Friday, February 21, 2014
English IV: Quarter 3 Question 1! Due 2/26!
In what ways are the characters in your book realistic? Unrealistic? What is the author's primary means of character development (character's actions, character's words, narrator tells you/ physical description, what others say to or about the character, what others do to the character, etc.) In what ways are any of the characters like or dislike you? Explain!
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I’m reading Bloodlines by Richelle Mead. It tells the story of Sydney Sage, an Alchemist (the group of humans who protect the human race from knowing about vampires) in charge of keeping the Moroi queen’s sister, Jill Dragomir, safe from protestors trying to assassinate her; Jill’s death would result in the queen losing her title because of an ancient law stating each queen must have at least on family member alive. The characters in this book have some realistic and some unrealistic traits. In many ways, the main characters represent high schoolers; there’s the smart and motherly person (Sydney), the shy, nervous, and socially awkward person (Jill), and the person who uses outlets such as drinking to escape their feelings (Adrian). Sydney is the most realistic character, partly because she is the only human among the main characters. Sydney is an example of the nerd and rule-follower; she does what she’s told even when the requests are odd, such as going off campus to get coffee or using an ancient spell book to make an amulet for “research”. Sydney’s personality is realistic, but the rest of her life is not as realistic. Because she is an Alchemist, she has a large, golden flower tattoo on her face that has vampire blood in it to keep her free of diseases and to keep her from telling humans about the existence of vampires; I don’t know about your experiences, but this does not seem very realistic to me. Jill is one of the other main characters. Jill is fifteen, while the others are are seventeen or older, so she is portrayed as the young girl who does not really know very much about high school, relationships, and the world. Jill’s character is very realistic in that way, but the unrealistic is also evident because she is a Moroi vampire (a breed of living vampires). Other than being a Moroi, her character is not as realistic because she died and was brought back by Adrian, which created a bond between the two that allows Jill to feel his emotions and even see what he sees; again, this does not seem very realistic. Adrian is also a Moroi vampire, making him unrealistic. Along with being a Moroi, he is also one of the few spirit users in the world; being a spirit user, he is able to bring things back from the dead (like he did with Jill), heal things, and invade other people’s dreams. Aside from Adrian’s unrealistic characteristics, he is also a normal teenager who is trying to cope with a broken heart. After the break-up, Adrian constantly drank to try to forget about his broken heart instead of trying to talk to someone and deal with it in a better way; a lot of people deal with their problems this way, which is not really a good thing, but it makes Adrian seem more realistic. Most of the character development is shown through conversations between characters and characters’ actions. Because the story is told from Sydney’s point-of-view, we see everything she sees and we hear all of her thoughts. Her conversations with other characters and her observations of how they react to the conversations and other situations are our only means of learning more information about the other characters. I’d say I am like Sydney and Jill in certain aspects. I’m somewhat like Jill because she’s really shy and socially awkward and those are two words that perfectly describe me. She doesn’t really understand how to act in certain situations and she sometimes seems kind of clueless; again, I’m just like that. I’m similar to Sydney because we are both rule-followers and we both try to do things perfectly all of the time. She’s very focused on her education and homework, and she always has all of her things done in a timely manner, which I also do.
I'm reading The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes. There are a lot of characters in the book, and they are all very realistic except for the omniscient narrator who is a ghost. We don't know who the ghost is or what they are seeking, but they visit a Dublin town house and float around to the different floors and their tenants. On the top floor is Katie. Katie works in the music business and is on the verge of losing her job. On the next floor, Lydia drives Andrei and Jan crazy with her idiosyncrasies and peculiar demands. On the outside, Lydia is an attractive woman who is brash and odd. The ghost, though, sees into her thoughts and finds that she is a very tender soul who feels very insecure and sad. Andrei and Jan are both homesick for their native countries and suffer greatly under Lydia's apparent tyranny. Jemima is an elderly woman who lives on the second floor with her giant dog, Grudge. Jemima is the only one who can truly sense the ghost's presence, but we don't know much about her yet, except that she loves a young man named Fionn. On the first floor, Matt and Maeve live a fairy tale life, wrapped up in their love for each other. The author uses a completely omniscient narrator to reveal most everything about her characters. Their thoughts, actions, dialogue, and appearances are referenced from time to time, but most of the character development occurs through the ghost unearthing their many memories. I haven't really found a character that I identify with yet, because I only just started this book, and the characters are still in the extremely early stages of development.
So I've been reading the "A Song of Ice and Fire series, which, as you may have heard, has a lot of characters. Let's begin with everyone's favorite family, the Starks. Eddard stark, the head of the family. Eddard, or "Ned," is a very simple man. He was never meant to lead his family, but his older brother and his father were killed in the rebellion, forcing him to take charge. He is a very skilled leader, and was able to help turn the tide against the Targaryen ruling family. Because he was not the first born, he is much more down to earth than other lords, even sitting with the servants during meals. However, he does have his faults. He's a terrible politician, not being able to manipulate other men into doing his bidding. His very strict code of honor prevents him from getting much done at all when it comes to royalty, which leads to several very bad events. Rob is his firstborn son, and tries to be very much like his father. He also has a misguided sense of honor, and has made decisions because of that that weakened his ability to do what he wished. The mother, Catelyn stark, comes from the riverlands to the south, and is not used to the Stark ways. She does try her best, however, and has a very strong sense of family. The 2 daughters of the family are Sansa and Arya, and are very much opposites. Sansa is your generic princess-y girl, who enjoys knitting, boys, and lemon cakes. Several events in the story come to pass that change her worldview for the better, but they aren't pretty. Arya, meanwhile, is much more adventurous, and often gets into trouble because of it. She even convinced her father to let her learn sword-fighting. Ned has 3 other boys as well. There's Rickon, who is very young, and acts like it (No readers like him, he's an annoying brat). There's also bran, who enjoys climbing, and hopes to one day be a knight. he has a very strong affinity with his pet direwolf, and this comes into play later. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, each stark child has a pet direwolf, which is like a regular wolf, but they get massive as they grow older (Bigger than a cow). The final, but perhaps the most important, is the bastard child Jon Snow. He was brought back with Ned after the war, who refused to say who the mother was. He was too honorable to let baby Jon fend for himself, and Catelyn, unsurprisingly, never warmed up to the boy.
The royal families of kings landing are also quite prominent. The King's family is the Baratheons, 3 brothers who are quite different from each other. The firstborn is King Robert, a great warrior who led the rebellion against the previous ruling family. He has gotten rather out of shape in rule, and is quick to anger. Some think, and rightly so, that he would make a better knight than king, and his fondness for festivals, while earning him the love of the people, has put the crown several thousand coins in debt to the Lannisters, the Queen's family. Roberts brothers are Renly and Stannis, who are as opposite as they come. Renly is the youngest, and a fantastic politician, but he isn't the best warrior, and often dissapears for suspicious amounts of time with a certain Tyrell knight. Stannis is the middle child, with a colder personality than the frigid north. Both brothers serve on the kings council, along with Varys, the master of whispers, Petyr Baelish, the master of coin, Grand Maester Pycelle, and the Hand of the King, which is a position that often changes hands.
On the queen's side of the family, you have the Lannisters, the 3rd great house involved against the Targaryens. The queen, Cersei, was hoping to be married to the prince Rheagar Targaryen, before the rebellion came along and got him killed. She was instead married off to Robert, to seal a pact between houses. She does not like Robert at all, however, and much prefers the company of her brother, Jaime (they have incest based relations). Jaime is a member of the kingsguard, a group of 7 knights, garbed in white, that swear to defend the king to their dying breath. The odd thing is, he was the previous king's guard, and actually killed the madman when the city fell under siege. The Lannisters betrayed their king, to whom they had sworn themselves to, and let the Stark and Baratheon armies into kings landing. jaime still serves as a member of the kingsguard to the new king, but he now has the title of kingslayer, and no one thinks him a knight in shining armor. Their brother is a dwarf named Tyrion, and not the "Oh boy oh boy do I love mining, booze, and beards" kind. His mother died giving birth to him, and his father never forgave him for that. Tyrion is treated as a shameful blemish on house Lannister, all because of his birth. He does, however, had a good relationship with his brother, barring one incident with the dwarf's former wife, which was set up by his father. Their father is a cold man named Tywin, who is a brilliant tactician, and a ruthless lord. The Lannisters are the richest of the great houses, their home having many natural gold deposits. Cersei has 3 children, a girl and 2 boys. Her firstborn, Joffrey, is a massive massive jerk, and heir to the throne should anything happen to the king. He has a bodyguard with a burnt face named Sandor Cleglane, although many refer to him as "The Hound." Joffrey's little brother is named Tommen, and is a toddler. Their sister is named mycrella, and all 3 have blond hair, like the Lannisters. this is rather odd, as most documented Lannister-Baratheon children in the past have brown hair, like the Baratheons. Hrm, how interesting...
Anyways, those are the 3 major ruling families. I could go on about the Targaryens, the Martells, the Tyrells, the Wildings, the Greyjoys, R'hllor and his priests, the free cities, the Dothraki, the White Walkers, the Others, the Night's Watch, the 13, or even the dragons, but, I'm getting tired of writing this, and I don't want to work on this all day.
I'm reading Take A Chance by Abbi Glines. This book is part of the Rosemary Beach series and tells the story of Grant and Harlow. Grant Carter is a very realistic character is very privilege in the upper class but his childhood growing makes him have some insecurities like every person has about themselves. Harlow Manning is some what of a realistic character she is the daughter of a famous rock star who has never had very many friends supposedly because of who her father is but I think their is something more about it than that and we just do not know it yet in the book. Even though Harlow had a famous rock star father she grew up in small town with her grandmother because her father couldn't take care of her because he was always on tour and her mother '"died" in a car accident. I think I mostly relate to Harlow because show grew in a very stable home and is kind of quite and shy but can be very loud when needed.
I am reading the book Picture Perfect, by Jodi Picoult. The characters in this book are realistic. It starts out with a women (Jane Doe) who wakes up in a grave yard and does not remember where she is or who she is. THis is a little weird but what she does is pretty realistic. She tries to walk and figure out what she is but gets really light headed and goes back and lays down. Later it talks about a man (Will), who has just moved to a new city in California. He is just a normal guy trying to find his way around the city. At one point he gets stopped by two policemen who try an arrest him because they think that he is up to something. Will though is going to become a cop too and starts on the job the next day. The cops agree to let him go. Will keeps driving and comes upon this women sitting on the curb of the street right outside of the cemetery. He stops and gets out to see what is going on and is surprised at what this women did. She walked up to him and felt the dried blood that she had on her head, (she did not know why it was there). When she got to Will she reached up and touched right above his eye where there was a bump from where the cops had slammed his head on his car. Then she fell to the ground because she was out of her mind and was very tired. Will picked her up and put her into his truck and waited there until the women woke up which seems pretty realistic if you are a nice gentlemen. The characters are not fully developed yet but the author has a couple ways of developing the characters. For the women we go by what the author says about her and how she describes her. For Will on the other hand the author tells us a little bit about how he looks and what he does but the women so far when she is conscious has explained a little bit of the character to us. There has only been on thing that has not been described by the author about the women, this time the men describe just a little bit about the women. He says, "he had never felt anything like it: a touch more quiet than a breath." I haven't learned a whole lot about each character but I would have done what Will did when he stayed there with the women until she woke to make that everything was ok. I would not want anything to happen to the women if he was not all the way with it. I have not seen enough about the women to see if she is anything like me. She hasn't been conscious long enough to actually see what she is like.
I'm reading a book called The 5th Wave, where aliens have killed most of the people on the planet. The characters are pretty realistic for the most part. I think they tend to over or under react to a lot of the situations though. They also put this like five year old kid through like military training and that didn't make sense at all. I don't know what the author was doing there, but I don't know anyone in real life who would do that to a five year old or a five year old who would deal with it as well as this kid did, so that was pretty unrealistic. The author mostly uses character's actions to develop the main character because she's by herself for most of the beginning, so there's no one for her to interact with. The main character is nothing like me, she over thinks everything, but she's kind of weird.
The characters in my book switch around a lot because it is a bunch of short stories in one book. But the characters are mostly all unrealistic, because they are horror stories and the characters do a lot of things that are not actually possible. It is kind of hard to compare the characters in the book to myself, when most the characters are vampires, werewolves, skeletons, and ghosts. The book is really good though and the fictional characters make the book very interesting to read.
In my book, Emperor of Thorns, the characters are all realistic in their own way. As realistic as characters in a medieval fantasy novel can be. The main character, Jorg Ancrath, has just turned eighteen years old, and has successfully conquered not one, but two kingdoms, and entirely eradicated another. His final goal is to unite the 100 Kingdoms, as their Emperor, and end the current war that engulfs the world. Jorg, asa character, is realistic given his situation. He is a cunning, strong, and great leader, and treats his men with respect, once they earn it. From being thrown in a thorn bush, forced to watch as his younger brother and mother were murdered, being abused by his father, accidentally killing his love interest, and also accidentally killing his baby step-brother, his wanting to bring the conflict to an end through whatever violent means necessary is rather realistic. As for how he may be like me, well, I like to think I am a good leader when it comes to it, and that I am able to do what is necessary to protect my aspirations to become Emperor of the world.
Mrs. Gulley is Awesome.
my book is realistic becuase it has things that could really happen and things that could potentially be real with the events that happen
I am reading a book called gentlemen and the characters in the book are very realistic because they act like normal high school kids dont want to be at school like to goof around and all that good stuff. And one of the character Bones is like me because he does not like many people he is skinny and fearless and will speak his mind and when another person messes with him or his friends he has their back no matter what and anyone who messes with him the learn not to mess with him again. The main group of kids that the book focuses on is like me and my friends we do not take people being mean to us and we like to goof around with each other and we will defend our selves if we have too and the characters stand up for themselves when they need too.
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