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ABOUT A BOY

by Montse Bode

I’m writing this review about a book called “About a boy”, written by Nick Hornby. The plot turns around two people, the weirdest and oldest twelve-year-old boy in the world (Marcus), who doesn’t know how to behave like a normal boy of his age, and a man in his thirstiest (Will) with the brain-deepness of a macaroni plate.

The story is centred in these two characters, although at first sight, you couldn’t believe they can be connected. There are also other secondary characters, like Fiona (Marcus’ mother) or Rachel, the woman who finally makes Will fall in love.

I found this book very entertaining, probably because of the way it has been written. The author has a special sense of humour and the dialogues between the characters are full of irony, clearly prepared to make you laugh, although sometimes the situations are not very funny by themselves. For example, the incident that Marcus always called “The Dead Duck Day” is one of my favourite parts of the story, but at the same time, when he reminds it, it makes you think about the suicide attempt of his mother.

One of the things I liked most was how the two main characters change thanks to the influence of the other one. The both have their own problems, but neither of them is aware of that until they meet each other. Marcus is a good boy and a good student, but he’s completely unable to make friends and he has a lot of unusual habits like singing aloud without noticing which that turns him into the perfect bullying victim. I feel myself very close to Marcus, because this situation in which a boy is not accepted by his mates is very common nowadays and I always have thought that it is completely unfair. When I was younger I used to witness this kind of behaviour in other kids and, although I wasn’t ever a victim (I had good fists), I never understood why being different is a reason for being the butt of everyone’s jokes.

On the other hand, Will is a perfect example of a self-centred and useless person, that keeps up like a fashion-victim teenager and whose empty life is a long succession of women and short-lived hobbies, which end up when he goes off in them. I find such a meaningless life a complete waste. The character is funny sometimes, especially because of his inner speech. Thanks to it, he is convinced of the rightness of his actions.

In conclusion, I strongly recommend this book that I’ve enjoyed very much because I think it’s a very interesting, funny and easy-to-read work. After reading it, I want to try something else by this author.

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The Kalahari Typing School For Men By Alexander McCall SmithI chose this book because my former English teacher in the 4 th year in the E.O.I. encouraged us about it, but I read another one. Eventually nobody followed her advise,so I decided on favour of this book this year. The Kalahari… is a short novel written by Alexander McCall Smith who is an author unknown to me, which is not very strange because I´m not very queen on reading novels. The story takes place in Botswana, South Africa in an uncertain time, perhaps a few years ago, perhaps at present. I have read that this book is the fourth in a series about Botswanan private detective Mma Precious Ramotswe, a woman with a lot of common sense and intuition. (Mma is equivalent to Mrs in the local language). Other characters in the novel are Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, her mechanic fiancé, Mma Makutsi, her assistant, and her two foster children. The title refers to a school established by Mma Makutsi in order to supplement her income as assistant detective. She needs more money so she decides to open a typing school for men who have been too embarrassed to get a “woman´s skill”, but who need to know how to type in order to run their computers. To her surprise, one of the students apparently falls in love with her.Unfortunately Mma Precious Ramotswe discovers that this man is married. There is only one real mystery in the novel, a man who wishes to apologise for his bad behaviour twenty years ago and tries to find the person who was offended. In a secondary plot a male detective, who claims to be from New York, opens a rival detective agency, pretending that a detective must be a man, but at the end of the book this agency must be closed because the man doesn´t understand the way of thinking of the town. The book is short and easy to read. There´re not big heroes in the novel. The people are simple, proud and intelligent. The author focuses on domestic issues and human relationships. Alexander McCall Smith recreates everyday lives of this ordinary people, who treat each other with respect. He writes about a traditional lifestyle and its values in a time that is near to change.I was a bit confused with the novel because, when I chose it, I thought that it was a detective novel with crimes or something like that, but this is another type of novel: you can find detectives but not blood. It was a surprise but, eventually, a good surprise. In my opinion this is an interesting book, very easy to read because its vocabulary, in which you can see a positive picture of modern Africa. It is both a “celebration of the old times of Africa, and a lament for their decline”.

The Talented Mr. Ripley is a novel by Patricia Highsmith, published in 1955. This novel first introduced the character of Tom Ripley, who would return in other titles. I read this book because I had seen the movie and I’d liked it, but now I prefer the novel. Tom Ripley is a young man who lives in New York, with no purpose in his life, although he has an enormous talent to survive. A wealthy man, Herbert Greanleaf, sends him to Italy to persuade his son, Dickie, to go back to the States and give up his bohemian lifestyle. Dickie Greanleaf, rich, happy and handsome represents everything Tom has always wanted to be without success. After his arrival in Italy, Ripley meets Dickie and Marge, his American girlfriend,and they become friends. Tom does fall in love with every aspect of Dickie´s life and feels an obsessive affection for him. Despite the fact that Tom is very kind and friendly, Marge become suspicious of him and Dickie begins to be tired as well. As a way of finishing the situation, Greanleaf agrees to travel with Ripley to San Remo,but Tom has already decided to kill him. The two hire a boat and Tom murders Greanleaf. Tom assumes Greanleaf’s identitity and cheats on Marge and the police, managing to keep safe. The story concludes with Ripley travelling to Greece and inheriting Dickie’s fortune,according to a will forged by himself.

The book seemed fascinating to me. The reader knows the point of view of a killer. You are inside his brain and sometimes you even understand his cold thoughts and feelings. Tom Ripley is a completely amoral person, but Patricia Higsmith shows him as an ordinary guy with a brilliant imagination.

María Elena González 5th. Year

While I was reading the book, I thought that the main character, Adrian, could be any teenager who lives in my city. When you are a teenager, you always have the same problems, the same dreams, the same feelings…

He is very worried about his phyisical appearance, because his body is changing. When I read that a spot ruined Adrian’s day, I looked the word up in the dictionary. I agree, when you are a teenager a chin plenty of spots can ruin your day, your week, even your life..

I really like when Adrian called himself “intellectual” and at the same time he admits he isn’t very clever. Did you remember when you were brainier than your mother? Or brainier than your teacher?.Of course intellectuals like him are allowed to be interested in sex.

His first aim is to impress girls, he urgently needs a girlfriend. He felt very important when his favourite girl, Pandora, congratulated him, because he had worn red socks against the High School rules. Despite the punishment It was worth doing, Adrian and Pandora started a relationship.

I like this book, It is easy to read it and very funny. It doesn’t have difficult vocabulary, and you can find expressions we have studied in class, like “to take her mind off her troubles”. It’s amusing when you find words you have learnt, for example when Adrian describes his mother’s boyfriend as a “stinking rat Lucas”.

I recommend this book, I’m sure reading it you will laugh a lot and you will practise fresh vocabulary.

Ana Colmenero Teleña

The Celts probably originated in Central Europe in 1500B.C., and from there, they started to colonize most of the Western world from Asia Minor to the Atlantic Ocean. It was the Greeks who first called them “Keltoi” which means “the hidden ones”. However, the Celts referred to themselves as “the people”.

Today we can find many Celtic ruins in many places of Western Europe, such as GB, Spain and France. Examples of this ruins are “Stonehenge” in Wiltshire, it’s believed that it was designed as a huge cosmic amphitheatre; the “Uffington White Horse”, which is a chalk hill carving. It’s in England too. The “Peña Tú Idol” in Puertas de Vidiago (Llanes), and many others.

Stonehenge

Uffington

White Horse

Peña Tú Idol

Furthermore, we know about myths and legends such as “Tristan and Iseult’s story” or “the Knights of the Round Table, Merlin and King Arthur’s adventures”. Also, the Celts had symbols connected with animals, trees, which were very important to them, because trees gave the Celts food, wood and protection. Some trees, like the oak were considered sacred. Also, druids used forests like classrooms where they passed on their knnowledge. Moreover, the Celts had symbols related to numbers.

For example, 1, it’s the origin of the creation.

CIRCLE: it’s the simplest symbol. It represents the course of the sun in the sky and symbolizes eternity.

 

SPIRAL: one of the oldest symbols. The spiral represents the sun, however, when the spiral spins to the right it represents the sun during winter and the sun gets smaller as the spiral spins; then, when the spiral spins to the left, it represents the sun in summer and the sun gets bigger as the spiral spins.

2: it’s the balance between opposite forces, for example: Good and Evil, Life and Death, Light and Darkness, etc.

DOUBLE SPIRAL: this picture symbolizes 3 things:

- It’s the representation of duality.

- Moreover, it represents the physical and spiritual growth in relation to the movement of the cosmos.

- And it symbolizes eternal life too.

3: this number was the most important, it was sacred.

TRISKELE OF LIFE: it’s a triple spiral. it represents the belief that life moves in eternal cycles.

TRISKELE or TRISKELION: it comes from the triskele of life. As you can see, the lines grow in opposite directions. Its arms simbolize the union of the 3 fundamental elements in Celtic culture: earth, water and wind.

4: four corners of The Earth.

TETRASKELE

                                THE WHEEL OF BEING

They both symbolize the union of the 4 directions of The Earth.

5: it represents the 5 elements of the Universe: earth, water, wind, fire and spirit. Also it can represent the 5 phases of life: birth, youth, adult age, old age and death.

There are other symbols that look like knots:

KNOT OF TRIQUETRA which is also called KNOT OF ETERNITY. It represents a closed cycle between life, death and reincarnation. This symbol is like the one in the TVSerie “Charmed”.

KNOT OF TUIM: the four seasons; the 4 elements: earth, wind, fire and water.

(The knot of Tuim is the picture inside the cross).

They also had LABYRINTHS, which represented the inside of the human being.

Or the CELTIC CROSS, which is quite similar to the Catholic Cross but with Celtic pictures.

By Rita Mª González.

Matilda is a novel written by Roald Dahl. It may be his best book or at least the one which has brought him the largest profit and the most important awards. It is a moving and fantastic story that will grip both children and adults from the beginning.

The book is about a brilliant and sensitive girl who has a family that doesn’t pay attention to her. She will find in Miss Honey, her teacher, the love she had always lacked and the reason to develop her incredible talent. I personally think that in this book the author emphasizes the characters rather than the action because of the continuous presence of emotions. Matilda’s lack of love, Miss Honey’s tragic personal story or the Trunchbull’s hate to children conform a clear evidence of what Roald Dahl might have suffered when he was a lad.In my opinion, what people like about this story is that it shows how such a small girl faces the cruel reality with the use of her talent and later on, with magic. At first, her power is in the way she copes with her familiar situation by trying to “punish” her parents in order to make them change their behaviour. But magic literally appears when she finds out that she can move things without touching them. Also, the fact that she uses it to help Miss Honey make her look as a heroine in the eyes of the reader.I really enjoyed reading Matilda but what I didn’t like very much was the presence of violence and bad words when refering to children because it could make them think that’s the normal thing. Anyway, it is an entertaining and worthwhile reading that I highly recommend to those who would like to revive their school time.

Sarai Díaz García

This book by David Lodge relates the experiences of two professors who, during the course of 1969, take part in an annual exchange scheme between the University of Rummidge, in the English Midlands, and the State University of Euphoria, in California.

As soon as the book starts, while both are flying to settle in their new places, we realize that they have very different personalities and belong to very different worlds. We could almost say opposite worlds, as if their respective flights, flying in opposite directions at the same time, were a metaphor about their lives.

The main characters, around whom the novel is built, are two professors in their 40s: Philip Swallow, who is a conventional English man, a little dull, and whose ordinary life goes by, plunged into monotonous regularity. To him the exchange represents the chance of his lifetime to feel free, at least for some months. On the contrary, the American Morris Zapp is a distinguished and ambitious member of his community, with a lively social and professional life, who accepts the exchange only under pressure because of his personal situation. As the book progresses their respective wives, Hilary and Désirée, will come to prominence, becoming a decisive reference in the series of contradictions and misunderstandings which affect them, and the plot develops full of sense of humour.

As an example of this humorous tone I would like to emphasize what I consider is a little game the author proposes to us about the names of the protagonists and their personalities: Philip usually is “for the birds”, I mean he frequently goes unnoticed, which is funny being his surname “Swallow” or “Sparrow”, as he is sometimes called. Hilary, his wife is the opposite of “hilarity”, since her life is always led by good manners in a practical way. Morris Zapp, besides being a “zappy” man, is on the point of being “eliminated” from his wife’s life, Désirée, whose name has to do with the warm sensation she provokes in her husband.

In this novel the author deals with different topics related to the personal or cultural circumstances of his characters and, as a former professor who was involved in similar experiences, he seems to know the ropes about this, using the irony to be critical. But, what is more, he develops the story so that we can find a double sense in the plot and, at the end, we discover that, over particularities, the human being has feelings in common and everybody searches for happiness.

I find the narrative structure of this book interesting, since the narrator use alternative actions, drawing a parallel, about the same facts in each of the main characters. This progression allows us to compare easily their behaviours and to follow, perfectly, their dramatic evolution. Besides, there is a wide variety of narrative resources; not only very accurate descriptions, but we can also find a chapter written only through letters and another one through press clippings. In addiction the last chapter surprised me, because it is written as a film script with an open final. As a result of this, some years later, a sequel would be published with two new books.

One final thing I would like to say is that the book was riveting and I enjoyed it, so I think it is worth reading.

Roberto

 

The book I’ve read is “Cards on the table”. I chose it because I’d never read anything written by Agatha Christie before and I’ve always been interested in detective stories.

Everything starts when Mr. Shaitana, a quite odd collector (he likes collecting every kind of things, including “dangerous” things), invites 8 people for dinner at his house, 4 of them are sleuths (among them, Hercule Poirot, Christie’s famous detective) and the othher 4 are murderes who belong to Mr. Shaitana’s collection. At the end of the party, the host appears dead, he has been stabbed to death by one of his own exhibits, but…who committed the crime? How did he or she do it? And why? You’ll only know it by reading the book.

The book is highly recommendable for those people who are fond of reading Christie’s stories. I found it entertaining and, although it isn’t gripping, it’s an amusing story. What I most liked about this book was Mr. Hercule Poirot’s deductions and the way he used to get them, some of his devices were really enthralling, above all, because they are very simple but extremely effective.

By Rita Mª González.

 

 

I’m going to talk about my last summer trip. I went to The States. I´ve been there three weeks, the first one in New York and the other two in a small town called Cookeville in the state of Tennessee.

It was the first time I have crossed the Pond. At first I was very nervous because I´d never been in an English speaking country before and people had told me that I would have to pass a lot of controls in the customs. And I was travelling alone. People had warmed me to keep out of black people in the customs because they weren´t very polite. So, I was frightened.

When the plane arrived I followed the people. And then I got to the customs. There was a queue and a kind black man telling you what customs officers you had to go. I had to go with a Chinese or Japanese man. I didn´t know what I had to say and that man spoke English with a strong accent from his country. So, it was a bit difficult to understand him but I was lucky because he could speak some Spanish words so finally I felt comfortable.

Then I passed a metal detector and that was all, I was in New York. In that moment I couldn´t believe that it was true so I went to the street to see the famous yellow cabs. I´ve ever wanted to go to New York and see the yellow cabs, the Empire State, Central Park,… and some other typical things. And, finally, I was there. 

Then, I had to wait for two hours till my boyfriend arrived from Tennessee to pick me up. After that, we caught a bus to the hotel but it turned out that it was more a guesthouse than a hotel, according to its appearance and inexistent room service. However, the best thing was its situation. It was just two minutes from Times Square, which can be considered the city centre. And the price was even better, it cost half the price for other hotels in that zone, called the Diamond District. 

In the week we spent there we visited the whole island of Manhattan. The main buildings, different districts, some restaurants and of course Central Park, Ground Zero and the Statue of Liberty.  

Now I´m going to show you some photographs of New York. I have to say that it was very difficult to choose these photos because I took a lot, almost 2000, between New York and Cookeville.

Show photos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

María Casquero Rodríguez

Kiss Kiss is a collection of short stories by Roald Dahl, first published in 1960.I could say that they are fantasy science fiction stories.The author describes his stories like monstruous and macabre and I think it is true ;the story called “pig” is really macabre .The stories that I like most were: “the Landlady” and “Mrs. Bixby and the Colonel´s coat”.I´m going to summarize them.

The Landlady:Billy Weaver had just started to work.He arrives in Bath and he is looking for a place to stay.He founds a house and he rings the bell.A middle-aged woman appears and treats him really generously.She tells him that he is going to stay there for ever.While he is there he realises that the animals that were by the fireplace were stuffed , the woman said to him that she did it herself.She gave him a cup of tea but Billy refused because he said that it “tasted faintly of bitter almonds” I think it was because the woman wanted to poison him.

The story takes place in Britain,Bath.The main character is Billy.

Mrs.Bixby and the Colonel’s coat:Mr Bixby,who was a dentist,and his wife live in a flat in New York.Unknown to the dentist,his wife has a boyfriend called the Colonel ,who she sees once a month with the excuse of visiting her old aunt Maude.One day Mrs Bixby gets a mink coat from the Colonel,the are not going to meet each other again.She thougth about telling her husband that her aunt had given her the coat,but it wouldn’t be believable because aunt Maude was poor.She decides to go to a pawn-broker and sell the coat.The pawn-broker gives her a pawn ticket.When she came home she told her husband that she had found it in the taxi.The next day Mr Bixby went to the pawn-broker to redeem the ticket.The dentist gave his secretary,Mrs Pulteney,the mink and for his wife he got a tacky fur neckpiece.All in all both had a lover.

The story takes place in the USA ,New York.The main characters are Mrs Bixby and her husband.

In my opinion it is a entertaining and gripping book,once you start reading one story you have to continue,it really grips you.

It wasn’t very difficult to read although I didn’t undertand some words.

I would recommend this as a gripping and enjoyable book.On balance ,I liked it.