Monthly Archives: April 2017

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros

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houseonmangostreet_sandracisnerosThe House on Mango Street, a book by Sandra Cisneros, highlights the life of a Latina girl growing up in poverty. Desperate to escape her seemingly predestined fate of unhappiness, the protagonist Esperanza writes her story and her path to salvation. The story is told through a series of vignettes, all expressing Esperanza’s deeply rooted emotions of joy and sadness. Throughout the events that occur on Mango Street, we can see that Esperanza is surrounded by women trapped either by themselves, or by the men in their lives. Esperanza’s fate is closely intertwined with these women, whom she discovers have similar motives to her own. Not only does Esperanza want to escape their fate, she wants to do so by defining herself.

Although The House on Mango Street is a hard book to truly understand and grasp, by nature of its writing style and subtle complexities, it highlights so many themes that are relevant in our society. Among them, the struggles of self definition ranks highly. Cisneros is able to illustrate the struggle of defining yourself amidst opposition from forces that we have no control over, such as our gender, race, and socioeconomic status. All too often throughout the story, the reader sees girls who change themselves in their desperate plight to be accepted. The only question to ask yourself is, to what extent must a person go to live the life that they dream of?

-Mirabella S.

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros is available for checkout from the Mission Viejo Library. 

Film Review: Beauty and the Beast

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The original animated Beauty and the Beast film gets redone as a live action movie. It was amazing! Disney did a really good job with this movie.

The story is pretty much the same as the original Beauty and the Beast that we all know and love. There were some differences from the original and I wished some scenes from the animated version were brought over for the live action film. Some of the differences, however, gave some cool twists regarding the world the characters live in that you wouldn’t have known from watching the original.

One of the best parts of the movie was definitely the music. The new film had many of the original songs and they were just done perfectly. Emma Watson, who played Belle, also sang many of the songs – knowing it was her singing gave the movie a cool factor. She also has a beautiful voice and it just worked with the songs perfectly. On top of it, Disney added some new songs which as always, were amazing.

Emma Watson, was also perfect as Belle. The image that she gives Belle, is just the was you would imagine her as a real life person .She is also a great actor, and did a really good job of bringing Belle to life. Overall, it was a great family friendly movie. It is a great to watch especially, for something like a family movie night.

Picture Bride by Yoshiko Uchida

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picturebride_yoshikouchidaPicture Bride, a novel by Yoshiko Uchida, is the story of a teenage girl named Hana who is sent to America. She carries a picture of a man she has been arranged to marry but has yet to meet. Traveling an ocean away from her once noble Japanese family, Hana is promised that in America, she will live a life of comfort with her merchant husband, Taro Takeda. Hana is devastated when she finds not a successful merchant in San Francisco, but an impoverished shopkeeper who can barely provide for himself. However, despite her many trials, Hana and her husband learn to be happy in a marriage that seemed doomed to fail. San Francisco was not kind to Japanese immigrants in the mid-twentieth century, and Hana soon found herself faced with racism and hardships, all leading up to the one event that would change her life: the Japanese internment camps.

This novel has become one of my all time favorites, not only because of the wonderful writing style that Uchida uses, but because of his portrayal of Hana Takeda. Hana shows us rare insight into the mind of a young immigrant woman. Forced into a situation that she cannot control, Hana learns to adapt to a society that seems out to get her from the moment she sets foot on its shores. In her time period, women’s rights, especially those of an immigrant woman, were stifled. Hana was expected to be a homemaker and a mother. Graceful and dignified, Hana dares to quietly go against the norms of her culture and become an independent woman who struggles to adapt to a foreign nation and values.

-Mirabella S.

Picture Bride by Yoshiko Uchida is available for checkout from the Mission Viejo Library. 

Film Review: A Dog’s Purpose

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When I heard out that this book had been made into a movie, I knew I had to read it. So there I was, checking the book out of the library and I was completely hooked the second I started. I have always loved dogs and the way the author, W. Bruce Cameron, wrote this story is just fabulous. I have no idea how he could write this heart-warming tale from a dog’s point of view so well and accurately! It amazes me, and sometimes I wonder that maybe he is part dog!

“All dogs go to heaven, unless they have unfinished business here on Earth.”

The main character is a dog that has been reincarnated four times! The dog comes back each time because he is trying to fulfill his purpose. Basically, he is seeking “a dog’s purpose in life” in his different reincarnations.

In the dog’s first life, he is born as a stray mutt named Toby. His mother has warned him to beware strangers, that man is not to be trusted. However, after getting severely bitten by a malicious dog, Toby lives a tragically short life. But the story doesn’t end there. In his second reincarnation, he is a Golden Retriever named Bailey, a purebred retriever. He is sold, and finds a loving home with a boy named Ethan and his parents. Bailey loves his boy Ethan, and they spend almost every moment together, their bond inseparable. They also love to play the game Rescue Me, where Bailey jumps into the lake to save Ethan.

In his third life…he’s a girl. He’s a German Shepherd named Ellie, ready to save and to Find people and rescue them. She realizes that this is similar to rescuing Ethan, and does her job and saves many lives until her own ebbs away. And in his final life, he’s a male again, this time a black Lab named Buddy. Ethan is now an old man, and Buddy is determined to be with his boy once more. He treks a long way, and he finally finds Ethan in the town that he once knew, and he realizes nothing changed much. Buddy also finds an emptiness inside of Ethan, and decides to bring him his old girlfriend, Hannah, hoping that will fill up the void of emptiness. The two get married, and Buddy realizes that he has truly fulfilled a dog’s purpose.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

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yellowwallpaper_charlotteperkinsgilmanThe Yellow Wallpaper is a short fictional story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. It was written in the late 1800’s and tells the story of the daily life of an average woman living in the late 1800’s. The main character’s name is not revealed, but is referred to as The Narrator. The narrator is suffering from postpartum depression, which is condition where women are ill or depressed after giving birth and seeks to find help.

I really enjoyed this short story as it related to the reality of women being treated poorly and unequally. Back then, men believed that women should just stay put at home and do nothing because they did not want them to stress about working hard shifts like men did. They also believed that women should not be educated because it will make them even more stressed. In The Yellow Wallpaper, the narrator does have a male physician to make her feel better, but the physician only tells her to do nothing at home and did not even bother to give her any medications as physicians would normally do in today’s world.

While she is at home, the narrator starts having hallucinations as she sees yellow wallpaper. She stares mysteriously at it and believes that the color carries horrible symbolism. She believes that the yellow wallpaper is intriguing as it gives her something to do in her life rather than sitting and doing nothing all day. This relates to sarcasm and the average woman living in the late 1800’s because it relates to how women had nothing to do everyday and was desperately looking for a hobby that intrigues them; although, staring at a wallpaper would not intrigue anyone. Considering how she is at a state of having hallucinations, she does not notice that she is actually in a house that is meant for the mentally ill as the beds are similar to those of mental hospitals. Also, another example of how she is suffering from hallucinations is that she believes that the physician is actually her husband. Overall, I would recommend reading this story as it was very interesting due to how it influenced thought on the treatment of women and how it should be changed.

-Matt J.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

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harrypotterchamberofsecrets_jkrowlingHarry Potter, ready to head back to Hogwarts after another long summer at the Dursely’s, gets an ominous message from a house elf named Dobby that he should not return to school. He returns to what he believes is just another year at Hogwarts but when messages written in blood are found on the wall declaring the Chamber of Secrets had been opened, students are petrified, and a mysterious voice that only Harry seems to hear, the entire campus is left in fear. This perplexing plot snatches the reader’s attention as Ron, Harry, and Hermione slowly find pieces to this puzzle.

In the midst of all this, Harry find a journal from a student named Tom Riddle which shows him the last time the Chamber of Secrets was opened. According to this, Aragog, a spider Hagrid had care for, was the result of the attacks. This is what really left me puzzled. Why would Hagrid let his arcomantula hurt the students? He was always nice to all the students and never would want to harm any of them. So, obviously the trio had find out what really happened on that day. Hermione, being the brains of the group, figured out what was down in the Chamber of Secrets and learned how to find it only to be petrified.

Harry, Ron, and the clueless Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Gildroy Lockhart, all head down to the chamber. A rock slide separates them leaving only Harry to fight the beast hidden away in the secret room along with young spirit of Voldemort. By a miracle from Godric Gryffindor, he defeats Voldemort and his basilisk before being rescued to safety by Dumbledor’s pet Phoenix, Fawkes.

A wild ride of twists and turns, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets keeps you captivated through the very end. It is an amazing sequel to Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and a great piece of writing from J.K Rowling.

-Ava G.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J. K. Rowling is available for checkout from the Mission Viejo Library. It is also available for download from Overdrive.