Rating: WARTY!
This is a great idea for a book - a boy who finds an old origami book which has magic in its paper, but the execution of it was lacking a heck of lot in a wide variety of areas. There were numerous mistakes in it, in both spelling and grammar. There were also problems with the plot. This is a pity, because it's a good idea for a story. I'm sorry it wasn't executed better.
'There was a wide variety of writing problems. One was common - missed apostrophes, such as in "the books pages" and in "I pictured the spider on David skin," which was missing a possessive suffix, and " with the help of David embarrassed parents escorted him from the seats." There was a number of misspellings of the kind that a spellchecker won't catch such as "...where I planed to put the other one" (the author meant 'planned'), and "It made me grown in despair" (the author meant 'groan'), and "David might hit hard, but deepening on how much he wanted to hit me..." (the author meant 'depending').
There were poorly written sentences such as " He snatched out his hand and made a grab for", and poor grammar: bunch of people had gathered around David and some other girl" which amusingly suggests that David is a girl. There were sentences where the negative was clearly intended, but what was written was a positive statement such as "Even if they did move," in place of "Even if they didn't move."
There were inexplicable actions, such as Joseph at one point developing a crush on Toni out of nowhere. He signs up for school play stage crew just to be close to her. The sign-up sheet has just been posted, yet the play is only a few days away - where's the planning and rehearsal time? The problem with this relationship with Toni is that not only is it completely out of the blue, but also that she's described as the prettiest girl - like this is her only value and it's the only reason he likes her. This is an insult to girls and it's not acceptable.
My biggest problem was that of the unrelenting and very public bullying going on here, yet not a single teacher steps up to prevent it or to bring it up in class to denigrate it and warn those who would do it. This is the case even when the bullying happens in the classroom! No one speak sup about it. not even any of the other kids - and these are the same kids Joseph is suppose dot end up friends with at the end of the book!
The bullying is never reported even by Joseph, even when he's punched and kicked right at the school gate by fellow students. This is not a good example to set for kids. The only policy with regard to bullying is one of absolutely no tolerance. Along with this, Joseph has his origami book stolen out of his locker and no one, not Joseph nor anyone else who learns of the theft, ever reports it. This is nonsensical.
The sloppy writing became increasingly prevalent as the story went on. Here are some examples:
- There I grabbed some normal paper large origami paper
- And any student in the production could be excused right not to get ready
- "I'm sorry children, but the play would have to be canceled."
- "I'm sorry children, but the play would have to be canceled." (they were wet - maybe she did wad them up!)
- causing a short blunder of confusion.
- dipped out of the behind the curtain ready to throw myself on his smug nasty face for the evil thing he did to all of us.
On top of that, the book's ending was just too speedy and perfect. I can't give a bye to young writers when they write so badly, so I can't recommend this with it getting a serious overhaul first. it's good for a first draft, but nowhere near good enough for a published novel.
