Welcome! It's #IMWAYR time again, when bloggers share what they have been reading and find out what others have been up to. Kathryn hosts the adult version of this meme at Book Date. Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee and Ricki at Unleashing Readers host the kidlit rendition. These are fabulous places to start your search for what to read next.
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5 stars |
A Hundred Billion Trillion Stars Seth Fishman & Isabel Greenberg (Illustrator) October 3, 2017
It is a book to help us (children and adults) grasp the enormity of large numbers. I say help, because really, how can anyone come close to making sense of a number like 100,000,000,000,000,000. Most of us can't really grasp 1,000,000,000.
I really appreciated that these massive numbers were written in words at the bottom of the pages where they were mentioned. My favourite page explains that the 10,000,000,000,000,000 ants that live on this planet weigh as much as the 7,500,000,000 people who they share it with.
This book makes connections that show how how important the ocean is to our lives, even if we live a long distance from it.
Did you know that seven out of every ten gulps of air you take contain oxygen created by ocean plants?
It's full of fascinating tidbits information about ocean creatures.
I especially appreciate the end of this book where it cycles back to us, revealing the many ways human actions affect the oceans.
Author's notes in the back matter expand on the information in the book.
They give the reader a glimpse of the world under the sea just off the coast of South Africa. It reveals a multitude of creatures who inhabit that realm.
While an octopus is shown, I expected a bit more about it. I think this is just because of the author and the text on the bottom of the cover.
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5 stars |
The Crane Husband by Kelly Barnhill February 28, 2023
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4 stars |
A Lethal Lesson by Iona Whishaw & Marilla Wex (Narrator) April 27, 2021 π
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4 stars |
Framed in Fire by Iona Whishaw & Marilla Wex (Narrator) April 26, 2022 π
I was enthralled by this story of two friends, Fabienne and Agnès, growing up a small community in France after the war. The two thirteen year old girls write a novel. (Fabienne tells the story while Agnès transcribes it.) They get the local postmaster to help them get it published, with Agnès presented as the author. Her life is changed because of this. Ultimately this book is about about how much one of them will sacrifice to improve the life of the other.
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4 stars |
The Woman All Spies Fear: Code Breaker Elizebeth Smith Friedman and Her Hidden Life by Amy Butler Greenfield October 19, 2021
Not only did I learn more about codes, I learned about the their use and abuses across the span of her life. It was fascinating to learn about how the different aspects of government interacted.
Elizebeth and her husband were both code breakers and makers. As is usual in these cases, it was he who garnered most of the credit while they were alive. Her life is remarkable given that she was a woman born 1892. Getting an education was no mean feat. Becoming one of the countries foremost code breakers of her time is an especially remarkable accomplishment.
I worried this would be harder to listen to, but Yeonmi Park is almost dispassionate about some of the horror she and her family experienced. By North Korean standards, her family, at least until after her father was arrested, were privileged. Following his incarceration for smuggling, things changed drastically.
Roll For the Initiative by Jaime Formato