Is My Dog a Wolf? How Your Pet Compares to Its Wild Cousin

I checked this book out after a neighbor of mine called and said "I have your wolf." My dog had gone off with another neighbor's dog to play and ended up at this neighbor's house. Granted, my dog is a husky and therefore resembles a wolf, but I thought it was hilarious that I recieved a phone call with someone telling me that they had my wolf.

This book, Is My Dog a Wolf?, is a great informational book for kids. I found it very accessible to even struggling readers. The language is conversational in style, and so it reads smoothly. Each section is only two pages long – on facing pages, so the child can see it all at once and not have to move back and forth. Each section has a large, bright, bold heading in unique fonts to draw attention to it. A child could easily flip through the book to get to the information he/she is looking for.

The photographs in the book are fantastic. The colors are vivid and bright. There are close up shots and distant shots. Each photograph captures the emotion of the animal. There are several great shots of dogs and wolves interacting in playful fighting. When the author explains the posture of frightened, scared, happy, worried, and submissive dogs, there are photos to match each description.

Each photo is important to the section being discussed – you don’t have to wonder why a photo was placed on a certain place. The language of the captions is also simple and conversational.

The author includes one of Aesop’s fables: A Dog & Wolf Fable. This incorporates fiction with nonfiction and allows a struggling reader more opportunity to understand the concept of the difference between wolves and dogs.

Long Night Moon

I really enjoyed this book! I really enjoyed the illustrations by Mark Siegel. Even though each page is dark and of the night (I'm afraid of the dark!), they were comforting illustrations. The moon shone so brightly and warmly, that even in the cold months you could sense its warmth. I think this book is a great way to get children to appreciate nighttime and not be so scared of being outside in the dark.

I've always been scared of the dark - but it wasn't that bad until I moved from the suburbs out into the country. My nearest neighbor is 1/2 mile down the street. So, at night, when I go outside it is dark, like I never knew dark could be! I can't imagine what that kind of darkness is for a child. In this book, the moon plays an important role in lighting the world for all the creatures - the young girl to the raccoon. Even though we don't always have full moons, I think this book would bring comfort to all children who are afraid of the nighttime. Just knowing that the moon is your friend and is up there for you.

I Had Seen Castles - Rylant

I have always enjoyed historical fiction because it brings to life the people of events. I love getting into the inner thoughts of characters who are going through what I so dryly learned about in a textbook.

I Had Seen Castles is a short but intense story about a 17 year old boy after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He feels anger at the bombing of his own country and cannot wait for his 18th birthday so he can enlist. This is ironic because just before the bombing he and his friends had joked about running away into the forest to avoid the draft. But the bombing on Pearl Harbor changed all that.

The scene in which John retells the moment he heard about the bombing, brought to mind the moment I heard about the planes being flown into the Twin Towers. What an awful day. I was sitting in my first education course at LU, and the secretary of the education department walked in crying and asked to speak to our professor. The professor came in and told us to go back to our dorm rooms, turn on the T.V., and call our parents. He did not say what had happened, but we all turned white. Nausea rolled through me. We rushed back to our rooms and watched the horrible footage. While I read the scene in which John talks about the radio broadcast, the same sickness I felt on 9-11-01, I felt again thinking about Pearl Harbor.

I remember feeling the same anger and wanting war. Before 9-11, I had never been a person to want to fight. But I was angry and I wanted revenge. So, I understood John’s response. However, war is so different now. I watch the movies depicting war prior to our technical advancement and cannot believe the amount of lives lost in battle. So, I can understand Ginny’s objections to the war. So much loss; so much devastation. I know we still have loss and devastation today, but nothing like it was during WWII. I cannot imagine.

When John and Ginny argue about his registering for the war, John cannot put into words why he wants to join. He cannot seem to tell her that he wants to fight simply because he does not want to be a coward. He has heard about the death of his friend, and has come to realize, even though he does not admit it to himself, that this war is dangerous and that he may not come back from it. But as he and Ginny argue, he asserts that if living a life in this country is so important, then he must go fight and risk his life because everyone’s life in this country is at risk. Freedom is at risk.

The focus of the book is on the progression of John as a boy/man throughout the war experience. The events in the book are told bluntly and without any ‘fluff.’ John remembers the boy in Europe that was crying for his mom while he was walking around looking for his arms. I cannot imagine! Looking for your own arms! The horror. These descriptions make the reader understand how he says he was no longer a boy, but a ghost who did what the war demanded of him.

There are other stories going along with John’s story. Like the story of Emily, John’s sister. She feels pity for the boys who are going off to war and are so hungry to feel alive before they face their death. She ends up becoming officially engaged to two young men, and pregnant with a third’s baby. This baby, at first a shame for the family, ends up being a gift to the family. The baby takes her home in the nursery of Emily and John’s sibling who died when he (or she?) was only 2 months old. Emily has brought life back to the nursery and fills it with mischief and laughter. Emily is even respected as a war widow (even though she and the boy were never married). The boy died before his 20th birthday leaving behind a child he had never seen.

The ending of this book is not happy, but rather melancholy. John cannot bring himself to live in America, because he has suffered, and America has not. America cannot understand the changes he has undergone, cannot understand the misery he has lived through. I feel this must be true for all our veterans. What must life be like for them to come back to a country that seems to have not changed after they have seen so much horror? John cannot come back, even though his parents love him and he loves them. He cannot come back even though he loves Ginny and wants to be with her. He must stay away. He will always remember Ginny, because it was Ginny who saved his life. She told him he would live to be an old man, and it was those words that kept him going in his darkest days. And now, at the end of the book, he wants Ginny to know that he has lived to be an old man, and that he still loves her.