MYP4 English 9

Beloved by Toni Morrison is about a woman whose name is Sethe. She escaped slavery and lives in Cincinnati with her daughter, Denver, in a house that is haunted by the ghost of her dead baby. Sethe’s past is full of pain, and the ghost reminds her of the terrible things she went through. 

One day, a man named Paul D, who is someone Sethe knew from the Sweet Home plantation shows up. His presence makes her feel less lonely, but also brings back memories of when she was a slave.

Counting on the stillness of her own soul, she had forgotten the other one: the soul of her baby girl. Who would have thought that a little old baby could harbor so much rage? Rutting among the stones under the eyes of the engraver’s son was not enough.

Through flashbacks, the book explains the horrible things that happened to Sethe during slavery and how she escaped. It talks a lot about things like motherhood, trauma, and how hard it is to move on from the past. The story shows how love can be powerful but also painful, especially when tied to such a terrible history.

currently i am reading The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller a novel inspired by the events of Iliad written by Homer currently in the novel  Achilles and Patroclus are heading to the Trojan War where achiless has been destined to fufil his duty as a great soldier along with patroculos who has chosen to come with him to the war.

“This is what Achilles will leave us, I thought. A story told by our children’s children.”

This line captures the duty and power achiless has and the role he is expected to fufill and foreshadows the longlasting legacy he will leave behind.

I have been reading the book INSURGENT by Veronica Roth. Insurgent picks up right after the events of Divergent, with Tris prior and Tobias Eaton on the run after the attack on the Abnegation faction, by the Erudite faction. The story follows their journey through a fractured society where trust is very hard to find and alliances are fragile. Tris is struggling with the aftermath of her parents deaths, the betrayal of her own faction, and the weight of the choices she has made. As she navigates the political tension between factions, she uncovers dangerous secrets, confronts her own fears, and accepts her identity as a Divergent.

“There are so many ways to be brave in this strange world. sometimes bravery involves laying down your life for something bigger than yourself, or for someone else. sometimes it involves giving everything up have ever known, or everyone you have ever loved, for the sake of something greater. But sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it is nothing more than gritting your teeth through pain, and the work of every day, the slow walk toward a better life. (p.128)”

This quotation said by Tris, is talking about how the world is a weird, confusing, and scary. She mentions how in life you need to be brave no matter what circumstances; If its for a friend, family member, or someone you have loved. You need to slowly keep pushing forward and going on with life, through any  challenges for a better way of living.

secrets of sable island is a story written off the coast go Halifax Nova Scotia famous for its ship wreaks and its wild horses. Caleb Mackean lives in a lodge with norse who saved him after he was washed off board of a ship, Caleb eventually makes a friend Marin who is struggling to take care of his sick mother and her cruel father who wants to take her back tot he main land and send her to a conversion school to teach her some manners.

Rodney – so thats what you’ve been sneaking off to gallivanting around up to God knows what when you should’ve been back taking care of your mother! go home and pack. we’re leaving on the supply ship tomorrow …the whole family!

marine  but mother docent want to leave!

Rodney – don’t defy me girl I’ve made up my mind. I should’ve put your mother in the hospital and you and that  convent months ago!

the family slowly begins to fall apart after Rodney lost his leg during a rescue and tends to take it out on his daughter and the others around him while his wife tries to fight it even though she’s in critical condition

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen is a classic novel exploring themes of love, class, family, and personal growth. Set in early 19th-century England, the story centers on the complex relationship between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. Elizabeth initially views Darcy as arrogant and proud, while Darcy sees Elizabeth as beneath him socially. Over time, they both learn to see past their first impressions.

“I have faults enough, but they are not, I hope, of understanding. My temper I dare not vouch for. It is, I believe, too little yielding— certainly too little for the convenience of the world. I cannot forget the follies and vices of other so soon as I ought, nor their offenses against myself. My feelings are not puffed about with every attempt to move them. My temper would perhaps be called resentful. My good opinion once lost, is lost forever.” (pg. 52)

In this quotation, Darcy admits he has flaws, but he believes his judgment and intelligence are sound. This suggests a self-awareness but also a sense of pride in his insight and intellect. He acknowledges that he is stubborn and inflexible, perhaps unwilling to conform to societal expectations or to compromise easily. This inflexibility can be seen as both a flaw and a mark of personal integrity. I picked this quotation because I think it is realistic since not everyone is perfect.

The science of Self Discipline is a book made by Peter Hollins a bestselling author, human psychology researcher, and best known for is work on self defence. He has been studding about psychology and peak human performance for over a dozen years. He has helped and worked with numerous individuals to help them unlock their potential and to achieve success. He has put all of These teaching into his book called  The science of Self-Discipline. The book is about how to understand self-discipline, how to increase will power and motivation, and mindset. In this book Wille he is explaining the biological basis of self-discipline he says how you should focus on self-discipline when you are trying to achieve ling-term goals.

“Being disciplined in your pursuit of long-term goals is only possible if you can consistently focus on the decision and actions that lead to accomplishing those goals. Thus, it’s nearly impossible to achieve focus and self-discipline separately, as each is intertwined with the other.” (P23)

What he means is that when you are trying to achieve a long-term goal you have to keep focusing on the chooses and decisions you are making when your trying to achieve it. For example you can chose to go to the gym and work out or stay home and watch TV even if its for one day you have to focus on your goals and actions you do. you have to chose the right option and stay focused on what you are doing. That is what he means in this quote.

For this quote on the champions mind by JIM AFROMOW. It is on chapter three, Be In It To Win It.  Jim is talking about how to be patient and to let the play come to you. He calls this part PACE, DONT RACE which means don’t try to speed up or rush to what’s going on when you feel pressure but to stay calm and be on the same pace as the play that is going on. In this part he says what you should do if you are going to fast and making errors.

“when things go wrong or you feel pressure increase, everything usually speeds up-your walking pace, rate of speech, and so on. If your inclination is to rush, remind yourself to slow it down in order to avoid making errors.”(P72)

What he means is when you mess something up, make an error, or start to fell pressure you will start to speed up and rush. which could lead mistakes and if you are in a tournament finals you cannot make mistakes or that will cost you a game or the lead. you have to slow down and remind your self no to rush and to stay on the same pace as the play that is going on. If you do that it will be easier to play and to avoid mistakes. That is what he means in this chapter.

I am currently reading a book called 1984 by george orwell. It is about a character named Winston smith, and it takes place in a “dystopian future” where the government is in absolute control of the public and society. Winston is a minor government employee who works in ‘The Ministry of Truth’ under oceania. He is not happy with the living conditions they are offered and he thinks about rebelling multiple times. winston is a thirty-nine year old man with poor health due to the state of living.

“In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality was tacitly denied by their philosophy.” Ch VII pg 83

This quote shows us how controlling the party is and it tells us about how the party controls the minds of people by forcing them to believe whatever they wanted and convince others that what the party says is right – ‘Psychological manipulation’.

In the book A Good Girls Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson, it is about a girl named Pip. About 5 years ago, a girl named Andie Bell was murdered supposedly by her boyfriend Sal Singh. In school Pip has to do this big project and she decides to do it on the murder. Throughout the book it explores her journey to find the truth and if people were right. She meets people from Andie’ s past and people who were involved in her life.

When you ask people in town what happened to Andie Bell, they’ll tell you without hesitation: ‘She was murdered by Salil Singh.’ No ‘allegedly,’ no ‘might have,’ no ‘probably,’ no ‘most likely.’ He did it, they say. Sal Singh killed Andie. But I’m just not so sure (p.19).

Andie was always a strong believer the Sal was not the one who killed Andie and that something else happened. She is determined to find the truth and wants to know what actually happened. Everyone in the town has believed that is was Sal including the police who quit the investigation because that thought it was Sal. But was is really Sal? Or was that all a lie?

The DaVinci Code, by Dan Brown is the book I have been reading for a while now. It is about a symbologist named Robert Langdon, who meets a cryptographer named Sophie Neveu at the Louvre museum in Paris when they are investigating a strange murder. The person who was murdered left a code and arranged his body in a particular way that meant something to Langdon and Sophie, But no one else. Them discovering and deciphering the code entangled them in a dispute between the Priory of Son and Opus Dei over a possibility of a child.

“Meaning that history is always written by the winners. When two cultures clash, the loser is obliterated, and thw winner writes the history books–books which glorify their own cause and disparage the conquered foe. As Napoleon once said, ‘What is history but a fable agreed upon?’ ” (P.256).

This quotation makes us think about what history actually is, and where it originates from. Because really, there is no way to confirm that history is true, it was just passed down through generations. Same with books, or plays. Anyone could’ve written a book and filled it with a bunch of lies and acted like it was true. Makes us realize that we just take history and believe it true, when the reality could be the exact opposite.

I Am Malala is a book written by Malala Yousafzai, a women’s rights advocate who lived during the Talibans oppressive ruling. In the book, Malala describes witnessing the Taliban taking away the education and freedom of girls in her country. Refusing to accept this, Malala began fighting for women’s right to education, making her a target of the Taliban which lead to her being shot on her way home from school. Malala having Survived the attack continued to fight for educational rights throughout the world and went on to become the youngest-ever Nobel Prize winner.

“Let us pick up our books and our pens, they are the most powerful weapons.”

This qoute highlights Malala’s belief in education as a form of empowerment and how important it is.

The Song of Achilles is a novel written by Madeline Miller inspired by the events of Iliad written by Homer but instead told through the perspective of Patroclus, a young prince who has been abandoned by his father and exiled to the kingdom of Phthia. The story follows his relationship with Achilles the prince of Phithia who is the son of a king and a goddess, as they grow up together and

“He is a god, and I am only a boy. He is a golden chariot, and I am a mud-spattered cart.” – Patroclus

This quote highlights how Patroclus seems to struggle with himself compared to Achilles who has been destined to become a God and in a way can illustrate the compalexitty of growing up

The 5th Wave is made by Rick Yancey. The story is about a girl named Cassie Sullivan, who is one of the last surviving people on Earth after a lots of bad things happened like alien invasions. The book is about a world where the aliens, known as the “Others,” have taken over the people through four waves of destruction:
The First Wave: is a big electromagnetic pulse that takes out all electronics, making the world a chaos. The Second Wave is a super big tsunami that wipes out coastal cities, causing millions of people to die. The Third Wave is a about a really bad virus that kills about all of the remaining people and the Fourth Wave is when the aliens begin using human, or “silencers,” to kill the last survivors. By the time the story begins, humanity is going to extinction, and Cassie is trying to survive in a world where there is no trust, and danger is everywhere. Cassie’s journey is because she is looking for her younger brother, Sammy, who has been taken by a military group. And while she is looking for him, she encounters Evan Walker, a mysterious boy who may or may not be alien.

“The enemy’s strategy is simple: If you don’t know who the enemy is, you can’t trust anyone.” – Cassie Sullivan. “The 5th wave is the last wave. The wave that ends the human race. And it’s already here.” – Rick Yancey

The title is the “fifth wave,” which is about how the alien plan to use human children to carry out their final assault on the persons in the whole world. These children are trained by the military to fight against the Others, though many of them don’t realize they are being manipulated.

This story has a diferente side between Cassie’s perspective and that of other characters, including Ben Parish (Cassie’s classmate before the caos begin), and Sammy, who each have their own roles in the fight for survival. The 5th Wave is the first book in a trilogy, like the “The Infinite Sea” and “The Last Star”.