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Up for Discussion: How I Became a Ghost
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From: Megan Schliesman <schliesman_at_education.wisc.edu>
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 2014 09:10:14 -0600
KT mentioned the voice of Isaac in her initial post, and several people have talked about the seamlessness of the spiritual beliefs being integrated into the story, as they are into the characters' lives, and these are two things I always mention when I booktalk this title. I also mention the pace, because like these other elements, it grabs on and doesn't let go.
FOr me, the voice and the spiritual elements are connected. The books opens with this amazing statement:
"I am a ghost. I am not a ghost when this book begins, so you have to pay very close attention."
And how can you not pay attention from that point on?
One of the thing about Isaac's voice is that it remains consistent , magnetic, stirring, from those opening lines. And to me this is connected to everything else in the story. Isaac himself remains consistent, magnetic, stirring, as strong of a presence after his death as before. He is also believable to me as a ten-year-old boy, one who is bearing witness to and enduring too much. But that voice makes what he is going through managable for readers--not easy, but managable, while the purity of his intentions, his desire not so much to be heroic as do what is right, and what only he can do, is something with which I think older children and young teens can connect--I think it speaks to the inner selves of so many kids.
Megan
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 2014 09:10:14 -0600
KT mentioned the voice of Isaac in her initial post, and several people have talked about the seamlessness of the spiritual beliefs being integrated into the story, as they are into the characters' lives, and these are two things I always mention when I booktalk this title. I also mention the pace, because like these other elements, it grabs on and doesn't let go.
FOr me, the voice and the spiritual elements are connected. The books opens with this amazing statement:
"I am a ghost. I am not a ghost when this book begins, so you have to pay very close attention."
And how can you not pay attention from that point on?
One of the thing about Isaac's voice is that it remains consistent , magnetic, stirring, from those opening lines. And to me this is connected to everything else in the story. Isaac himself remains consistent, magnetic, stirring, as strong of a presence after his death as before. He is also believable to me as a ten-year-old boy, one who is bearing witness to and enduring too much. But that voice makes what he is going through managable for readers--not easy, but managable, while the purity of his intentions, his desire not so much to be heroic as do what is right, and what only he can do, is something with which I think older children and young teens can connect--I think it speaks to the inner selves of so many kids.
Megan
--
Megan Schliesman, Librarian
Cooperative Children's Book Center
School of Education, University of Wisconsin-Madison
600 N. Park Street, Room 4290
Madison, WI 53706
608/262-9503
schliesman_at_education.wisc.edu
www.education.wisc.edu/ccbc/
My regular hours are T-F, 8-4:30.
---
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Received on Tue 18 Feb 2014 09:10:36 AM CST
