Annexed by Sharon Dogar

My book is Annexed by Sharon Dogar. It's like the Diary of Anne Frank, but in Peter Van Pels point of view. It's fiction, but the plot is about the same as what it really was. Their in the Annex still, and the same things are going on but the author tries to make it so it was like what Peter was really thinking. If you've ever read the Diary of Anne Frank, you can see the resemblance.

At first Peter likes this other girl, her name is Liese and right before he goes into the Annex he watches her and her family get taken away by the Nazi's. At first he was heartbroken, and HATED Anne Frank. He thought she was so full of herself and would never shut up. She was those kind of girls that was a know-it-all. But then, as time goes on in the Annex, he realizes she's not half that bad. Then he starts to fall in love with her, as she is in love with him.

What I really like is that this story is based on Anne's diary, which everyone or most everyone knows about. It's all about Anne, and what she thought. But this is different, a different point of view so it's not quite the same. Even though some of it, most of it isn't really what he probably thought, it's still different and really good. There's nothing really that I hate about this book, not yet at least.

The book is 337 pages long, normal readers length. The book I read before this book was about the same length but it really wasn't that interesting to me. It was, but it was pretty boring. If you're into the whole Holocaust deal and how it was like to be in hiding during that time, you'll find it very interesting. The last book I read before I found this one, it took me almost a month to read 100 pages. That's how boring and slow-paced it was to me. Then I started reading this book and within a week I've read 100 pages. Plus I'm only reading it in school when I get done with my work or durring SSR.

The structure is normal, it doesn't have chapters though. It's like Anne's diary, it has days. So I guess you can consider them to be 'chapters'. But they're really short chapters. If you don't like the chapter length in normal books, you'll like this because it's one in a half pages long each 'chapter'. The longest 'chapter' I've had so far in it was like, three/ four in a half pages. It goes by really quick.


"These are my memories. I cannot stop them coming.
If I lay them before you, will you believe them?
You, who reamin on the outside?
Are you listening?
In the Annex, I could wake up from my dreams---
But in the camps the dream never ends. I wake up and the nightmare is real.
I can't really believe it is happening myself, so why should you?
Do you?
Will you notice that I'm missing--or that the street looks strangely empty?
Ach! She made the right decision, that woman.
She didn't need her suitcase where she was going.
But then again, she didn't need her child either." Page 81.

Elizabethan Women/Hairstyles

The girls of Noble birth were taught by tutors at home and Elizabethan women were taught at age five, or even younger.

Elizabethan woman were raised to believe that they were inferior to men.

Elizabethan woman have to govern a household and be skilled in housewifely duties.

It was important for Queen Elizabeth to keep her image and beauty of a ‘Virgin Queen’.

Elizabethan Hair Styles for women were designed to compliment the upper class fashions of the day.

Elizabethan women were supposed to bring a certain amount of money and goods to a wedding.

This connects with Romeo and Julliet because that's how the women were like back then. How they dressed and how they acted.

Poem: The Great Depression

Little Andrew

Age 8, playful, comfortable but poor.

Lives with a kitten named Oliver and the clothes on his back.

He wishes he could be with his friends, playing tag;

but there are no parents around to tell him when to come home.

He needs some shoes to help his working parents.

Little Andrew and Oliver, willing to work.

Reading Experiences

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I can not put a book down. I'm a Freshman and last year I couldn't even stand reading one single page of a book. My former teacher used to make us do book reports and she would give us all the time in the world practically. But yet I still had to look online what the book was about and somewhat do the project. Now, this year I read the book and know everything about it. Unlike last year knowing just some parts and not even know what it's about. Thanks to my teacher loving reading and a great choice in books, I love reading! Silent Sustained Reading has changed me, as you can tell. If my teachers did that last year I would have probably been into reading. Reading during class has made it easier to get started in English and get my mind focused on it. The only downfall is those few people who still don't like reading and think it's great to have a little social time. I plan on reading way more books for the rest of the year, no doubt about it!

High School > Middle School

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I remember in Middle School I could care less about my grades, only fun. Now that I'm in High School I'm being more aware of what I have ahead of me, to look forward to. To do that I have to do good, great amazing! That's exactly what I'm doing. Last year I had practically all D's and F's. The only way I even got close to High School was Summer School. Now I have nothing below a C. I got high honors the first quarter and this quarter one A, two C's and the rest B's. I have come a long way and tend to keep it like this, too. It's like I'm a whole new person.

My baby blog!

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I would like to learn a bit more about blogging. At the beginning of the year I had no idea what it was but now I've become very fawned of it. I heard my teacher say something about music, and much different things there is to it. I think it would be interesting to learn that so I can express myself more. Be me! Show my real side. While I'm writing these blog's I get better at writing, I believe. It's making me more free and easier to express myself. Unlike before I never really cared much about writing but now I really like it.

Shooting In Tucson

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Jared Lee Laughner, suspect of the "Arizona Shooting," could be spared the death penalty because of his mental state. He was accused of killing six people and wounding  13, along with a congress women, who is in the hospital for getting shot in the head. There were up to 150 witnesses, several who held the shooter down. Laughner, is charged with murder and attempted murder in the shootings at a supermarket that killed a 9-year-old girl, a federal judge and four others. His attorney, is known for trying to keep defendants cases from being executed. An Arizona jury cannot be objective from the trauma of this event. They will need every little bit of evidence that makes him look crazy.

I believe that Jared Lee Laughner should be given the death penalty. In my opinion it honestly does not matter if he's mental, or crazy. Just because he's not right in the head doesn't mean that he should get treated any different from the rest of us. He is a murderer and deserves to die. He had every intention of doing what he did. He killed innocent people who have done nothing wrong to him. That 9-year-old girl had no right to die, she had her whole life ahead of her. That's just down right sick to me. Also to kill a 70-year-old man who dove in front of his wife and took the bullet for her. She's now living but that was terrible. He knew exactly what he was doing, how dare anyone try and say different. No one in their right mind would do that. It's also not right to treat people that aren't exactly the same as us any different than us.  He's a murderer, a criminal and does not deserve to be called a human being.

Book Review: Willow

The book I read is called ‘Willow’ by Julian Hoban. This is such an amazing and moving book. It’s about a teenage girl named Willow who in the past year killed her parents in a car crash. It was an accident but she’s left with all this guilt to live with. She now lives with her brother, his wife and their daughter. She transferred schools because she cannot stand the memories of her friends and their parents and how it used to be for her. She says living back there where her friends are, she’s like a terrorist. 


Willow works at a library and she meets this guy named ‘Guy’. She at first doesn’t want or think she will tell him anything, she was wrong. He’s the one now who she goes to for her problems without her really thinking of it, it just spills out. Not to mention because of the car crash, she cuts to ease the pain. But no one knows.


When Willow first meets Guy she tries her hardest to get away from him to be alone, to cut. To save herself from all this hurt inside by overcoming it with real, physical pain. She’s sitting outside the campus, he comes along. Getting to know her, being friendly. But she drops her purse. Usually a girl would be flattered for a guy to be as kind and thoughtful as him. But she doesn’t want him to find out about her ‘stash’. Her razors. He picks up her purse and starts putting everything on the ground in it. Including the razors. He picks one up and says, “Hey, I use the same kind!” Not knowing at first what it’s for. Then after a few seconds it starts to click. Then he bursts out running for her brothers office. She’s run up with him, holding his hand to stop him, to not tell. He promised her he wont, and he’s keeping his word, too.

All because of that one incident he’s now making sure she stops, or at least calls him before she does it. She figures she would never do that, but no matter how hard she tries to refuse the offer, she now thinks before she does it and it’s really changing her. She finally has someone to talk to about things, about anything since the accident. She first practically hates him, but now she’s starting to feel things, things differently towards him.

I really love this book. I personally think it’s moving in so many ways. Not just that, it’s a cute story, in a way. I believe that any teenage girl would like this or any ‘lover(s)’. The length it’s pretty small. So if anybody who’s a slow reader, or doesn’t like lengthy books, this one is the one to read. The narration is different, it’s third person. It’s so sad/cute/amazing/moving. I didn’t hate anything about this book, really. I couldn’t put it down. This book is about actually depressed people and how people, anybody, will not know what is going on with them unless they actually pay attention. About how you can help people who are thinking about taking their life, how you’re not alone and people feel the same. There are people like you out there who are willing to help.

"Her leg hurts. It's extraordinary that a two-inch cut could be so painful. It's easy to do, really, just open it up before it's healed, take something blunt like the toe of a sneaker and try to enlarge the cut up to three or four inches.... Now that she has her fix, now that the pain is flowing through her blood like a narcotic, Willow is free to think about other things."

"When you found me out, you thought that I wanted to kill myself, that all this slashing was like target practice until I got up enough courage for the real thing. You don't understand at all. You just don't get it. I'm saving myself. I've taught myself, I've trained myself, not to feel anything except physical pain. I'm completely in control of that. Do you understand? Do you get what that means?"