Franklin Endicott and the Third Key — Review

Thought for the Day:

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”
~ Harriet Tubman ~

Gifts for My Writer Friends:

Info-dumping is something all writers tend to do but shouldn’t. In fact, I just reviewed a self-published book that was nothing but info-dumping. UGH! That author could have used this article. K. M. Allan has 5 Ways to Avoid Info-Dumping HERE to help you out.

Moriah Richard has written an interesting article HERE for Writer’s Digest about using the five senses to enrich your writing. Her examples are excellent. See if you can spot the typo. It’s hard to believe it got by everyone.

Want to strengthen your character voice in your novel? HERE Liam Cross has a post on A Writer’s Path that will help with that. I really like his examples.

My back is much the same, but I’m waiting for some new medication which I hope will help. I have Wimbledon coming up this week, so I can’t complain about having a good excuse to just sit inside out of the heat watching it. My niece posted a funny thing on Facebook recently, and I thought you all would enjoy it. It’s a little long, so I will post half this week and half next week. I hope you think it’s as fun as I do.

Winston Churchill loved paraprosdokians, figures of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected.

1. Where there’s a will, I want to be in it.
2. The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it’s still on my list.
3. Since light travels faster than sound, some people appear bright until you hear them speak.
4. If I agreed with you, we’d both be wrong.
5. War does not determine who is right – only who is left.
6. Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting
   it in a fruit salad.
7. They begin the evening news with ‘Good Evening,’ then proceed to tell you why it isn’t.
8. To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.
9. I thought I wanted a career. Turns out, I just wanted pay checks.
10. In filling out an application, where it says, ‘In case of emergency, notify:’ I put “DOCTOR.”
11. I didn’t say it was your fault. I said I was blaming you.
12. Women will never be equal to men until they can walk down the street…with a bald head and a beer gut, and still think they are sexy.

I have another book for emerging readers today. I just love books at this level. I think it must take great skill to write these fun books with low word counts and pretty specific vocabulary all the while keeping them fresh and interesting. This one, Franklin Endicott and the Third Key is book 6 of the Tales from Deckawoo Drive (with a guest appearance by Mercy Watson) by Kate DiCamillo. If I see her name on a book, I will try to grab a copy. It is also delightfully illustrated by Chris Van Dusen. This one came to me from Candlewick Press in exchange for an honest review.

Franklin Endicott worries. He worries about just about everything and even keeps a notebook in which he lists all the things he worries about. It is a large notebook and well-indexed. He even worries his little sister Stella will find his notebook and be frightened by his worries, so he hides his notebook under his bed, and that is when the nightmares start. He researches nightmares and even brings Mercy Watson to stay overnight, hoping she will eat his nightmares, but she just snores and hogs the bed. Consequently, he doesn’t sleep much, and one night as he is getting warm milk, he notices Eugenia Lincoln, the lady next door, is also up in her kitchen fighting insomnia. He makes extra and takes the warm milk to Miss Lincoln’s house. They discuss their sleep problems, and Miss Lincoln suggests concentrating on the mundane tasks one has to do. Hers is getting a key duplicated, and Franklin asks if he can accompany her. They make a plan for the next day.

The next day, Eugenia Lincoln and Franklin set off to downtown and end up at Buddy Lamp’s Used Goods. It is an odd shop filled with unusual items, some of which worry Franklin. They leave the key with Buddy. Franklin is to return the next day to pick it up, and when he does, there is a third key in the envelope. Eugenia Lincoln says it isn’t hers, and it is up to Franklin to take care of the problem. Thus begins Franklin’s adventure.

Kate DiCamillo has quite the franchise for emerging readers with her quirky cast of characters in the Deckawoo Drive books. They all have compelling stories, interesting problems, and engaging characters. I haven’t read all of them, but I have read a few, and I always enjoy them. This one is no exception. And I believe they are all illustrated by the talented Chris Van Dusen. I highly recommend all of the books in this series.

I have no giveaway this week since I will donate the nice hardback copy I got to the school. Don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE.