The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn Part One

Remeber a few weeks ago when I said that there’d be a couple bigger changes with my blogs?  Well, those changes have arrived.  The first change is: pictures.  I’ll be putting a picture or two at the top of every blog.  A picture of the cover, one of the characters, you name it!  You can post comments on what type of book I should read next, a picture you think I should add, a book recommendation, anything!  You can post your own comments at the bottom of any book post if you have a Twitter, Facebook, or WordPress account.  The second big change is: polls!  Every week, I’ll put a new poll up along with my post.  Anyone can vote, and you can post comments to me on what type of poll I should do next.  I’m going to do polls on all sorts of things, but if I can get to a computer, there’ll be a new poll every Friday.  Enough about the new changes, though.

This week, my older sister recommended a really awesome futuristic book to me, called The Bar Code Tattoo.  This is the first book in a two-book series by Suzanne Weyn.  The series takes place in 2025, and the world is totally different. All the food in the world is owned by one company, Global-1.  The United States Postal Service has gone out of business, and everyone communicates by email.

There is also a bar code tattoo, which you are allowed to get on your seventeenth birthday.  It has all your money on it, so to buy something, you scan the code and it charges your account. Couldn’t be simpler, right?  Wrong, at least for Kayla Marie Reed.  Both her parents had the bar code, and it didn’t help them at all.  In fact, her father committed suicide because of the bar code.  It soon becomes a law that anyone over seventeen has to get the bar code.  With both her parents dead, Kayla is on the run.  But can she run from the bar code tattoo?  Or is she too late?

13 Gifts by Wendy Mass

This week I read the second and third books in the series with 11 Birthdays.  I didn’t like the second book as much as the third, so I decided to just blog about this one.  The second book was about a girl named Rory, who comes up in the third book, which is about a girl named Tara.  Tara sneaks into her school at night to steal her principal’s stuffed goat.  As punishment, her parents send her to Willow Falls (the town where Amanda, Leo, and Rory live) to stay with her aunt and uncle.  Her mom gives her some money and a new iPod, but Tara loses those and her cell phone!  Since she needs money, she decides to steal one of her uncle’s rare comic books and sell it.  However, the woman she tries to sell it to recognizes in as her uncle’s!  The woman, Angelina, says that she will give Tara the money if she finds thirteen items scattered throughout town.  Tara agrees, and she and her new friends Rory, Leo, and Amanda start collecting the items.

This series is a little weird.  The first book is about Amanda and Leo, the second one is about Rory and doesn’t mention Amanda or Leo at all, and the third has Amanda, Leo, Rory, and a new character, Tara.  The one character the is in all three books is Angelina D’Angelo.  In the first book, she was the one who set the enchantment that made Amanda and Leo’s birthday happen again and again.  In the second book, she pulled Rory out of a drainpipe.  And in the third book, she’s the one who makes Tara get those items.  (At the end of the book, you learn why she made Tara get those things.  It’s not just because Tara needed money!)  Angelina is pretty odd.  Nobody knows how old she is.  She’s lived in Willow Falls for (it seems like) forever and has a hand in every odd and suspicious thing in the town.  She knows everything about all the people in town, and seems to be able to cast enchantments!

This book is awesome!  I would recommend it to any girl in fourth, fifth, sixth,  and seventh grade.  It is kind of realistic fiction, kind of fantasy, and even has a little bit about the town and Tara’s history!  I’m definitely giving this book (and the series) a √++!

11 Birthdays by Wendy Mass

From now on, there is going to be a slight change in my blogs.  I’m going to start rating the books that I read.  A √+ means that I really liked the book.  A √- means that I didn’t really like the book, a √ means that it was okay, and a √x means that I really didn’t like the book.  Also, a √++ means that I loved the book.In the first few blogs with this system, I’ll remind you what the ratings mean.  Hope you enjoy this new system and prepare for more changes coming!

This week, I started a new series by Wendy Mass.  11 Birthdays is a story about a girl named Amanda and her former best friend, Leo.  Amanda and Leo share a birthday and always had their parties together.  However, on Amanda and Leo’s tenth birthday, Amanda heard Leo talking about how he hated sharing birthday parties with her.  She went home early and didn’t speak to Leo for a year.  The story takes place on their 11th birthday, exactly a year since they last spoke to each other.  Amanda just wants her birthday to end, but when she wakes up the next day, it’s her birthday all over again!

My feelings about Leo changed during the story.  At the beginning, when I first heard what he had said about Amanda, I wondered why he would say those things about his best friend.  I thought he was really mean and that Amanda was right to ignore him after that.  However, when Amanda realizes that Leo is the only one who (besides herself) knows that the same day is happening again and again, Leo explains why he said those things and apologizes.  After that, I really liked Leo and thought that Amanda should have let him explain right after he said them.

I would recommend this book to almost everyone.  I think that both girls and boys would enjoy this book because it’s about a boy and a girl.  Also, people who like fantasy and sci-fi would also like this book.  People who like historical and realistic fiction would probably enjoy this book, since Amanda and Leo have to research things about their ancestors.  I would definitely give this book a √++!

The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan

This week I read a fantasy book by one of my favorite authors, Rick Riordan.  The Red Pyramid is about two kids, Carter and Sadie Kane, who are the descendants of the Egyptian pharaohs.  Carter and Sadie are trying to defeat Set, the Egyptian god who is trying to take over the world.  Carter and Sadie are hosting two other gods, Isis and Horus.

I liked this book okay.  It wasn’t as good as some of Rick Riordan’s other books.  I didn’t really like some parts of the main section.  However, I didn’t like the ending at all.  The rest of the book was really strong and good, but the ending was really weak.  Some of the other books by the same author were a lot better. It was pretty good, but there are a lot of parts that I would change.

Most of the parts I would change about this book are in the ending.  One thing I would change is Carter and Sadie’s father.  He intentionally hosted the god Osiris’s spirit, knowing that he would die.  I would have had Osiris die, but their father live.  Another thing I would change is Amos, Carter and Sadie’s uncle.  He was completely taken over by Set, who was using him to try to lure the two Kanes into a trap.  Amos tried to resist the god, but Set was much more powerful than him.  Amos’s confidence was shattered and he just moped around after Set was defeated.  Eventually, he decided to go to some magical healers to see if they could help him.  I would have had him try to tell Carter and Sadie what was happening before Set completely gained control.  Those are just a few things that I would change about this book.