‘The Vanishing of Katharina Linden’ by Helen Grant

Thesis: The Roanoke colony proved to be an unsuccessful venture in the New World for England, since leaders of the expedition held the viewpoint that privateering would prove to be the most profitable aspect of founding the new settlements in the West. However future, still unsuccessful attempts to make a permanent colony at Roanoke, helped England understand how to build a prosperous one; and it became a building block for establishing future colonies for England and helped shape the ideas that would help launch their empire.

As anyone can imagine it is fascinating to read a story about something we would never want to happen to ourselves. Whether it be a disappearance or a murder, the suspense intrigues the reader and triggers them to want to find out the ending. The main character in The Abduction is a seventeen year old girl with the so called maturity of someone much older, who slips up and puts herself into a dangerous situation. She is abducted. Joyce Carol Oates immediately turns the reader's attention towards the girl directly into the situation, personally placing them into the story trying to find out how to escape. In Stanton’s Ted Talk he explains the concept of “Don't give them four, give them two plus two.” Give the reader two pieces of information separately and let them put it together on their own. Oates uses this concept from the beginning when she says, “it wasn’t actually right away that she understood something was wrong” and “he was making an effort not to talk too fast or get too excited and wasn’t paying all that much attention where he was driving” to lead the reader in the direction of an abduction occurring. This concept of leading the reader to the answer allows them to work for what they want in the end.

In the passages Confetti Girl by Diana López and Tortilla Sun by Jennifer Cervantes, the narrators and the parents have different opinion on what is the right thing to do, and because of their different opinions, tension and distance in their relationship is created. The narrators in both passages feel alone or left out either because of the lack of attention of because they are missing a beloved parent. In both passages the narrators feel uncomfortable with the parent and is not fully opening up to them. In the sections Confetti Girl and Tortilla Sun, the different opinions between the two narrators and parents create distance and tension in their relationship.

The story seizes the reader’s attention straightaway as Ava conveys that this is her and her sister’s first summer alone. Immediately, readers are asking questions-why are these girls alone? Should they be alone?-and they read more to be recompense with answers. The diction subtly aids to pique interest such as, “. . . the Chief slurred.”, implying speech impediment or inebriation. This small detail provokes readers to question, just in the first paragraph, the Chief’s parental fitness and what sort of situation the girls must be in if they must feed alligators. As some of these questions are answered, such as how the sisters live in a gator theme park, more questions are raised-what will the ghosts do to Ossie? What will the Bird Man do to Ava? What is Ossie planning? The reader is drawn to what is going on with Ava and what will happen to her, prompting further reading. (Part of this intrigue is provoked by Russel’s rendering of Ava as the storyteller, as we get an idea of who she is from the first paragraph). Also, all questions are answered in due time and the information that readers need to know is given. This story could have easily become convoluted, as it pairs a supernatural element and must also provide enough setting (such

When most people think about a life of abandonment, they probably see that life as one filled with suffering. In “The Book Thief” abandonment is a central topic throughout this novel. The abandonment through Liesel’s life helps develop her character in the novel. This abandonment happens through family, friends, and mentors. Through acts of both circumstance and heart she constantly feels abandoned, but through the course of these events she eventually finds happiness from it all.

He uses fragmental sentences when he is describing the girl like “She was maybe 14,”(129) and “She had black hair and brown skin,”(129) and the scene around her such as when he says “ There were dead pigs, too,”(130) and “There was no music,”(129).The use of fragments helps the author to convey sensations such as sight by simply being objective with his thoughts to allow the reader to picture the girl and her surroundings the way he did during the situation. With this, readers begin to understand O’Briens point of view, with these collections of fragments he demonstrates his feeling of grief and sadness for the girl. Readers understand that at the time meeting the girl was so quick and confusing, demonstrating to the reader how the situation didn’t make sense and affect him until a long time after while at the time he was objective and saw no deeper meaning. His longer and parallel sentences tend to include more analysis and storytelling. These demonstrate what he concluded and questions he had about the girl after the fact, such as when he says “which must’ve meant something,”(129) while his fragments provide an insight into his mind while the girl

The setting and time period of this story supports the adventurous innocence of its youthful characters, as well as enriching the story’s momentous and climactic confrontation between the forward-looking Mona, and her more traditional mother, Helen.

During this meeting the German women relayed all the information she had on the what was happening in the war. She writes, “very quickly, as fast as I can speak, I report what news I’ve gleaned from Russian papers and from the Russians themselves” (pg. 84). Her connection with Russia military men (while not very pleasant) did give her the ability to gain information on what was happening. These meeting are time to spread information about the war as well as about the people in this community. A woman from Hamburg tells the group that she had been hiding her from the Russians in a false ceiling (pg. 84). The Germans had to have some type of organization and strategies to survive under the harsh rules of the Russians.

Small towns usually consist of people that know about everyone else’s business but their own. In the fiction novel Bone Gap by Laura Ruby, Ruby introduces the reader to the main character, Finn O’Sullivan, who everyone believes is a weird and peculiar child. Finn lives with his brother Sean and friend Roza in a small town called Bone Gap. One day Roza goes missing and given the fact that the O’Sullivan boys’ mother left them for her lover, the people of Bone Gap do not find the disappearance a surprise. Except Finn knows the truth about her disappearance. However, no one in the town, not even his brother, believes Finn’s story. The mystery unfolds as Ruby uses the different characters’ point of view on the situation. Ruby uses different aspects of literature to pull the reader in preventing

She wanted to be a role model for her children and at the same time, she wanted to become friend with them. Helen valued education, and she wanted Julie to go to college and have a successful life. However, after she found out that Julie had secretly being together with Tod, the poor, unambitious man. She was disappointed, betrayed, sad. Julie moved out of Helen’s home. Later, when Helen found out that Julie and her husband Tod had nowhere to live, she let them move in with her. She is a permissive parent, yet, she cares about her children, provides them as much support as she can. Helen stayed calm when Gary told her he wanted to live with his dad for a while. I can see her heart was bleeding when she heard her son’s words. She gave Gary his father’s phone number anyway, and Gary talked to his dad over the phone and figured out the cruel fact that his dad didn’t care for them anymore. Helen wanted to comfort Gary but he refused to talk. I felt Helen’s guilt and desperation at that moment. After she broke into Gary’s room and found out that Gary was carrying the bag that contains pornography, she immediately asked Tod’s help to talk to Gary. She had a chance to talk to Tod and had learned that Tod came from a broken family. She had a better idea of who Tod was and his help to Gary gained Helen’s respect. Helen supported Tod and helped her daughter Julie overcame the tough situation in marriage. Helen

The idioms of everyday American speech in a middle-class domestic situation are used in showing the events and relationships of the Berlin family. In contrast to the conversations of Becca and Stan, usually presented as straight dialogue, the discussions among the three sisters are conventionally presented, often with “she said” and other interpolations to give explicitly the emotional level of the sister’s disagreements. Madga, the Polish student who acts as Becca’s guide to the death camp site speaks fluent English but at times awkward English “Oh, they are much in appreciation” she says when given a pair of jeans. Contrast between the formal, traditional language of the fairy tale and childish, informal chatter is shown when the children comment or question as Gemma proceeds with her Briar Rose fairy tale story telling. Her contrast revisiting of just this one fairy tale shows the reader that while her conscious memory has buries the details of her past horrors, she cannot help returning to the fairy tale allegory. Contrast is also shown between the warm, happy imagery of life in the Berlin house and the bleak, harsh details of the holocaust.

Most curriculums being taught to students withhold a mass amount of history. Some may do this because they feel some events do not have the same importance as other topics being taught. Such topics for example would be the rape and sexual exploitation of thousands of African American females during the time periods where racism and segregation was the norm. It is important for people to be educated about the horrific events that these women went through without justice. It is also essential because it shows the amazing activism Rosa Parks took part in. Most people are often just taught about Parks’ actions on the bus. At the Dark End of the Street by Danielle L. McGuire shows how Rosa Parks and many other dedicated their lives to receive equality not only for themselves, but for all African Americans in the south. Danielle L. McGuire’s work is an amazing way for people to not only learn more of Rosa Parks story, but to get a better understanding of what all African American woman had to deal with during this time period. The realism of sexual violence and its dominant impact on the African American women was one of the many events that helped ignite the Civil Rights Movement. McGuire wrote At the Dark End of the Street in order to resolve the negligence of this reality.

The simplistic plot of the novel and the overall theme of love allows the author to span the lives of the main characters. The reader sees the span of the life of two of the main characters, Sidda and her mother

As the trip progresses, the children reveal themselves as funny, spoiled brats. O'Connor's desire to illustrate the lost respect for the family and elders among the young is quite apparent in her illustrations of the children. One evidently notices another foreshadowing image when the family

The resentment within the young girl’s family is essential to the novel because one can understand the young girl better as she makes her decision.