My Annotated Bibliography

Jennifer Sherman

Annotated Bibliography

McCaughrean, Geraldine. (2006). Cyrano. Orlando: Harcourt, Inc. 0152058052.

In this piece of adolescent literature, McCaughrean recreates the renowned play that Edmond Rostand wrote 100 years ago.  The story goes back over 400 years ago in Paris, France. It follows the character of Cyrano de Bergerac, a renowned poet and swordsman who falls in love with a beautiful woman named Roxane. Cyrano longs to be with the aristocratic and eloquent Roxane. However, he feels that he is too ugly to win her love. For despite Cyrano’s magic with words, his astounding wit, and his flawless sword fighting skills, Cyrano is cursed with having an ugly and rather large nose. He is cursed with the belief that he is simply not good enough to be with the woman who deserves and owns his heart. Yet, that does not stop Cyrano from expressing his love and winning Roxane over. It just means that he must do it through different means. When Cyrano learns that Roxane has feelings for the attractive yet dimwitted Christian, he decides to be the voice within Christian’s body.  Cyrano writes his love poetry and letters. He speaks to her with eloquent rhymes and words of adoration. But he does it all behind the mask of Christian’s beauty and name.  Soon Roxane is head over heels for Christian. But is she in love with his face or his mind? Where does Roxane’s heart truly lie and will she find out about Cyrano’s role in her relationship? This book recaptures the lyrical and romantic nature of the time period as it brings its readers to a time when sword fighting and poetry were the ways of the upper class. It recreates the suspense, the beauty, and the drama that were part of the original classic of Cyrano de Bergerac.

Rowling, J K. (1998). Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. New York: Scholastic Press. 0590353403.

Since it was published more than a decade ago, Harry Potter has taken over the book industry by storm. All seven books have been read over and over again by millions. Movies, action figures, and everything in between have been created and adapted based on the beloved character of Harry Potter. This is the book that started it all. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone takes its readers back to the moment when Harry is visited by the giant Hagrid who gives him a letter that takes him away from the lonely world of the Muggles to the adventurous land of wizardry, magic, and mysterious creatures. The book begins Harry’s stay at The Hogwart School of Witchcraft and follows him as he begins to piece together the puzzle about where he came from, who he is, and what it means to be a wizard. Readers will be turning the pages to find out about why Harry has a scar on his forehead, how he ended up in the unmagical world of the Muggles, and if Harry can find a way to protect the powerful Sorcerer’s stone from evil’s hands. Rowling does an excellent job of describing and developing this fantastical world of wizardry and wonder that readers will feel as though they are looking out into their own backyards.

Shusterman, Neal. (2007). Unwind. New York: Simon & Schuster Books for Young. 1416912045.

This novel takes its readers to the time of the second civil war. This time, instead of a battle over slavery, the citizens are fighting over the legality of abortion. Abortion has been declared illegal, but in order to appease those in opposition, it has become legal for parents to elect to have their children “unwound” at the age of 13. In this process, the children are killed and all of their body parts are harvested, thus continuing their life in someone else. Yet, this compromise does not end the war. Now it is time for the children to fight back. Unwind takes the perspectives of three different teenagers who are on their way to the harvesting camp as they battle to save their lives. This fast-paced and thought-provoking novel forces its readers to question the meaning of life and who has the authority to dictate that meaning. It is a well-written novel that is sure to bring its readers at the edge of their seat, flooded with questions and bursting with a desire to fight back.

Swanson, James. (2009). Chasing Lincoln’s Killer. New York: Scholastic Press.0439903548.

Chasing Lincoln’s Killer is the young adult version of Swanson’s bestselling nonfiction piece Manhunt. Just like its predecessor, it takes its readers through the 12-day search to find President Lincoln’s killer, John Wilkes Booth, after he shot Lincoln at Ford Theater. The book acts as a narrative, as it goes inside the minds and actions of several of the characters, giving the readers an inside look into each moment from  Lincoln’s victory speech to Wilkes’ death.  Readers will become engaged in the climatic buildup and the intricate details of Wilkes’ desire for redemption and his ultimate demise. Complete with actual dialogue and breathtaking photos, the book provides a thorough and accurate account of one of the nation’s most significant moments in history. It is an accessible nonfiction piece that engrosses its readers as it they are reading the story for the very first time.

Book Review for Sleeping Beauty written by Adele Geras and illustrated by Christian Birmingham

Watch my VoiceThread to learn about Geras' enchanted version of this renownned fairy tale!



Geras, Adele. (2003). Sleeping beauty. New York: Scholastic, Inc. 9780439581806.

Response to American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

Jennifer Sherman

Graphic Novels

Response to American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

American Born Chinese is an easy read. It is a graphic novel that is set up like a comic book. The pictures are quite simplistic, with very little going on except for the illustrations of the characters and the bubbles that show what they are saying. There is not much to be gained from the pictures in the book. Most of the plot development is done through the characters’ dialogue. A reader can easily ignore the pictures and move through the book very quickly without getting lost or confused about the development of the storyline. The dialogue is also quite simple. The word choice is very basic and the plot is easy to follow. There is nothing about this book that makes it challenging to read or inaccessible. It is a book that is very nonthreatening.

With that being said, I believe that it is the perfect book for readers who are disengaged.  It is easy to follow and comprehend. There are very little words to a page. The plot is interesting and the narrative is very humorous. While some jokes may take a bit more time to understand and may require the readers to pay closer attention to the pictures and their interpretations, once a reader notices these jokes, they become more apt to look closer as they read. I will admit that I was skimming through the book quite quickly until I missed the picture where Chin-Kee was peeing in the coke can. When I realized that I missed this, I forced myself to start over and to begin reading the book again. I had cast the pictures off as superfluous. However, the pictures were often what added to the humorous tone of the piece. While they may not have been needed to understand the plot, they were an important part of the overall experience of the narrative.

However, a book is not great for disengaged readers simply because it is easy and fun to read. What makes this book so great is its ability to be so accessible and still hold literary merit. For while the book is simplistic and not very challenging to read, it introduces themes that are incredibly important and difficult to grapple with. While the book may be easy to page through, its content is not as simplistic. The book brings up ideas and situations that are important and often difficult to address. Yet, by putting these ideas in such a simplistic form, it puts these complicated and often uncomfortable ideas into focus. It makes profound themes and questions more accessible and easy to understand and to actively think about.

The book has a clear theme that is focused on identity. There were several storylines that were at first unconnected; however, all of them dealt with the idea of accepting yourself. The first story of the Monkey King was about the monkey’s inability to accept his monkey form. He became upset when the rest of the Gods mocked him because he was not wearing shoes and he was not as cultivated as the rest of them. This forced him to be ashamed of his own form. He went back to his island and forced all the monkeys to wear shoes. He was no longer the great ruler that his monkey followers had loved and accepted. He dedicated his days to becoming the strongest form possible so that he could overthrow the rest of the Gods.  However, he eventually turned back into his monkey form so that he was small enough to escape a giant boulder that the Creator had buried him under. He learned that there were advantages to his monkey form. He learned who he was and what he was meant to be.

The main story of Jin/Danny was also focused on not accepting your differences and forcing the opinions of others to be infiltrated into your own thoughts and idea of identity.  Jin enters into school as the only Asian student, besides one another girl who is assumed to be his betrothed. He feels isolated from the rest of the students because he is different. When one student tells him to stay away from a girl he has been seeing, he assumes that it is because he is Asian, and he decides to transform himself into a white boy named Danny. He does transform; however his “asianness” still haunts him in the form of Chin-kee, his mysterious estranged cousin.

  I loved the character of Chin-Kee. I think that he was representative of the book as a whole as he was able to encapsulate this idea of taking on a difficult topic though a humorous or accessible venue. Chin-Kee acts as the culmination of Danny’s fears. He is the prototype of all Asian stereotypes. He is an excellent student, he is uncivilized, he sees woman as being property to be married and owned, he eats cats, obeys authority, etc. Chin-Kee is embarrassing. He is everything that Danny is trying to escape. In essence, he is the identity that Danny/Jin is attempting to be leaving behind. For while Chin-Kee is clearly not representative of Asian identity, for Jin, he is the manifestation of everything that he has become to believe is being Asian. Yet, he cannot shake him. He can separate himself from Chin-Kee. Chin-Kee haunts Jin/Danny and makes him think that the other students are not accepting of him. Danny/Jin leaves school because he thinks that people no longer like him because of Chin-Kee.

Chin-Kee is funny. He dances to songs by Ricky Martin and pees in cups. However, he is also a very complicated and thought-provoking character. He brings up questions about stereotypes and how they affect both the people who believe in them and the people they are placed upon. We are able to see how Danny/Jin has started to view being Asian. As Chin-Kee becomes the Asian identity that he is trying to displace, we see how Jin’s idea of what it means to be Asian has been transformed and altered by the views and opinions of others. He has begun to believe in these stereotypes. I loved how the book left it up for interpretation whether or not Danny/Jin’s friends were truly against him because of his differences or if this was just in Danny/Jin’s head. Did his friend not want him to date the girl because he was Asian? Did the people at the schools really not like Danny because of his cousin Chin-Kee? In the end, I do not think it really matters. The point is that the existence of these stereotypes and these surroundings have forced Jin/Danny to view the world this way. They have forced him to not accept himself and to want to adapt to his surroundings.

There were also many subplots within the stories that added to this theme. One of my favorites was the parable that Jin’s mother told him about the boy whose mother moved him around to different places, a marketplace, a cemetery, and a university. At the marketplace and the cemetery, the boy was engaging in fruitless behavior where he was mimicking his surroundings, selling sticks, burning incense, etc. The mother then moved him by a university where he started throwing himself into books. This story introduced the idea of the effect of context and power of one’s environment and surroundings. The son began to learn his way of life through his surroundings. He began to create an identity or a life that was based on the situations that he saw and was exposed to everyday. The mother believed that it was important to go to school and to get an education, so she moved her son near a school so that he would do that. I think that this sets up a question of why immigrants move here and the priorities that Jin’s mother puts on him. If a person is supposed to adapt to their surroundings, is Jin supposed to turn himself into the “whiteness” that he desires?  Does Jin have the power to not conform or is the environment simply too strong to resist? Is it possible to retain one’s authentic identity or are we always transforming ourselves to fit with our surroundings, just like the transformer toys that Jin loves so much?

This story opens up questions about assimilation and conformity. However, it also introduces ideas about societal and familial pressure. I think that it becomes clear that Jin is not the only one that is putting pressure on him to find an identity. His parents clearly have expectations for him.  His environment also has expectations for him as well, as they ask him and the other “different” people to conform. It is no longer acceptable to eat strange, exotic food or to have black hair that does not spike up like a crown. Jin is being affected by his surroundings just as if he was living in a cemetery or a marketplace. It becomes a question of how much of his frustrations with identity are from his own insecurities or from other societal pressures. And is there really a difference? How much of ourselves is innate to us and how much is built through the environment we expose ourselves to?

In conclusion, I loved this book. I thought that was it was fun to read. I laughed aloud on the bus as I turned the pages. But I was also moved by its content. I think that this book can be read in so many different ways. Even now, I have reread it numerous times, and I find something different each time that I read. The book is short and a quick read. However, it is very dense. There is so much that one can grab onto and I think that it is impossible to not be filled with questions and a new look at the world and one’s own identity when reading this book. I was touched as a reader as I read this book on so many different levels and I believe that this is one book that truly does not have a target audience. It is meant for all.

Response to The Arrival by Shaun Tan

Jennifer Sherman
Graphic Novels

Response to The Arrival by Shaun Tan

As graphic novels have grown in popularity in recent years, I have ventured to read a few. While I found them interesting and fun to read, I have never come across one that I felt really bore any literary quality. I have never come across one that I felt was worthy to even be called real literature. Sure, I thought that they were a fun way to get kids to open a book and start the process of reading. I could see how they had the potential to get students exposed to the idea of narrative and how to tell and interpret a story. However, most graphic novels that I read came off as comic strips or funnies from the newspapers to me. That is, until I read The Arrival by Shaun Tan.

The first thing that set The Arrival apart from other graphic novels that I have read was its pictures. Unlike the other books that I read, this one did not have pictures that were cartoons or comic book-like in nature. Instead, this book had pictures that were very life-like. Rather than using the frames of shots or scenes that are drawn in fluorescent colors, this book used charcoal colors, gray, black, and white, to create its images. It made the book almost appear like a documentary. It was like we were following the character’s actions and travels through a series of still frames that were taken on the journey. I got the sense that these people were being followed. They were being documented. It was as if they were part of a history record or that they had to be watched and recorded as they were being accounted for as they entered the new country. I felt like the pictures were keeping a trail on the characters. For me, this made the book seem more authentic. It gave the book a much more serious tone that I felt was carried out throughout the plot development and messages of its content. As the book showed an immigrant entering another country, it took on a more historical content that I think fit well with these types of pictures.

I also thought that the pictures were very beautifully and artfully crafted. I loved their simplicity and their honesty. Everything was very minimalist, with a concentration on the people and their expressions. I thought it was amazing how much could be told just by the facial expressions of the characters. In the beginning, we can see the sadness in the families’ eyes. We begin to know that they are going to be separated before we see the man get on the boat. We can see the anxiety in the immigrants’ faces as they are being inspected. We can see the frustration in the main character’s face when he is trying to communicate with the other people in the town. Without even seeing the other characters or hearing their discussion, we are able to know that his efforts are unsuccessful just by the look on his face. I thought that this was amazing. It brought real meaning to the idea that a picture can hold a thousand words.

Furthermore, I felt that this focus on facial expressions created this instant connection between the characters and the reader. Because we were able to understand the story based on his expressions, we were instantly exposed to the human connection that existed between us. Our languages, backgrounds, religions, and cultures may be different, but our expressions and our feelings are the same. While, as readers, we may have been unaware of what exactly this man’s story was or what was even going on with him at that moment, we were still able to understand his feelings. Because we were able to connect to his sentiments, we were able to know the heart of his story. We were able to know what mattered. I felt that this focus on the human expression highlighted this universal bond that all people share and that many people fail to see when they concentrate on the differences that exist. In the end, it is important to know that while we may seem as though our differences make it impossible to coexist, we are fundamentally the same. We are all human beings. We all smile. We all cry. We all long to be loved and accepted.

I was amazed at how much the pictures were able to tell a story. They were able to capture all of the essential elements of the story, as they built on theme, suspense, plot, and character development. From the very first page I was taken aback when I was looking at the items that the man was packing. I saw the picture of this family, the hat, and the kettle. These things made sense to me. However, when I saw the paper bird, I was confused. I started to wonder if the family was going together or it was the man that was just leaving. As I was focused on this confusion, I forgot about the bird until I saw it come back at the end of the chapter when the father gave it to his daughter. This moment made me stop for a second. I was simply impressed at the author’s ability to use these pictures to create this suspense. The bird acted as an element of foreshadowing. It had the ability to simultaneously peak interest and give clarity to the plot of the story.

As I navigated through the pictures, I had to focus on every last detail, as I had no way of knowing what was important or essential to the plot of story. I had to navigate my way through the pictures and become a very active reader. Unlike in many other books where I feel I can fall back and ride on the coattails of the words to enter the story, this book made we work to read it. I had to analyze and reflect on each picture in order to make meaning. I had to see that set of pictures on the first page, and realize and wonder, why that bird did not fit with the rest. I think that this is simply an amazing way to build the skills that an active reader needs through what seems like a very easy an accessible task. A picture book seems nonthreatening, but in fact, it demands much more from the reader than many other books do.

The pictures did a great job of at showing the confusion of the character as they created this world filled with foreign and unknown objects and animals. As the character did not know what these objects or creatures were, they were depicted in a very odd and unrecognizable shape. What really struck me was the ability for the book to put the reader into the exact same position as the characters. This is where I thought that the picture book form really shined. I do not think that this connection could have been captured in any other form. Because the book required such an active reading, it often left the reader in a state of confusion. We had no background knowledge or guidance as to what was happening. We had no way of knowing what was being said, where we were, or what was going on. I loved that. I loved that we were just thrown into the book, forced to muddle our way through it and to find some sort of meaning.

Just like the character, we could not use words to understand. He could not understand what the other people were saying, and we could not hear the words. We both had to rely on our ability to decode foreign objects in order to create meaning. Once again, the only thing that we could really hold on to for meaning, were the facial expressions of the people. There were very little images in the background that were distinct or common. Even when they were objects that could be recognized like the paper bird, we had to decode these objects and figure out why they were significant. We had to make our own meaning as we struggled to make sense of the world. The ability for this book to create this sense of isolation was breathtakingly effective. I thought that this was the greatest asset of the book. It was what made it stand out as a respected piece of literature. It allowed the reader to have a more authentic experience, as they began to take on the perspective of the immigrant on their arrival to a new and unknown land.