THE STORM IN THE BARN

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Phelan, Matt  (2009).  THE STORM IN THE BARN.  Massachusetts: Candlewick.  ISBN: 0763636185.

PLOT SUMMARY

Jack is an eleven-year-old boy living in Kansas in the 1930s during the dust bowl.  His small town is desperate for rain and his family is suffering their own plight as his older sister fights for her life due to the damage done to her lungs by the dust. Jack wants to help in any way he can, but his dad makes him feel worthless everytime he tries.  To add to his troubles Jack is being bullied by older boys.  One day as he tries to escape the bullies he hides out in an abandoned barn.  In the barn he sees a suspicious puddle and decides to investigate.  He comes face to face with a mysterious figure thats face looks like rain.  Jack has to find a way to release this monster and bring life back to his town and his family.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

The Storm in the Barn is a crative mix of historical fiction, fantasy, and graphic novel.  It is an excellent choice for those readers turned off by history.  The story contains very few carefully chosen words so much of the excitement is in the pictures within the comic book like frames.  Phelan uses color (and the lack of) to truly capture the setting and mood in each scene.  Much of the book is in washed out yellow and brown tones that reflect the dreary covering of dust that envelopes the town.  However, he also uses dark blues and gray to illustrate the frightening rain monster that Jack discovers in the abandoned shed.  Red is used to show the bloodbath created when the men of the town gather up all of the jack rabbits and massacre them to protect their remaining crops. 

Phelan does an excellent job of conveying the desperation and hopelessness felt by those suffering from the effects of the dust bowl.  He creates a hero in young Jack when he is able to restore the rain monster to the sky and breath hope back into the land.

REVIEW EXERPTS

School Library Journal (September 01, 2009)- “A complex but accessible and fascinating book.”

Publishers Weekly (August 17, 2009)- “The big novelty here is the Dust Bowl setting, and Phelan's art emphasizes the swirling, billowing clouds of fine grit that obscure even nearby objects.”

Booklist (August 01, 2009)- “Phelan turns every panel of this little masterpiece into a spare and melancholy window into another era, capturing an unmistakable sense of time and place…”

CONNECTIONS

• Have students write a short story using comic strips.
• Read other books set during the Dust Bowl such as Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse.
• Have students view pictures and videos about the Dust Bowl http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe30s/water_02.html

WATER STREET

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Giff, Patricia, Reilly.  (2006). WATER STREET.  New York: Yearling.  ISBN:  0440419212.

PLOT SUMMARY

It is 1875 on Water Street in Brooklyn New York.  The whole city is mesmerized by the towers that will soon be the bridge connecting them to Manhattan.  Bird Mallon is a daughter of Irish immigrants who always thought she wanted to be a healer like her mother until witnessing the effects of a tragic accident left her unsure.  As she struggles to decide her destiny she finds an unlikely friend in Thomas Neary, the boy that has moved into the apartment above hers.  With his mother gone and his father stumbling in drunk each night, Thomas longs to be a member of the Mallon family.  Together Bird and Thomas spend their 8^th grade year trying to help Bird’s sister, Ann, find a more meaningful job and save Bird’s brother, Hughie, from a life of fighting and gangs.  Through it all, Thomas and Bird develop a deep friendship and Bird discovers the path she is meant to take.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

Giff tells this historical story by alternating between the perspectives and Bird and Thomas.  Thomas is a gentle character that appreciates everything the Mallon does for him.  His relationship with Bird develops slowly, but she soon realizes that he is her friend and not just a pest trying to weasel his way into her family.  Giff creates a flawless setting during the late 1800s in Brooklyn describing the building of the bridge and those whose lives were lost below it, and the drive of the immigrant workers striving to provide a better life for their family in their new country.  Bird’s parents have the same hope for her as they turn over their farm savings to provide her the opportunity to attend high school.  Giff has written an endearing coming of age story that showcases a beautiful friendship and loving family.

REVIEW EXERPTS

School Library Journal (September 01, 2006)- “Giff masterfully integrates the historical material and presents a vivid picture of the immigrant struggle in the 1870s.”

Booklist (August 01, 2006)- “A poignant immigration story of friendship, work, and the meaning of home.”

CONNECTIONS

• Pair with Brooklyn Bridge by Karen Hesse, a novel about Russian-Jewish immigrants in the early 1900s.
• Have students research the casualties of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge.
• Have students write a letter to Thomas from Bird or a letter to Bird from Thomas.

WEDNESDAY WARS

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Schmidt, Gary D.  (2007).  THE WEDNESDAY WARS.  New York: Scholastic, Inc.  ISBN:  054723760X.

PLOT SUMMARY

The year is 1967 and Holling Hoodhood is convinced his 7^th grade English teacher, Mrs. Baker, hates him. To make things worse, he is stuck by himself with her every Wednesday afternoon while the rest of his classmates go to Hebrew school or Catholic mass.  At first Mrs. Baker has Holling doing menial tasks to pass the time, but she decides to make the best of their time together by introducing him to Shakespeare.  Holling is now sure that she hates him.  Why else would she submit him to this torture?  But it turns out Shakespeare is not so bad, and in fact Holling learns some life lessons from the classical writer. 

As he is reading Shakespeare at Camillo Junior High, a war is raging in Vietnam.  Holling is contstantly reminded of this as his father and sister fight about politics over the dinner table. Throughout the school year his relationship with Mrs. Baker improves and she helps him overcome some 7^th grade obstacles like making the cross country team and deciding where to take his crush on Valentines Day.  In the end Holling realizes Mrs. Baker has also helped him to form his own views on the world around him, and come out from under his father’s shadow.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

Holling Hoodhood is the kind of character a reader can’t help but love.  His series of misfortunes are so far fetched, but he always approaches each one with humor and optimism.  Seventh grade at Camillo Junior High can sometimes be turbulent like when an eighth grader post pictures of Holling wearing tights with feathers from his Shakespeaere debut.  However Mrs. Baker is a strong pillar  that Holling soon learns he can rely on.  She is a strong willed teacher that has been an Olympic runner, loves Shakespeare, and has a love and respect for others. 

 As the war is waging in Veitnam much of the school, including Mrs. Baker, are worried about loved ones overseas.  Holling’s sister, Heather, is a self-proclaimed flower child and often defies her father as she tries to make him understand the instability the war is causing.  As Holling witnesses these disagreements at home he is beginning to question his own views on life and whether he truly wants to be the next Hoodhood of the family architectural firm, Hoodhood and Assoc. Holling begins to realize that Shakekspeare may have been teaching him some life lessons after all as he slowly evolves into a free-thinking, caring individual. Schmidt creates an entertaining story as Holling tries to decide what he stand for that is a perfect parallel to the Vietnam War as our nation tries to make the same decision.

REVIEW EXERPTS

School Library Journal (July 01, 2007)- “[Readers] will appreciate Holling's gentle, caring ways and will be sad to have the book end.”

Booklist (June 01, 2007) starred review-  “Schmidt, whose Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy (2005) was named both a Printz and a Newbery Honor Book, makes the implausible believable and the everyday momentous. Seamlessly, he knits together the story's themes: the cultural uproar of the '60s, the internal uproar of early adolescence, and the timeless wisdom of Shakespeare's words.”

Publishers Weekly (April 16, 2007)- “Schmidt delivers another winner here, convincingly evoking 1960s Long Island, with Walter Cronkite's nightly updates about Vietnam as the soundtrack.”

CONNECTIONS

• Let students watch footage of newscast from the Vietnam War 
• Read some of the same plays written by Shakespeare as Holling did.  If teaching younger children use the Shakespeare Can be Fun series by Lois Burdett
• Have a 60s dress up day and eat cream puffs!