FREAK THE MIGHTY & THE BIG DARK — Double Review & Giveaway

Thought for the Day:

“A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading it.”

~ William Styron ~

Gifts for My Writer Friends:

We often hear about keeping up the tension and ramping up the conflict, but how often do we hear about writing happy scenes? We need to have some of those too. HERE is a good article by K. M. Weiland about How to Write Happy Scenes: 6 Tips.

I never seem to get enough about setting. It is so important in writing and can make such a difference if a setting is developed well. HERE is a good article from the Institute of Children’s Literature called 4 Ways Setting Acts With and As Character. It is worth a read.

HERE is a Narrative Nugget from Janice Hardy that will help you make trouble for your characters.

I spent three weeks on the road. I visited 17 states, drove 7200 miles, attended a spectacularly fun class reunion, and attended baseball games in seven major league parks to bring my total to twenty. I visited the Kansas City Royals, Milwaukee Brewers, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Detroit Tigers, Pittsburgh Pirates, and St. Louis Cardinals. The White Sox have the most beautiful park I saw on this trip. It was worth the trip. The Chicago Cubs have the best fans. It was a day game on a weekday, and the stands were full at the beginning of the game, and nobody left until it was over. Dodger fans could learn from this. (For those who don’t know, Dodger fans generally aren’t in their seats until the third inning and leave by the seventh.) My best experience was in Pittsburgh. They have no vendors in the stands! Nobody standing in front of you during play opening endless cans of beer or shouting in your ear while the game is going on. Ushers ask attendees to wait until breaks to get back to their seats. I loved it! The Pittsburgh park also has the most interesting skyline backdrop. Everyone I met along the way was great to talk to and helpful with directions and information about the teams. I had a chance to visit the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. It’s quite small, but it is packed with wonderful information and memorabilia. If you have a chance to visit, it is really well worth seeing. I probably won’t get a blog post up next week. I will be going to Southern California to see my daughter Maggie in a show about Woody Guthrie at the Laguna Playhouse. And as long as I’m down there, I will attend a Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim game, adding one more park to my total. But I’ll be back the next week.

I did get caught up on some reading during my time away, and for adult books highly recommend SMALL MERCIES by Dennis LaHane and NICKLE BOYS by Colson Whitehead. I read others as well, but those are both standout books.

I have been really enjoying reading books by Rodman Philbrick. I love his name. It sounds like a made-up Hollywood name from the fifties. I do wonder if it’s his real name. Anyway, I recently read two more of his books — FREAK THE MIGHTY and THE BIG DARK. They couldn’t be more different, but both are excellent and worth reading. Both are also quite short, quick reads, so if you haven’t read them, you might want to give them a try. They will also be great for getting reluctant readers to be not so reluctant.

FREAK THE MIGHTY is not a new book. It’s been out for over 20 years, but is still being widely read and taught. With good reason. Max is a big guy, growing faster than kids his age should. People see him as dumb and slow. When Freak appears in Max’s life, things change for Max. Freak is tiny but smart as a whip and funny and brave. And this odd pair make each other better in so many ways. This is a captivating story of friendship, love, and loss that will hook every reader and leave them most satisfied.

When I was teaching, one of my favorite books to teach was ALAS BABYLON by Pat Frank. As I read THE BIG DARK, I was reminded of that book, and I wished I was back in the classroom and could introduce kids to THE BIG DARK. It would be fun to teach. Also, I have read often in the last few years that historically, the North and South Poles switch positions every so many hundreds of thousands of years, and that we are due for that to happen soon. I wonder how the earth will be affected by that. I think Philbrick must have been thinking of that as he wrote this book. No one seems to know what will happen, but maybe the story of THE BIG DARK is a possibility. It’s a survivor story (and if you have been reading my blog for a while, you know I love those) with themes of family, friendship, and community that make it a very compelling read. Charlie and his family, along with most of the people in their small town are out watching a spectacular show of Northern Lights when all of the power is suddenly gone. Not just the electricity, but all battery-run things, all cars, snowmobiles, anything with a motor quits and won’t restart. They are all stranded in the dead of winter. Luckily, most homes have either wood stoves or fireplaces, and many have well-stocked pantries and freezers, but Charlie’s mom is a diabetic, and she doesn’t have much medicine on hand. And one family in town comes bearing guns and threatening everyone. It’s a mess. But that makes for a really good story.

I have gently-read hardback copies of both these books to give to one of you. All you need to do is be a follower (it’s free and easy — see the top, right corner of the post) with a U. S. Address, and leave a comment. If you share the link to this post on social media, please let me know in your comment, and you will get extra chances. And please don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE.