Brock ColeRecensioni

I brought this out at Christmas for a reading. My four-year-old niece listened patiently, but was not into it. I could tell she was bored and not following the story. However, my seven-year-old niece liked it. She didn't laugh out loud or anything, but I think she was amused by it and picked up on the moral. This made the shortlist for SLJ's Mock Newbery blog, so I think my expectations were way too high going in.

I was prepared for another depressing book about teenagers suffering, and I was pleasantly surprised that this book was different. It was still a formulaic story about two kids at a summer camp who are bullied, but the compelling writing and shifting of perspective from kid world to adult world were so great that it was way better than just a typical bullying story. Goats perfectly captures the world of kids that exists below adults' radar, and how hard it can be for kids to prevail over the combination of power-trips and clueless-ness in adults who have control over them. Kids who don't even know each other, with hardly any money or food are better able to care for each other than the adults in their lives.

Goats takes place in the eighties, and some of the parts where white kids and black kids are hanging out are weird - the author makes a point of declaring which kids are white and which are black in a way that is pretty awkward. I flinched at the stereotyping of all the kids at times. However, the awesomeness of the characters came through and the suspense of the story was great.

jose luis alzati!

What was the point of this book? Kids book...no big finish......no moral. What was the point?! Ok, that wasn't a fair assessment. The writing was actually pretty good...lots of build up and suspense. But someone forgot to tell the author that the book had to come to an end...and when she figured that out, she just kind of did a "oh, then everything was all right..." No explanation, no moral, no clean up. What a waste!

While I can see where this book gets its praise from Im only giving it two stars because its not something I actually enjoyed reading. The protagonist has an interesting way of thinking and is very much a survivor and a memorable person, but actually reading this book just made me feel kinda gross. Whatever I was supposed to "get" out of this book, I didnt.

Bullied by their camp mates, a boy and a girl are marooned on an island, but unite, survive, and rise above human cruelty. One reviewer calls this book "one of the most unflinching, important novels ever written for children." For middle school and teen readers.

Mentioned during lecture for LIS-481. This story takes some standard fairytale tropes (foolish father, three daughters with different approaches to problem-solving) and plays with them. The text is rather on the long side, and although the soft watercolor illustrations are lovely, certain details could be clearer, particularly in the final double-page spread of the whole extended family at the table.

An awkward journey of discovery.

At a summer camp, a unbelievably cruel prank is played on one girl and one boy. Their fellow campers, boys on one side of the camp and girls on the other, take their victim to an island near the camp, strip them both naked, and leave them abandoned there for the night. In the morning, they will go back and get them. The author doesn't tell how old the kids are, but based on a couple of sentences describing their bodies (what stage of physical puberty they were in), I imagined them to be 11 or 12 years old.
The boy and girl find each other. Needless to say, they are not eager to return to this camp. They manage to get off the island during the night and make it shore elsewhere. They decide they don't want to be found.
What follows is part survivalist story as the boy and girl struggle to eat, find safe warm places to sleep, and avoid capture by anybody. But what made this book so superb was the quickly developing relationship between the two kids. They start out naked, then in improvised clothing, and then in stolen clothes. (I assume this book is frequently banned or challenged because of this nakedness. Neither the author nor the characters dwell on this, and at no point in the book do the kids have sex, or do anything sexual; but there are a few adult characters in the story who assume otherwise.) I was empathetic with these kids (as a child I was often the victim of bullying or at least the butt of mean jokes) and I loved the way the story played out.

Like "The Goats," this is a weird book, so I'm not sure who might read it, although I imagine that my adolescent self would have liked it as much as my adult self.

The protagonist is high school junior in Chicago where she lives with her absent father's new wife, a self-absorbed woman only 6 years her senior, while her mother is in South America and her father is lecturing in Europe. Celine, an artist, suffers the vicissitudes of high school (her reckless parents, a boorish boyfriend, the slings & arrows of outrageous fortune) with some level of poise, albeit, funny, snarky poise. That said, she does not dwell on the usual teengirl fodder--clothes, boys, parties, intoxication.

As part of her desire to graduate early, she must complete a paper on "The Catcher in the Rye" for an English class. As I read Cole's appealing book, it felt a bit like an apologia for "Catcher" or Cole's aspiring to a better troubled adolescent novel. In fact, Celine actually interacts with a little kid, her 8-year-old neighbor who is left in her care, and she does, in fact protect him from the corrupt adults.

I'm not sure which reader I'll recommend this to--it calls out for an arty reader with a sly sense of humor on the brink of disillusionment.

Like "The Goats," this is a weird book, so I'm not sure who might read it, although I imagine that my adolescent self would have liked it as much as my adult self.

The protagonist is high school junior in Chicago where she lives with her absent father's new wife, a self-absorbed woman only 6 years her senior, while her mother is in South America and her father is lecturing in Europe. Celine, an artist, suffers the vicissitudes of high school (her reckless parents, a boorish boyfriend, the slings & arrows of outrageous fortune) with some level of poise, albeit, funny, snarky poise. That said, she does not dwell on the usual teengirl fodder--clothes, boys, parties, intoxication.

As part of her desire to graduate early, she must complete a paper on "The Catcher in the Rye" for an English class. As I read Cole's appealing book, it felt a bit like an apologia for "Catcher" or Cole's aspiring to a better troubled adolescent novel. In fact, Celine actually interacts with a little kid, her 8-year-old neighbor who is left in her care, and she does, in fact protect him from the corrupt adults.

I'm not sure which reader I'll recommend this to--it calls out for an arty reader with a sly sense of humor on the brink of disillusionment.

"Fair Monaco," is about three children who go stay at their grandmothers house for the weekend. When their grandmother is to scared to let them do anything, the children stay inside and just hang around. When the children are sleeping, they are faced with weird dreams that disturb their rest. When they start dreaming up happy dreams, their dreams are projected upon their grandmother, who becomes inspired to start activities with them.

This was an interesting story that was a little hard to follow. It seemed unclear what the plot was, but it started to make sense towards the end. The illustrations were nice, and they depicted the dreams of the kids well.

When his village suffers from a hard winter, Simon, whose mother laughs at his foolishness, goes in search of spring.
1 book

A grand little story about love between siblings, courage, and determination.

Celine is compared to Holden in Catcher in the Rye. Well, I never liked Catcher in the Rye and a comparable female protagonist didn't do anything to change my mind.

43 months - A silly story with ok illustrations.

After reading the book “The Money We’ll Save” by Brock Cole, I thought it would be a good book to add to my classroom library. I particularly liked that the plot was geared towards readers in grades three to five, while the language in the story included vocabulary words that would challenge young readers, such as “basting” and “glutton.” The illustrations are composed of watercolor paint and dull colors that matched the dreary New York City setting and dullness of the apartment the family lived in. The plot is well paced and the conflict of not having enough money on Christmas is clear to readers. I would choose to read this book to my class because it is humorous, while still displaying the hardships and sacrifices families of low socioeconomic status go through during the holiday season. Due to the fact that the holiday the family is celebrating is Christmas, I would be sure to have made myself aware of the religious beliefs of the children in my classroom before reading this story. The main message of this story is that during the holiday season, it is more important to love and value one’s family over receiving luxurious gifts and food.

1. This story is about a young girl who is very poor and is homeless and all of the townspeople look down upon her. When an ogre comes to town looking for a bride, they all decide to give the ogre the young girl. The young girl then defeats the ogre and outsmarts the townspeople.
2. I think this is a great story for children because it looks a little closer into discrimination. You don't find many children's books that have homeless people in them and this is a great way to open up a discussion about diversity amongst humans and a variety of situations and ways people live in. There is also a few rhyming poems within the story that I think children will really enjoy.
3. I think this book would be a good choice for children ages 5-8. The younger children may enjoy having it read to them and looking at the illustrations while older children could enjoy reading the story as well.

Two misfits help each other through the torment of summer camp. I loved this story.½

Not a new story (so you can kinda predict the ending), but I thought the illustrations were cute.

What a pleasure it is watching the shunned children get revenge on the mean kids.

Delightful story set in a 19th century New York City tenement.

An excellent story in the tradition of folktales, Cole's Good Enough to Eat introduces a new heroine alternatnely named Scraps-and-Smells, Skin-and-Bones or Sweets-and-Treats. When an ogre demands a bride from the town the orphaned and homeless heroine is easily selected as the bride-to-be, but our heroine has a few tricks up her sleeve. The songs interspersed are particularly fun, but the watercolor illustrations don't always march the tone of the story as well as they could.

Sometimes your attempts to save money actually cost you money in the end.

Intent on saving money before Christmas, Pa decides to raise a turkey poult in the family's three-room flat, with hilarious results! Set in a 19th century New York tenement, Cole's heartwarming story and watercolour illustrations vividly capture the essence of life for a poor family trying to make ends meet, while depicting characters with whom reader's will immediately relate. Although the ending is somewhat predictable, it does not detract from the underlying message that it is the love of family, not the presence of "stuff," that makes Christmas so special.½