Shark Girl

Title: Shark Girl

Author: Kelly Bingham

 Contemporary Realistic Fiction #1

What can I say? I love sharks; so, when I picked up Shark Girl by Kelly Bingham I was very intrigued. When I found out that the book was also written in free verse poetry, I knew that I had to read it. Sharks and poetry? It must have been written for me. I can honestly say that I enjoyed the book. The story is about a young, teenage girl named Jane who innocently goes on a swim with her family during the summer. That is when everything changes and Jane becomes a victim. During the shark attack she loses her arm, and for someone who is an aspiring artist – this is devastating! To make matters worse, her attack was filmed and put on the news for everyone to see. Now she has sympathy cards, letters, and flowers from people she doesn’t even know. Everyone wants to be her friend but still everyone whispers and no one seems to care that she can’t even button her pants with ease anymore.

I found this story to be truly touching and eerily realistic. I felt like I was reading about an actual event, an actual teenage girl that experienced this. Though I couldn’t relate to the attack first-hand (though I can tell you, I don’t plan on getting in the ocean anytime soon!), I did relate to the alienation Jane felt. I believe this is something all teenagers can relate to regardless of their situation which is what makes this book so appealing. It is fun, interesting, and different while being completely relatable at the same time. I would definitely recommend this book for 6^th grade and up. It’s excellent and shows children that telling a story in poetry is just as effective as traditional story writing. 

Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse

Title: Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse

Author: Kevin Henkes

Picture Book #3

I absolutely adored Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse by Kevin Henkes because it was a story about anger and how to properly deal with that complicated emotion. The story begins with the main character, Lilly, explaining about how much she loves school and all of the things she likes about school best. She then goes into discussing her teacher, Mr.Slinger, and how she wants to be a teacher just like him some day. As the reader of the story, I connected with Lilly greatly and reflected on my own feelings as a child when I used to want to be exactly like my teachers. They were always great role models to me and I used to take everything they said and did to heart, which is why I sympathized with Lilly when Mr.Slinger had to reprimand her one day for showing off her purple plastic purse during inappropriate times throughout the day. Out of anger Lilly draws a mean picture of Mr. Slinger and sticks it in his bag at the end of the day only to find that he has written her a nice note saying she may share her purse with the class another day. The rest of the story details how she goes about apologizing for her mistake.

I think this story would be good for young readers because it teaches them about properly reacting when they are mad. Through the story, the children learn how Lilly is sorry for actions against Mr. Slinger and how she shouldn’t have reacted so poorly and so rashly. This would be a good story to use during a unit about emotions with Kindergarten or for a circle time book with the class after an altercation between classmates, a student and the teacher, etc. Moreover, I feel like the students would connect with the main character, Lilly, because she is described as being a student like them. Having a male teacher may appeal to the boys in the room if a story about a plastic purple purse is “too girly” for them to read.