, cousin Charles does. Fourty-year-old Charles continuously inappropriately looks at and touches Judith. He attempts to rape and kill her at the novel’s end, just as he admits he did to Jade Green. Jade Green’s hand stops Charles by choking him. Although this incident may seem inappropriate for this age, it fits seamlessly into the novel’s plot as a whole and touches delicately on sexuality and rape, particularly within the family. Rape direly needs recognition in young adult literature and this book addresses it delicate...
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...As soon as readers start the novel, they face a wonderful depiction of child psychology, the relationship between a servant and master, and deep characterization as Hosseini expertly paints characters who dealing with trauma and difficult memories. While the book was banned for a “rape scene in graphic detail” and “vulgar language,” this book will widen the perspective of narrow-minded Americans and will provide a way for those who feel culturally misunderstood to relate to these characters. The rape scene only adds to the all-too-real horror and pain that has captured the reader and has characterized the two friends so well. It is beyond worth the read and beyond worth putting on a shelf. This will engage the Afghani culture in Columbus, OH as Village Bookshop will be one of the few bookstores to provide so many culturally diverse, yet amazingly captivating, books.
Reading Chapter 11, “Genders and Sexualities,” written by Carrie Hintz was to construct and enact alternatives for these two traditional categories. Data is clearly indicated that sexual material is some of the most controversial content in literature. Children’s literature that is involved with adolescent’s childhood are key battlegrounds for attitudes about gender and sexuality. The significance of gender and sexuality in children’s literature is the persistent investment in what is perceived to be the innocence of children. Innocence is defined in part by children’s enforced ignorance of sexual matters. According to James Kincaid, “Youth and innocence are two of the most eroticized constructions of the past two centuries. Innocence was that
In a nation brimming with discrimination, violence and fear, a multitudinous number of hearts will become malevolent and unemotional. However, people will rebel. In the eye-opening novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns written by Khaled Hosseini, the country of Afghanistan is exposed to possess cruel, treacherous and sexist law and people. The women are classified as something lower than human, and men have the jurisdiction over the women. At the same time, the most horrible treatment can bring out some of the best traits in victims, such as consideration, boldness, and protectiveness. Although, living in an inconsiderate world, women can still carry aspiration and benevolence. Mariam and Laila (the main characters of A Thousand Splendid Suns) are able to retain their consideration, boldness and protectiveness, as sufferers in their atrocious world.
After hearing a brief description of the story you might think that there aren’t many good things about they story. However, this is false, there are many good things in this book that makes it a good read. First being that it is a very intriguing book. This is good for teenage readers because often times they don’t willingly want to read, and this story will force the teenage or any reader to continue the book and continue reading the series. Secondly, this is a “good” book because it has a good balance of violence. This is a good thing because it provides readers with an exciting read. We hear and even see violence in our everyday life and I believe that it is something teenagers should be exposed to. This book gives children an insig...
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James is usually read as a ghost story in which the central character, the governess, tries to save the souls of two children possessed by evil. However, the short-story can be also analyzed from many different perspectives, as we come upon a number of hints that lead to various understanding of certain scenes. One of the possible interpretations is the psychoanalytical one, in which we interpret the events either from the point of view of the governess or from the perspective of the two children. I will concentrate on the problem of the governess who, restricted by her own problems and moral dilemmas, projects her fears on her pupils and in this way harms the children. What causes her moral corruption and gradual maddening lies deep in her psyche. Both the Victorian upbringing and the social isolation of a poor village tell her to restrict her sexual desires evoked by the romance reading. The result is tragic. The governess becomes mad and the children psychologically destabilized and scared of the adults. The story ends with the governess strangling the boy in a hysteric fit. The Turn of the Screw is a very popular work of literature, with reach history of critical interpretations where not much can be added, therefore my essay is mostly based on The Turn of the Screw. A History of Its Critical Interpretations 1898 1979 by Edward J. Parkinson.
A recent young adult novel has stirred up a lot of controversy in the world of writing literature. The issue is that current young adult literature is too dark for teen readers, or is merely more realistic than previous works for teens. In early June 2011, the Wall Street Journal ran an editorial written by book critic Meghan Cox Gurdon says how dark is contemporary fiction for teens? Darker than when you were a child, my dear: So dark that kidnapping and pederasty and incest and brutal beatings are now just part of the run of things in novels directed, broadly speaking, at children from ages of 12 to 18. As I write rhetorically about this argument meaning the understanding of or approach to human interaction or based on their purpose and motivation.
Overall, Khaled Hosseini wrote a story, based on experiences from his own life and the history of Afghanistan from the turn of the 20th century until present day. He added the universal human theme of being good again, allowing this book and these characters to appeal to readers everywhere. He also crafted one of the most successful and popular novels in the Afghan American genre. Looking at the The Kite Runner from the outside in, or from the perspective of the author’s life and Afghanistan’s past, it is easy to see that Hosseini manages to open the eyes of the Western reader. A person on this side of the International Date Line is forced to reconsider their general perspective and beliefs about Muslims and Afghanistan after picking up The Kite Runner.
...ary devices covered in this paper cannot even begin to cover the entirety of a great short story. The point of view, the symbolism, and the setting are just a few things that make these stories so memorable. The ability of Shirley Jackson to make a reader question the way society allows as normal with its traditions, families, and customs causes the reader to think that this can happen anywhere. Charlotte Perkins Gilman makes the reader wonder throughout the story is she crazy or is she possessed. The ability to make the reader sit white knuckled holding the book is amazing and the writing styles of Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Shirley Jackson will forever go down in literary history.
This is an odd little book, but a very important one nonetheless. The story it tells is something like an extended parablethe style is plain, the characters are nearly stick figures, the story itself is contrived. And yet ... and yet, the story is powerful, distressing, even heartbreaking because the historical trend it describes is powerful, distressing, even heartbreaking.
However, due to its stark and chaos-ensued exploration of human nature, it’s been quite controversial with it’s central theme of putting yourself before the common good. Other themes include conflict between civilization, the human impulse to control others, and living by the rules peacefully and in harmony. The book has thus made it’s home at number eight on the American Library Association’s list of frequently banned classic...
Opponents of the Afghan novel argue that only mediocre reviews should be written for a book of this caliber. They have come to the conclusion that the only reason Kite Runner has received such rave reviews and positive feedback is because the United States’ confrontations with the Middle East are fresh in the minds of the readers. Ann Hornaday states that “When it was published in 2003, Kite Runner could not have been better timed, bringing the life and culture of Afghanistan to an America largely wary of the country with which it had gone to war just two years before.” With the war impacting so many Americans there was a frenzy to know about the enemy country. The people felt the desire to know more about the country and they thought that they could gain this information from reading the book. It is argued that if the book had been released before the war with Afghanistan then it would have been reviewed as a subpar novel.
Jane Eyre has been acclaimed as one of the best gothic novels in the Victorian Era. With Bronte’s ability to make the pages come alive with mystery, tension, excitement, and a variety of other emotions. Readers are left with rich insight into the life of a strong female lead, Jane, who is obedient, impatient, and passionate as a child, but because of the emotional and physical abuse she endures, becomes brave, patient, and forgiving as an adult. She is a complex character overall but it is only because of the emotional and physical abuse she went through as a child that allowed her to become a dynamic character.
Although “Araby” is a fairly short story, author James Joyce does a remarkable job of discussing some very deep issues within it. On the surface it appears to be a story of a boy's trip to the market to get a gift for the girl he has a crush on. Yet deeper down it is about a lonely boy who makes a pilgrimage to an eastern-styled bazaar in hopes that it will somehow alleviate his miserable life. James Joyce’s uses the boy in “Araby” to expose a story of isolation and lack of control. These themes of alienation and control are ultimately linked because it will be seen that the source of the boy's emotional distance is his lack of control over his life.
My eyes were caught by the title "rape fantasy" at the first time I saw this essay because it was so sensitive that most people are not willing to talk about it. After finish reading this novel, Estelle and her six fantasies gave me deep impression.
Personally, this book felt like a stern documentation of the lives of people in Afghanistan than a leisure novel. This book isn’t for everyone due to the heavy and hideous illustration it presents. Though I did not enjoy the morbid history context of the book, I would definitely recommend it because it tugged at my heart string. Personally the stories I like are most often true stories, the ones that hit the hardest. While reading the novel, It did give me an awareness that not all things in life are innocent and pure and that I should cherish my life since I’m in a haven from war and violence. There are always highs and lows in life, and truthful writing comes the best when you are vulnerable. In this book, I saw it in Khaled Hosseini’s writing, I saw how he described his home town get trampled by war and I saw how his people get murdered by politics. For me I really liked this