Just Kids by Patti Smith Non-Fiction Reading Response

The title of the book “Just Kids” has great significance to the book because its the theme that carries the story. The main characters, Patti Smith and Robert Maplethorpe are literally just kids when we meet them. Even at the end of the story, even when they grow older, even after Robert has died, they remain kids at heart.

The story opens with the central character, Patti, describing her early childhood in the South of New Jersey. In her own words she was, “dreamy,” “precocious,” and deemed “impractical” by her elementary school teachers. Less then ten years later, dissatisfied with the grown - up world of south Jersey she sets her sights on New York. In New York she imagines she could be her real self. To Patti that meant staying just a precocious kid. 

Using the excuse, “just kids” Patti and her new best friend Robert think they can get away with anything. Like on page 152 when Patti tells Robert she’s just peed in a take - out cup instead of a toilet and thinks that’s normal. Patty is a poet/musician and Robert is a photographer. Together they spend almost ten years “playing” in the New York art scene in the mid 1970’s.

Over the time that we get to know them the pair almost always do the opposite of what a grown - up would do. Patti and Robert both have equally strong imaginations and they see eye to eye on almost everything. They don’t live on very much money, but they feel rich. They live in a very tiny apartment, but they don’t care. Don’t get me wrong Robert turns into a super famous artist and Patti becomes a musical goddess, a mother, a widow, and the soul survivor of the story. Through all of that she stays just a kid. And looking at Robert on his deathbed describes him in his last moment as, “a sleepy youth cloaked in light.”

I Am Number Four by Pittacus Lore Reading Response

The title, I Am Number Four, has great significance and is the theme of the story.  The story opens just as number Three is murdered.  We don’t know it yet, but the main protagonist, John Smith, is number Four and he is next to die.  John Smith, a sophomore in high school, has just arrived in Paradise, Ohio, but he has been moving around since he landed here on planet earth many years ago.

When John Smith was just barely able to walk his planet, Lorien, was invaded by its planetary neighbors the Mogadorians.  These evil neighbors were running out of resources to keep their race alive.  Their plan was to conquer earth, but this couldn’t happen until the last of the Lorien race was annihilated.  Number Four’s grandfather, who had raised him (all Loric children are raised by their grandparents and a guardian/protector), led him and his protector, Henri,to safety.  Along with eight other children and their guardians, John was sent to planet Earth on the last transport pod before Lorien was destroyed.

After their space journey the Loric children, each with their own protector, scattered over the Earth to start new lives.  John, for example,  lived in many places before finding a home in Ohio.  Each child also has a charm that protects them from being killed.  But the Mogadorians know their fatal weakness.  If they want to kill every last Loric child they have to do it in the sequence that the Lorien elders assigned.  To the Mogadorians these Loric children would be known as numbers One through Nine.

The Mogadarians have an inner sense when the children are near and can track them.  The Loric children just want to live a normal life without having to run.   They mostly get along with and learn how to share their lives with humans.  John is taught at an early age to act like his fellow humans. In Ohio he finally finds the girl of his dreams.  He falls in love with Sarah Hart and hopes that he will get the chance to make a life with her.  But from the minute we meet him, we know as well as he that at life with Sarah will not be an easy one to make. When the Mogadorians come for John he has to make the decision to fight back and defeat them and live a life with Sarah or let them kill him so they can conquer earth. He choses the obvious choice. Defeat the Mogadorians and find the other Loric children so he can live a long and harmonious life with Sarah.