“The Fruit Bowl Project” by Sarah Durkee

“The Fruit Bowl Project” by Sarah Durkee is an unusual book about a class writing project motivated by a famous rock star.

When the kids in Ms. Vallis’ eighth grade writer’s workshop learn that rock superstar Nick Thompson is come to speak with them they are thrilled. Suddenly writing seems a lot more exciting.

When the day finally comes and Nick Thompson actually walks in the classroom door it seems too good to be true. Of course the kids have a lot of questions about Nick’s music career and other subjects, and Nick answers them. But then he guides the kids back to the subject at hand: writing.

According to Nick Thompson the songs he writes are like a bowl of fruit. Just like a million artists could all paint that bowl of fruit from a different perspective, even a simple subject can be covered in an infinite number of ways through the power of writing.

Nick challenges the class to write a story in any style that they want. The plot is simple: a boy drops his pencil while taking a test in school. As he picks up the pencil he bumps a girl’s arm and the girl is very angry at him because he joggled her arm. The girl accuses the boy of dropping his pencil so that he could bend over and cheat by looking at her test. Later that day the boy tells his friend a joke that is so funny it makes him spew milk out of his nose all over his lunch. Both boys throw away their lunches.

The plot seems boring and totally simple. The children are incredulous. Is this the best that Nick Thompson can come up with? But then Nick Thompson tells them the point of the project. You can make any subject interesting. You just have to choose a unique perspective, just like the artists that are all painting an image of the same bowl of fruit but from different angles.

So the children of Ms. Vallis’ class embark on the Fruit Bowl Project, a project that will have exciting and fantastic results.

I really enjoyed “The Fruit Bowl Project” by Sarah Durkee. The book’s introduction is fairly short. Readers don’t get much of a chance to meet and bond with the characters. However, in the large view the point of “The Fruit Bowl Project” is not the characters, the students who will be the writers. Rather the focus is on their written work.

More than half of “The Fruit Bowl Project” is devoted to the finished product: a volume of forty-nine different pieces written about the same event. Among the eclectic results are raps, poems, sonnets, monologues, screen plays and musicals, newspaper articles, fairy tales, interviews, cross-examinations and horror stories.

Sarah Durkee must have had fun writing “The Fruit Bowl Project” and it comes through in her writing. The idea of portraying one simple event in so many different ways is simply genius and very inspiring as well.

I highly recommend that all young readers or aspiring writers experience “The Fruit Bowl Project” by Sarah Durkee.

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“Hard Hit,” by Ann Turner

“Hard Hit,” by Ann Turner is a brief poetic exploration about a boy who loses his father to cancer.

Throughout “Hard Hit” Ann Turner writes in a rather distinctive style. Almost all her sentences are written on the right hand pages in lines that are four or less words long. Only in a few places does she use the left hand pages, and only to make certain key phrases stand out.

The main character is young Mark Warren. Compared with many other children, Mark Warren has a great life. He's a star pitcher for his high school baseball team, he has a great family with two parents, and Diane, the pretty girl in his class, seems to be on her way to becoming his girlfriend.

But then Mark's father is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. This news completely changes the focus of Mark's life. Mark is willing to try anything, praying to God, even not fighting with his sister, if only his father will survive.

Then Mark decides that if he can pitch a no-hitter baseball game for his father than his father will get well. Mark works out his frustrations by practicing pitching all day while Diane and Mark's best friend Eddie help him fine tune his skills.

Mark works hard to pitch a no-hitter game but he can't seem to do it. For a while it seems that he won't have to. The chemotherapy that has been making his father so sick seems to have done the trick. CAT scans show that the tumor has shrunk and Mark's father regains some of his energy.

But then Mark's father has a relapse and the cancer returns, worse then ever. Mark is more determined than ever to pitch a no-hitter for his father, but will it make any difference in the end?

“Hard Hit” is a very touching book, even if its style is a little bit sparse. However, Ann Turner's words are honest and pure and their style is sure to appeal to anyone suffering from the loss of a close relative. “Hard Hit” is obviously designed specifically for that purpose, with addresses and contact information in the back for such organization as The National Center for Grieving Children and Families, and The American Cancer Society.

“Hard Hit” is a beautifully written book that many young readers can benefit greatly from.

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“Immersed in Verse,” by Allan Wolf

“Immersed in Verse,” by Allan Wolf is “an informative, slightly irreverent, and totally tremendous guide to living the poet's life.”

I enjoyed “Immersed in Verse.” This guide book takes the reader through all aspects of the poet's life. From the very start Allan Wolf establishes his humorous but still informative style with the “Stereotype Poet's Hall of Fame.” The seven main types of poets: classic poet, beat poet, angry poet, gothic poet, secret poet, hip-hop poet, and professor poet, made me laugh, but at the same time Wolf accurately conveys a broad scale picture of the poetry genre using this succinct device. After introducing the main types of poets, “Immersed in Verse” progresses to the different types of poetry. Twenty examples show the broad palette of subject matter and style that the poet can work with.

After introducing poets and poetry Allan Wolf starts on advice for new poets. He lists beneficial habits of highly successful poets and tools of the trade. After that he begins analyzing the anatomy of a poem. It is in this section that I found the single best feature of “Immersed in Verse”: the poem “Where I'm From” by George Ella Lyon. This amazing poem opened up a whole new area of inspiration in my mind.

Most of the things that Allan Wolf covers in “Immersed in Verse” are very simple ideas that I have already figured out over my own years of poetry experience. However, the book does contain a few amazing jewels that I had never thought of. For example page 72 highlights “Found Poems,” including one wonderful poem that Wolf himself created from a piece of a love letter that he found on the sidewalk outside of a middle school. The left and right sides of the letter were missing. Just the heart of it remained, but you can still tell the general drift of the letter. This idea struck me as very innovative with many applications. Wolf also discusses collaborative poems, including the “Exquisite Corpse Poem,” in which a group of people build a poem while knowing very little about what the other collaborators wrote. This technique creates a very “stream of consciousness” effect that captures the mood and minds of the group that created it.

I think that “Immersed in Verse,” by Allan Wolf is an excellent introduction to the poetry life. This book is suitable both for complete newbies with no experience writing poetry and seasoned poets in need of fresh inspiration. I recommend “Immersed in Verse” to all young people interested in poetry.

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