A Note To Each Of My Followers

When I started this blog, I didn't expect to get any followers. So thank you everyone!!

Margo Pego (my first follower)

Scezzle (my best friend in real life and in the blog world. Thank you for being my best friend and my best commenter)

Lauren (her blog is always so creative)

Anora (her blog is so fun to read)

Alistar Of Woodland (an excellent writer)

Nela (her blog is awesome! I check around twice a day!)

Mattie R (her blog is really cool and she's having her books published)

Sierra (a very good blog and also a good commenter)

Gallop Girl (her blog is fun to read and she loves horses as much as I do)

Shaynie (her book blog has some very interesting books on it. I am enjoying searching through her blogs and look forward to seeing more of them)

Ceara (her blogs are really cool)

Emily Grace (one of my newer followers. Her two blogs are fun to look at)

Libbi H. (my newest follower also has very neat blogs and I look forward to exploring them further)

Cecily (I do not have the address to her blog)

Ingould (A cool blog and a pretty profile picture)

Once again, a big thank you to all my followers!!

Hattie Big Sky by: Kirby Larson

Sixteen year-old Hattie Brook's parents have died, leaving her in the care of no one in particular. So Hattie is shuttled from one relative to another. In the beginning of this book we find Hattie at her aunt and uncle's house. Hattie's aunt is eager to get rid of her niece and jumps at the chance to send Hattie to work for Iantha Wells, at Iantha's boardinghouse. Hattie is disgusted. But fortunately for her, that very day a letter arrives from her Uncle Chester, who has recently died, leaving her 320 acres in Montana. Tired of being Hattie Here-and-There, and despite her aunt's protests, Hattie summons up the courage to leave Iowa and go live in Vida, Montana, where she knows no one.


Under Montana's big sky, Hattie battles hard times, bad weather, and a temperamental cow. Not only that, but, upon arrival, Hattie finds that her uncle had left a large debt that she now has to pay off! Hattie also deals with Traft Martin, or "trouble" as she calls him, and his schemes to get her off the property so he can have it. But, for the first time, she finally feels like she is part of a family. Hattie witnesses her neighbor's barn burn down due to the fact he is German. In those days, boys were pressured to fight in the war, and people who didn't fight in the war were forced into being "loyal" Americans. As Hattie's neighbor, Karl, was German, he was suspected of not doing his duty as an American. Despite everything though, Hattie continues to work hard on her Uncle Chester's claim, until an unforeseen tragedy strikes.

I love this story! It's an interesting book about a pioneer girl who is seeking freedom and a new life.


My favourite characters are Perilee Muller and Hattie. Perilee, Hattie's neighbor, is like a mother to Hattie and guides her through her troubles. Hattie is courageous, independent, and in search of a better life. From this book I learned to have perseverance and not give up in tough situations.

11 and up

4.5 stars

Life As We Knew It by: Susan Beth Pfeffer

When a meteor has a collision with the moon and knocks the moon closer in orbit to the earth, nothing will ever be the same. There are worldwide tidal waves. There's volcanic eruptions in places where no one ever knew there was a volcano. There's people dying, everywhere.

And for Miranda Evans this is only the beginning. What would you do if you were sixteen, your parents were divorced, and people thought the world was coming to an end? Miranda has problem after problem. Her mother hurts herself and the guards won't let Miranda into the hospital, her friend Sammi becomes boy crazy and her friend Megan gets all religious, they have to cut back to two or even one meal a day, and if that isn't bad enough, the electricity stops working.

Then Miranda finds out that her friend Megan is starving herself because Megan's preacher is telling his congregation that if they eat, God will be angry with them since there's so many other people who could be eating the food they're eating. Of course, the preacher will gladly take anything they don't want to eat and eat it himself. Miranda is so angry she goes to the preacher and speaks her mind to him. But her troubles aren't over. Her whole family falls sick with a deadly flu that could quite possibly kill them. The only thing that Miranda can find joy in is swimming. And even that will soon be taken away from her.

This book is really captivating. It has a sixteen year-old girl's diary and views on life at a time when everyone thinks the world is coming to an end. Will her family end up on the dead list like so many other of their friend's families did?

My favorite character is Miranda. She rationed herself down to one or two meals a day, she took care of the family, and she cooked meals.

This book does line up with the Bible's views on the end of the world in some ways. There is an increase in natural disasters, just like the Bible said there's going to be, and there are false prophets, which also lines up with the Bible. Life As We Knew It is not written by a Christian author.

I hope you find this story as compelling as I did.

White Star: A Dog On The Titanic by: Marty Crisp

"Not without my dog!"

It's April 10, 1912, and twelve year-old Sam Harris is traveling across the Atlantic Ocean on the "unsinkable" Titanic to meet his mom, in America, who has just recently remarried.
Sam is surprised and delighted to find out that there are actually dogs on the Titanic. He immediately begins helping with the dogs and taking them for walks. Soon he meets a dog named "Star," a smart Irish Setter. Sam becomes close with his new found friend and begins to spend all his time with Star, much to the horror of his prim and proper guardian, Lady Cabot.

Together with Star and Bucky, Sam's friend, Sam manages to have a fine time on board the ship. Sam also meets other fellow dog lovers, including Robert Daniel and Ann Isham.

Until disaster strikes. The "unsinkable" ship hits an iceberg and begins to sink. Sam refuses to get into a lifeboat until it's too late and must decide what to do. The boy and dog must rely on each other, but can they both survive? One thought flashes through the minds of all the survivers of the Titanic, "It isn't fair. Why are we still be alive when all those other people are gone to the bottom of the ocean?"

I really like this book. I enjoy reading about the Titanic and this book had some interesting people and facts in it. Almost all the characters in this book are real, Sam and a few others are fictional but all the passengers were really on the Titanic.

White Star: A Dog On The Titanic at the back of the book had some fascinating stories about people who had really been on the Titanic. Here is the one I found the most interesting:

Ann Elizabeth Isham spent nine years away from home before she decided to return to U.S.A. and spend the summer months with her brother. She was only one of four women in first-class to die in the Titanic. Titanic experts suggest that Isham brought a large dog with her, possibly a Great Dane. She later refused to board a lifeboat without her dog. A few days after the Titanic sank, a German passenger liner Bremen, passing through the debris, reported seeing a woman, floating lifeless in the water, with her arms around a large dog.

Whether you're interested in the Titanic, history, or just like stories, this is an excellent book!