English 12 Literary Nonfiction Reviews

Title of the Book: The Devil In The White City Author: Erik Larson Number of Pages: 390 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ Review:       America's First recorded serial killer and out Eiffeling Eiffel. This novel takes you back to the 1890s in Chicago, Illinois. Paris had just hosted the "Exposition Universelle" where the amazing Eiffel tower was revealed. Americans, unhappy with the attention France was getting, decided to do something about it. Erik tells the converging tales of the "World's Columbian Exposition" and a man sometimes called H. H. Holmes. It has all the facts, information, and quotes of a biography with all the flow, wonder, and suspence of a fiction piece.       While the lure may lie in the scandalous murders, a lot of the book focuses on the fair. From it's attention seeking beginnings, through its rocky construction, to its open and close. You find yourself rooting for all the men fighting tooth and nail, time, money, and weather to make their ma

Title of the Book: The Glass Castle Author: Jeanette Walls Number of Pages: 288 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ Review: This surprisingly true-story, book is told by Jeannette Walls. She tells her unbelievable life story in an amazing, thrilling way. Walls tells about her crazy life, between burning herself when making hot dogs by herself at 3 years old, to living almost “homeless” in the desert, saving enough money to run away and build her own life. Finally settling down in Welch, West Virginia, this was both a blessing and a curse. She felt a little more stable because she knew they weren’t going to pick up and leave again, but her father was drunk most of the time, so her time was spent taking care of her siblings. The author’s writing style is unique because she has flashback of the past and the present. The first memorable moment is the few chapter of the book. She tells about the story of her cooking hot dogs at the age of 3, by herself. She catches her dress on fire which lands

Title of the Book: Be Free  Author: Jackie Gronlund  Number of Pages: 183  Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆  Review: Be Free is the most inspirational book I have ever read. The book is written by a young woman named Jackie who talks about many of her hardest struggles and mistakes before being a Christian, along with her more recent problems during her walk in Christianity. Jackie goes from living a rebellious life of smoking weed, drinking, and living like a rockstar on a tour bus, to leaving everything she had behind and moving across the country to attend a bible school. Jackie talks deeply about how important it is to let yourself be known and not be ashamed of your past. The book starts off with Jackie getting ready to admit her darkest secret. It had been eating away at her, leaving her feeling diminished and depressed. She was afraid that by making her secret known, she would become unloved. After revealing her secret she talks about the aftermath. The vulnerability, pain, and the ultimate

Title of the Book: "Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania   Author: Erik Larson   Number of Pages: 448 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ Review: On 7 May 1915, German submarine U-20 torpedoed and sunk the Lusitania, a British ocean liner carrying 1,962 passengers. 1,198 passengers and crew members died, including 128 American citizens. This immense and tragic loss of American lives would eventually push president Woodrow Wilson to the breaking point and caused the U.S. to declare war on Germany two years later. Dead Wake, by Erik Larson, chronicles the lives of passengers, naval warfare efforts, and other events surrounding that fateful day, and weaves them together into an engaging and detailed narrative of one of the great naval tragedies of the 20th century. In late April 1915, numerous civilian and naval powers were at work, occupied with the ongoing war in Europe and the increased threat of unrestricted submarine warfare. Numerous Europe-bound passengers where rushing around the

Title of the Book: Angela's Ashes Author: Frank McCourt Number of Pages: 368 Rating: ☆☆☆☆ Review: There is a reason Angela’s Ashes has so won so many literary awards. When I first got this book I had no clue what I would be reading, and I wasn’t all too excited. Within the first few pages, I was hooked and I wanted to keep reading (which for me is rare). Angela’s Ashes is the story of a young Irish-American named Frank McCourt, born in the United States and the son of two Irish immigrants. His father is a drunk and can’t keep a job in the U.S., so they are forced to move back to Ireland. Frank McCourt recaps his childhood in Ireland, being starved and poor and barely making it by with any money. He and his younger siblings (which vary throughout the book due to several circumstances) do their best to survive with a father who disappears and a mother who is unable to support herself. This childhood story is intense and very much so a story worth telling. What is so u

Title of the Book: Into the Wild Author: Jon Krakauer Number of Pages: 203 Rating: ☆☆☆☆ Review: Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer will either leave you eager to run away into the wild to try something spontaneous, or dead set on simply staying inside with a good book to spark your imagination. The story opens up with a man named Jim Gallien picking up hitchhiker Alex (later revealed as Christopher McCandless) on his journey to Anchorage, Alaska. After leaving his family and friends behind without any notice at all, Christopher McCandless starts out on an expedition into the wilderness to live an adventurous life of exploration and solitude, but only survives four months in the wild before his body was discovered. Krakauer reaches out to several individuals who encountered McCandless on his journey, and follows the events that led up to his sudden death that left the people who knew him shocked. While the story of Christopher McCandless is quite intriguing itself, Krakauer’s pe

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah Have you ever felt that your life was an endless cycle of failure and that you were being held back by an impossible obstacle? I have and I am sure that many of my readers have as well. However, there is no such thing as an impossible obstacle. No obstacle in life is not able to be overcome. "A Long Way Gone" by Ishmael Beah is an entrancing and overall fantastic memoir of his childhood during the Seierra Leone civil war. This memoir is touching and really captures the things that haunted Ishmael Beah for many years after he finally escaped the gruesome civil war. Much like other memoirs, he brushes on harsh realities that are going on around the world. However, he makes his own story unique because of his incredible style of writing and his use of another language mixed in with English. This memoir is definitely a novel that should be taught in schools and required to read. The story starts off with Beah and his friends as children in

Title of the Book: Diary of Anne Frank Author: Anne Frank Number of Pages: 283 Rating: ☆☆☆☆ Review: It would be nice for someone to understand what it’s like to grow up. The sad truth is that some of us have to grow up faster than others. In the book Diary of Anne Frank , the uncensored truth of one teens tale of coming to terms with what it was like to have to be alive and navigate a broken world while figuring out who she was to be is still an influential novel today. The book starts off with Anne just turning thirteen and craving a real friend, so she turns to a diary she received for her birthday. Little does Anne know that her diary would go with her into hiding and often be one of her only forms of support while she and her family was locked in an annex during the holocaust. Anne confides everything in the diary, including everyday thoughts, stories that happen in the small living quarters, quarrels that transpire and small things that give her hope.   The Diary

Title of the Book: Wild  Author: Cheryl Strayed Number of Pages: 312 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆  4.5/5 Review: Can you imagine hiking 1,100 miles by yourself with no training of any sort?  Traveling for months through several different climates, all to find yourself after being lost and going through tragedy?  That's exactly what Cheryl Strayed did.  After her mother passed away, Strayed started distancing herself from all of her loved ones; she divorced her husband and started acting recklessly.  After divorcing her husband, Strayed decided to hike the Pacific Crest Trail to find herself again.  Knowing that the odds were not in her favor, she acknowledged her fears, managed to set them aside, and started her journey. On her adventure, Strayed met several people, learned several lessons, and developed a better understanding of herself.  Showing, that sometimes all you need to do, is step outside of your comfort zone, take in nature, and put one foot in front of the other.  This book is

Title of the Book: A Long Way Gone: Memoir of a boy soldier Author: Ishmael Beah Number of Pages: 218 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ Review:  Have you ever be so scared that you couldn't move even when it was the only thing that would keep you alive? That is the fear that Ishmael Beah felt and why his life change forever. The book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldiers focuses on the life as Beah as he grows up in the face of war. The book starts off with Beah at the age of 12 and his friends leaving their hometown for a show, which would end up getting attacked while they were away. The story then follows Beah and a group of boys trying to survive as they travel from village to village running away from war. As they run for their lives they are followed by death, war, and fear due to the distrust that has come over the land. Once they think they have finally found safety Beah realizes that they are soon going to be put back into the war. The story then follows his life as a soldier for

Title of the Book: Angela's Ashes   Author: Frank McCourt   Number of Pages: 235  Rating: ☆☆☆☆ Review:   Angela's Ashes unfolds the memoir of Frank McCourt's "miserable Irish Catholic" upbringing and family life during his childhood. This chronicle of McCourt's life includes tragedy and humor closely knit together which makes this book, in particular, praising and unique. The author includes vivid descriptions of his extremely poor life having an alcoholic lazy Father and a Mother that had seven children and then dealt with calamity at a young age. This book is also a coming of age story of how Frank managed to live through those frigid and tumultuous years. His relationships and his desire for learning are a few things that helped him get by each day. Although there are many other misery memoirs what makes this stand out is how McCourt never regretted those sad events and knew that those events molded him. While reading Angela's Ashes you will

Title of the Book: Into The Wild Author: Jon Krakauer Number of Pages: 203 Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ Review: Seldom does one find a non-fiction novel that captures the most intense human instincts and emotions that Into The Wild embraces. Jon Krakauer pieces together a masterpiece, recounting the adventure that was Chris McCandless’s life. The outdoors offer a fierce but breathtaking sanctuary for all living things. Chris McCandless was fed up with society, people, and social norms. He never bought into the ideas that most people desire: money, power, fame. He couldn’t watch the way people treated others in such poor ways, so he decided to leave it all behind. Embarking on a journey that takes him across the country, to Mexico, and finally… Alaska! Into the Wild is a rare novel that is able to connect with the reader at a very fundamental level, while giving them a glimpse of what life is life in the wild. Fantasy’s are written when authors feel nothing on earth, nothing real, ca

Title of the Book: Three Little Words Author: Ashley Rhodes-Courter Number of Pages: 297 Rating: ☆☆☆☆ Review: Ashley Rhodes was three years old the day she was taken from her mother. Her one year old brother was put into a different car and their lives changed completely. Though their paths crossed often, the siblings would go on two totally different journeys. Three Little Words is Ashley's account of her journey through the Florida foster care system. She must deal with the trauma of trying to let go of her past, while also building herself a future. All while in a constant struggle of trying to get back to her mother. By age 5 Ashley has realized she must hold onto the things that she can: a doll, a music box, an outfit here and there. She finds that those things quickly disappear with each new relocation, each new family. Until they don't anymore. Ashley spends 9 years in the system, enduring abuse, trauma, loss, and abandonment, before finally finding a forever