Beka Cooper - Terrier

Terrier is the first book in the Beka Cooper series by Tamora Pierce. Tamora Pierce is my favorite author now. I still like Garth Nix’s writings, but I like Pierce’s even more. Terrier is her most recent book, and the sequel, Bloodhound, will be coming out in 2009. Some other series and books by Tamora Pierce are The Song of the Lioness Quartet, The Immortals Quartet, The Protector of the Small Quartet, Trickster’s Choice and its sequel, Trickster’s Queen. I have read them all at least twice. All of these books are interconnected and all are set in the realm of Tortall and neighboring countries. Pierce also has two series not set in Tortall, (but in a place quite similar) The Circle of Magic Quartet and The Circle Opens Quartet. These two series are also intertwined.

Beka Cooper is a girl who grew up in the Lower City, one of the eight districts of Corus, the capital of Tortall. The Lower City is the poorest part of town, and filled with pickpockets and murderers. When Beka turns in a troublesome gang to My Lord Provost, he takes a liking to her. Soon Beka finds herself moving from the Lower City to the Provost’s house in Patten district, along with her single mother, two brothers, and two sisters.

When Beka joins the Provost’s Guard, a police force commonly known as the Dogs, her sisters turn up their noses and sneer. They are training to be maids and seamstresses for nobility, and don’t understand why Beka would want to run around chasing Rats, the term for lawbreakers.

But Beka still counts herself as one of the Lower City folk, and will stop at nothing to protect them. When rumors of kidnappings and murders for money reach her ears, as an eager Puppy, or trainee, she’s on the scent. With the help of unhappy spirits and miniature tornados, Beka is determined to let nothing slip through her fingers. I would recommend this book to anyone middle school and up who would like an exciting read. Now I have to wait for the next book in the series…

Gone With the Wind

I have met my match.

I was walking through the rows of books in the school library the other day, asking myself the immortal question one asks themselves in libraries – “Oh what shall I read now?” I swept my eyes over the neatly stacked volumes, but no titles or covers caught my eye. Then I spotted a book with a washed out cover that might have been yellow decades ago, and big, faded yet bold print proclaiming the title to be Gone With the Wind. Hmm. The eighth graders were reading that, right? Hmm….
And so, for the next WEEK AND A HALF I read. And read. And read some more. By the time I reached page 837, I was a wee bit irritated. Most books, I’ll read them in under a week, tops. Usually they take about 2 days. But this book…
Don’t get me wrong. It was an excellent book. It’s just that 1037 pages tend to take a while to read. For an impatient gal like me, waiting that long to find out the end is a lot to ask.

I repeat, I have met my match.

Gone With the Wind is an amazing book in the time of the Civil War. It is in the point of view of a southerner, which is interesting because we get to see the thoughts and beliefs of the losing side.
This book gives us the story of Scarlett O’Hara, a determined young woman with a fighting spirit. Scarlett doesn’t give a hoot about what people think, as long as she gets what she wants. Consequently, no one can stop her, not even her husband, when she decides to start a business. At a time when woman were expected to stay at home and respect their husbands, Scarlett ignores custom and does what she wishes. For Scarlett pledges allegiance to only one thing – the red dirt plantation where she grew up.

Note: The entire time I was reading this, my dad the Flymaster kept saying numerous variations of “My dear, I don’t give a damn.” Whenever my mother the Great Yogini tried to say it, the Flymaster would say “Shh! You’ll ruin the book for her!” Mystified and bemused, I continued reading the book. As a result, my first thought when I finished the book was “OH.”