Blog 2

  The last book I read for enjoyment was called “Lost In The Stream”. I picked this book up because it was written by one of the local fishermen out of Rudee Inlet in Virginia Beach. He tells the story of when he and his captain set out from Florida to Cancun and hit a rogue wave. The captain described the wave like it was out of the movie “the perfect storm”. When the boat went down into the wave, the impact was so hard it split the boat in half. There wasn't enough time to grab the life jackets or flares before they were floating in the water. In the book the author says he was not a very religious man but when this tragedy occurred, the first thing he did was pray, over and over and over again. There were a lot of miracles that happened during the time they were treading water. One specific thing was when the life jackets and flares that were in a backpack in the front of the boat floated up beside them. He battled with thoughts on his life ending this way but stayed strong and listened to God's words. This is by far one of the best books I have ever picked up. I am not much on reading, but this book was different. It left me on the edge of my seat and I did not want to put it down. 

The last book I was required to read was for my second year writing seminar class and the title was “I, Claudius”. I did not enjoy the novel at all. It was based on ancient times in Rome when Julius Caesar made himself dictator of the Roman Empire. I am very intrigued by history, for it is one of my favorite subjects, but this was an exception. It was written by Robert Graves in 1934, but it was written in english that was very hard to understand because it was an autobiography. I would not recommend this novel to anyone unless you have to read it for school. It was very boring if you are not into the ancient Roman times or the story of Julius Caesar. 

My all time favorite book was “Where The Red Fern Grows”. I am not a big reader, so this was a long time ago. I think I was a sophomore in high school when I read this book. I chose this book because it was about a young boy and his two hounds he raised from puppies and trained to hunt raccoons. This interested me because I am very into hunting and I have my own dog that I have trained to hunt for deer. The dogs were Billy's best friends and they had a bond that could not be broken. They entered hunting contests to see which team could tree and bay the most raccoons in one night. They went on to win the contest and that was a major accomplishment for him and his dogs. I have done similar things with my dogs. I entered them in a fox pen race. A fox pen is an enclosed piece of land where people release foxes into and let hunters come turn their dogs out to see who can run the foxes the longest to win. While my dogs did not win, it was a blast to hear my pack run for hours chasing a fox. 

I think the best movie adaptation of a book I have read would be the Fault In Our Stars.  I had to read the book when I was in high school and thought it was pretty good but never really got around to watching the movie until almost a year after I read the book.  I watched the movie and I already knew what was going to happen so I figured it would be pretty boring to watch but it was actually not.  The book was very detailed but the movie just had more.  There were small bits and pieces of the movie that had slight differences in certain scenes, but for the most part, the main storyline was all the same.  I could remember what I read and how it was a little bit different from what I was watching.  The movie came out later then the book and was also directed by someone other than the original author.  I really do not have much to compare this movie adaptation to because I do not read all that often nor do I really have time to watch movies.