Wednesday, April 29, 2009

A Wonderful Re-Read

I love to re-read books but I don't often have the time to re-read young adult or children's novels -- there are just so many on my to-read shelf that I can't justify re-reading them. One exception, however, is when I have to read books on the North Carolina Battle of the Books list. These books I read to help prepare my students for competition, so I must be very familiar with them.

Last fall I submitted The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt as a book to be considered for the 2009-2010 list. I didn't have much hope it would make the list -- I had never had a nominated book actually be accepted (and I tried for years with Ender's Game). I was thrilled when the list came out and The Wednesday Wars was included. I've therefore spent the past two days re-reading it and loving it all over again.

How can one pass up the first line: "Of all the kids in the seventh grade at Camillo Junior High, there was one kid that Mrs. Baker hated with heat whiter than the sun. Me."

I must thank Becky of Becky's Book Review for bringing the book to my attention two summers ago. Her review made me rush to order it. If you haven't read any of her blog entries, you should -- she reads like crazy and I must say I agree with most of her reviews.

If you haven't read The Wednesday Wars yet -- go out to your nearest library and get it immediately. It won a Newbery Honor, for heaven's sake!

2 comments:

anastasia said...

i was on a train to seattle and happened to be sitting across from a school librarian; who happened to have some spare books on her. she gave me this book to read and to give a review of when done. i had about 75% of it read when we hit the station, but, wow, they just didn't write books this good when i was in school.

Paige Y. said...

I think this would have to be a good read-aloud too -- it's so funny!