This is ultimately an uplifting story of a boy and a girl who become friends despite their differences.

Jesse and Leslie create an imaginary world called Terabithia where they pretend they are king and queen. To them it is a magical world where they have thrilling make-believe adventures, their friendship grows, and they forget their every day problems.

Readers will find much common ground with the main characters Jesse and Leslie. Every kid knows it's not always easy to grow up, and the book says it well. Jesse is often annoyed by four his sisters and has to hide his passion for drawing; and Leslie, the only child of wealthy, intellectual parents who sometimes forgets she's a child, knows what it's like to be an outsider. But K. Paterson gives voice to their fears and hopes without imposing judgment or commentary.

A heartwarming book that won a Newbery Medal in 1978. Among countless books about friendship and loss, BRIDGE TO TERABITHIA stands out for the tender care the author lavishes on her main characters, and for the honest portrayal of a child's grief and a child's capacity for creating beauty from tragedy. It covers some pretty adult topics while still remaining a great kids' read.

Paterson has written so well the climactic chain of event that changed Jesse's life forever. It makes the book a real tear-jerker and by the time i finished it, i was crying like a baby. Promise!

Highly recommended, yes!

Astronomer Ellie Arroway was the director of SETI, or the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. When a radio signal from Vega System, 26 light-years away from Earth, was detected through their radio telescopes, Arroway knew it was the message she had been waiting for.

The radio signal, or the Message as it was called, was decrypted with the cooperation of multinational scientific community. It then revealed that the Message was an instruction for building a machine. The Message created a national, even world wide issue. That the project should be stopped, or the Machine was a sort of Trojan horse for the extraterrestrials to attack the Earth, even a Doomsday Machine.

Several religious communities and sects involved themselves with the Message and Machine issues as well. Some believed it was a message from God, others assumed it was from the Devil, and that the creation of the Machine was such a demonic act.The Machine was built nevertheless, and the project was completed.

Arroway met Palmer Joss, a prominent religious leader and they had different stands about the Message and the Machine, much more about science and God. Arroway was skeptic, or rather agnostic about the existence of God and doubted if there were even evidences. And Palmer Joss, the one who looked at scientists as faithless, people who alter one’s belief about the existence of a Great Being.

Lots of people have different beliefs about God, or the significance of science with our spiritual concerns. But Carl Sagan used his book, with his imagination, to explain how the two aspects are really connected.

Science can build faith the way it did to Arroway. Her journey through the galaxy on board the Machine made her understand that there were actually beings much smarter and much more civilized than humans, and what those beings could do, and how petty she was a creature compared to those who had sent the Message.

We are all searching for something. Searching for truth, for something we’ve never had, something we’ve lost. But most important is what’s within us, what we've always had, and yet never realized it was there all along.

***Contact was published on 1985, and then later adopted for a motion picture on 1997

A connect-the-dot face has a girlfriend and I go to movies alone. Is that fair?

All I know is the Count of Monte Cristo never got his ass kicked by a girl.

For a marriage to end, someone usually had to die.

Friendships were as important as neighborhood loyalty. Your friends gave you an identity and a sense of belonging. They afforded you a group you could trust that extended beyond the bounds of family.

Good things and bad. Goin’ in, you never know which one you’re gonna find. Always be prepared for both. And most of the time, bet on the bad.

I will do my best not to fail you and not to fail to find the truth. I will do my best to seek justice. And I know you will to.

-It’s the sheep that strays that you most want back.
-It’s not too late, Father. We still have a chance to bring in a couple of stray sheep. One last chance.
-Is that one chance legal?
-Last chances never are.

Just be glad you’re going home, Shakes. Forget everything else.

-Only the baddest apples do full runs.
-Or end up dead.

You ate eel? On your own? I mean, without nobody havin’ a gun on you?

You gotta stay tough to be tough. Guys smell it when you’re weak. Eat you like a salad.

You want your witness to have one hand raised in court. Not two.


-- LORENZO CARCATERRA --

Michael:
You know, Butter, you're not as dumb as you look

John:
But he is as ugly as he looks. It's like hangin' out with that guy with the bells

Michael:
What guy with the bells?

Shakes:
The Hunchback of Notre Dame

John:
That's him

--------------------------------

* * *

This is a powerful read with a chilling premise about diabolical doctors (and big pharmaceutical companies).

Quinn Cleary is smart, idealistic and poor. She's been accepted at The Ingraham, a prestigious medical school, completely subsidized by Kleederman Pharmaceuticals, where a select few receive the finest education free of charge.

But something is terribly wrong at The Ingraham. Quinn notices subtle changes in the bright, hand-picked students. Then she stumbles upon the silent, staring patients in locked Ward C.

She and her friend Tim Brown slowly discover the secret agenda behind the brainwashing and the grisly truth of the school's research.


http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/w/f-paul-wilson/select.htm
http://www.amazon.com

I grew up with this series, particularly Sweet Valley High, Jr.High and SVU. I was thirteen when i first read a Sweet Valley and i got hooked on it ever since. And becuz my life was boring, i just got contented reading Sweet Valley, especially that the characters were also teenagers so i could relate to them. Sometimes i even got inspired. I also learned to have sense of humor here. The approach was always light even in serious situations; simple but not shallow.

Sweet Valley characterized different types of teenagers. There was the rich kid, the typical cheerleader, the class clown, the class gossip, the straight A, the MVP... anything that could classify high school kids. Generally, it's focus was on school as what most typical teenagers' life was about -- go to school, make friends, go home... But for that matter it was actually about life as you grow up and cope up. SVU continued it as the characters moved on to a new environment, a lot of changes and new characters in their own lives. Complicated but easy to understand becuz what could be found here were common growing-up experiences like identity crisis, dilemma, coping up in school, peer pressure, being the center of morbid curiosity, dealing with parents... and being laughed at for getting serious. And i indeed experienced those. It just seemed cuter when i read it in fiction.


I rested my forehead against the cool bathroom tile and closed my eyes...
Every time I thought I was taking a step in the right direction, I wound up falling on my face. I took one last look in the mirror to see if I had IDIOT written across my forehead.
-- Jessica Wakefield
Jr.High # 6 (Lacey's Crush)