Summer Reading Project: Stuck in Neutral (Entry 4)

8/13/14

For my summer reading project I decided to choose the book Stuck in Neutral, by Terry Trueman. I decided to read this book because on the cover it says “My name is Shawn McDaniel. I am fourteen years old. I think my father is planning to kill me.” And when I saw that, I became curious and wanted to read more about why his father would want to kill him. This book was also a recommendation by a close friend. When finished reading I didn't see any personal connections between me and the novel.

After reading this book I would recommend it to anyone and everyone. I would recommend it because in the book Shawn is a kid with disabilities and I believe that if we recommend everyone to read and those who do read will understand that people with disabilities are people too and may think like us also just when faced with their disabilities we are unable to communicate with them and understand how they truly feel and who they truly are.

Overall, I found this book full of life lessons, a very good choice to read for my summer reading, and an overall very intriguing and thought provoking story.

(Thought provoking)

Summer Reading Project: Stuck in Neutral (Entry 3)

8/12/14

In the book, Stuck in Neutral by Terry Trueman a section of the book where I saw an intent of hooking the reader was a passage on page 12. On page 12 it says “There is one final bad-news punch line to my life. This bad news is complicated, difficult to explain. In a nutshell, it`s that I am pretty sure that my dad us planning to kill me. The good news is that he`d be doing this out of his love for me. The bad news is that whatever the wonderfulness of his motives, I`ll be dead.” To me this section/ paragraph of the book was the an intention of hooking the readers because it was early in the selection and addresses the conflict at the beginning of the selection which draws readers in to learn more about why Shawn`s father would want to kill him. In this passage it occurs when Shawn is stating all the positives and negatives in his life which lead to the passage above which happens to be a main idea of the selection also. I also found the passage to induce curiosity upon me with the question: Why would his dad want to kill him? Which is why kept reading the selection. The reasons I used explain why I believe the selection I provided was used with the main intent of hooking readers.