Will Bomb explode More Than This out of this competition or will the writing prowess of Patrick Ness smother the interesting historical book by Steve Sheinkin? I am struggling to choose a winner myself and was not organized enough to talk to other members of the group to get their opinion before writing this blog.
There is no doubt that Patrick Ness has an amazing command of written language and readers are kept off-balance throughout this story but not so off-balance that the momentum of the book is lost. However, in the end, I was not completely satisfied and if you asked me why I am not sure I could put it into words. Perhaps ambiguity is what Ness was hoping for and if that was the case then he was very successful.
I was fully prepared to not like Bomb. I generally do not love this style of book but I was pleasantly surprised. I found the research insightful and the story moved quickly - no ambiguity in the story line but still a sense of suspense and curiosity. I can envision this being used in a classroom but will students pick it up as an enjoyment read? With this question in mind, I have reached my decision and cast my vote for More Than This.
My Zombie pick is Wonder.
We wanted to create a way where we could read a few books, learn about many titles and have fun doing it! The tournament style reading of the Mighty Smackdown means that in the first round each participant reads two books, discusses both in a blog post, selecting one book to move on to the next round. Teachers are asked to commit to one round but most, if not all, continue on. We will read to the end when we will have only one book left standing!
Glad someone jumped on the Wonder bandwagon!
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