Summer Reads

Though I love to read and do so all year, I always read quite a bit more during the summer. This happens mainly for two reasons. I have more time, as I am not in school, and I tend to stay up later because I don't have to get up at the crack of dawn. I read quite a few books this summer and will comment on just a few. First, I finally got around to reading Wicked by Gregory Maguire and I'm so glad I did. I've talked to people who didn't care for it or didn't even finish it, but I loved it! I'm not sure there's any point in ever watching The Wizard of Oz again, as my view of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, has been turned completely upside down. Not wicked, but rather, misunderstood, Elphaba is a likable outcast with a passion for animal rights. It is a little difficult to read knowing, as we all do, her eventual fate, but even harder when you realize that she's not so wicked afterall. I would love to see Wicked, the musical, and lookd forward to the book's sequel, Son of a Witch. Wicked is available here in the Norton High School Library.

The second book on which I must comment is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I have been a huge fan of the books since day one and the final installment did not disappoint. All of the questions are answered and the ending is very satisfying. Rowling does not sugar coat things as some of our favorite characters lose their lives along the way but I still came away with a good feeling at the end. Though I will miss reading about my friends at Hogwarts (where I secretly wish I could have been a student) this book, unlike its predecessors, left me with the sense of a journey completed and as a bonus, a glimps of the next geration. I will donate my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows to the Norton High School Library after my family has finished passing it around.