The Chocolate War (pgs 201-250)

Summary: In these pages, things get a little awkward. Things get awkward and its primarily only for one reason. Within these pages contains information that the students are all set with chocolate. Not even a page later, the students want a whole lot more chocolate than expected. It may sound pretty awkard and strange but, that's this book. I also am starting to think that within these pages is where the title of the book is formed. Lately in the book, all they are talking about is chocolate.
Quote: "The compliment melted Brian's opposition. Besides, he was scared stiff of Archie amd The Vigils. Personal survival, that's what Brian believed in" (Cormier 236).
Reaction: How can you melt yourself's opposition?? Well anyway, I think Brian is coming up pretty often as the book is closing. There isn't much going on about Jerry anymore but that can quickly change as the book wraps up. So it is good that Brian believes in personal survival, which from that you can derive that he believes in surviving. I am not sure why it is "personal survival" but I am pretty sure Brian knows. That is what I derived from that quote.

The Chocolate War (pgs 151-200)

Summary: What happens in these 50 pages is that Brian Cochran is starting to have his sales dip extremely. He had to wonder if he did his arithmetic right. He shouldn't have that problem but I am pretty sure he'll get through it. Brian always wondered what Leon would say and it was in fact his main concern what Leon said. I don't know why but Leon would always make Brian nervous. It's truly an enigma as I hope Brian can get over his nervousness towards Leon.


Quote: "Brian flushed with anger. He was tempted to throw the master sheet at the Brother but held back. Nobody defied Brother Leon. Not Brian Cochran, anyway, who only wanted to get out of here." (Cormier 152)


Reaction: This situation reminds me of the ones where someone is so mad but no matter how mad they are, they would never react voilently toward a person of high respect to them. In this case, it's Brian and Leon. Brian is pretty upset that the sales are down for selling chocolate. I personally think someone should be trying to calm him down. Although that is what I think, they are in a gang and maybe they just let everyone deal with their own problems. So that is basically the main thing that went on through these pages of the book.

The Chocolate War (Pgs 101-150)

Summary: A lot more is going on in this book that seems to have the title make a little bit more sense as the story goes on. Aside from that, the first two pages of chapter 15 have Archie and Emile Janza talking about a picture. They don't actually mention what contains the picture for a while but it is later revealed that it is a picture of Archie. I brought this up because I think that it could be something that comes up later on in the book, especially the way that they talked about it.


Quote: "The next morning Jerry found out how a hangover must feel. His eyes burned with fire, fuueled by lack of sleep" (Cormier 124).


Reaction: This quote shows that Jerry hasn't got a full rep just yet. I say that because he is in the 9th grade and he is just now experiencing a hangover. I am not saying that by 9th grade you should have already had a hangover. What i am saying is that with what this book described him as in the beginning, he does not seem like he has been to that level yet. We will see if he rises to that level in these next few chapters.

The Chocolate War (pages 51-100)

Summary: I began to notice that just like in To Kill a Mockingbird, the first few words of a new chapter is in capital letters. I guess every author does that. Anyway, Jerry seems to be hangin out a lot with his gang "The vigils" in this section of the book. They were recruiting members to become a part of the gang in this section. Also the fundraiser seems to be heating up as well.


Quote: "Jerry's hands were joined like a duck's bill waiting to swallow the ball." (Cormier 77).


Reaction: I chose this quote because I think it shows a good use of a comparison (a simile). I think it does because it makes you really envision a duck and a duck's bill being closed together. Anyway, this quote is a quote that has to do with football. Jerry seems to be at practice and the coach seems to like what he is doing on the field. The coach seems to love to swear since he does not accept you as a player unless he called you a "son of a .....".

The Chocolate War (pgs 1-50)

Summary: The opening part of the book pretty much jumped out at me. It jumped out at me because I don't think every book just starts off with the phrase "THEY MURDERED HIM". The "him" is a guy named Jerry Renault and he is 14 years old. From what the book tells me, his sport seems to be football. Let's see what happens in the future.


Quote: "He was sorry to leave the earth, and he was vaguely curious about how he was going to get up, with both legs smashed and his skull battered in" (Cormier 3)


Reaction:I think this quote enlightens us in many different ways. Well one way is that it kind of lets you know that this book is one of those books that is in told in the past. It lets you know that because of the verb tense of the word "was". Also, Jerry was vaguely curious about how he was going to get up. I find that peculiar because I don't really see how you can be curious about your own actions. It is kind of like waking up in the morning and being curious on what you are going to eat for breakfast. It is just peculiar to be curious about your own actions. So that is how I percieve the quote.

ROAR term 2 notes on books

Staircase of a Thousand Steps: Just from the title of the book, I can predict that it might be a memoir type of book and it could be about where the events may occur one by one instead of over a series of different times. In this book lies "Steam rises off a dirt floor made shiny with sheep's blood..." (Hamilton). From that it seems like there could be horror involved. From the mini description, it could be each event that happened in the past explained in this book.

The Chosen: The title of this book makes me think that these two guys were destined to meet. It also makes me think that there are going to be some events that occur in which they are going to need each other to overcome it but one person may be upset at the other, that type of situation.

The Chocolate War: This seems like a pretty interesting book and could be something toward my direction of reading. I can't really tell what might be the contents of the book from the title but it could be that there might be a huge fight at the end that concludes the book.

Only the Strong Survive, The Odyssey of Allen Iverson (pgs 201-262)

Summary: In the conclusion of this book, AI has to adjust to new types of things on his team, the 76ers. Instead of being a defensive-minded team, the team became more offensive-minded because of the addition of players who could shoot from the outside and they were looking to score alot more. This would affect Iverson greatly since he is just a pure scorer and can simply put the ball in the basket. Now he was surrounded by people who were more like him. What this conlcusion also holds is the infamous case that involved AI and his possesion of guns. Although there was a witness that said AI possesed a gun, the character of that witness was not mature and also, there were no present victims and nobody was harmed.
Quote: "Within weeks of the Sixers' ousting from the playoffs, the Iverson-Brown saga, one of sports' most interesting psychodramas, came to a sudden close" (Platt 262).
Reaction: Well I also think that this has been an interesting psychodrama because just watching this on actual TV a while ago was just really exciting in a way. What this pretty much was was that AI and coach Larry Brown had a lot of disputes and it would have an affect on the team. As far as right now, they have a good relationship but back then, they would have their disputes and AI would disobey team rules. One for example was not showing up ti practices without any type of warning. I do agree with the part of the quote where they said it came to a sudden close. This actually did come to a sudden close and everything was all well again between coach Brown and AI.

Only the Strong Survive, The Odyssey of Allen Iverson (pgs 151-200)

Summary: These 50 pages focus on AI's NBA life. Also, it focuses on his normal life after he is in the NBA. A famous rapper named "Mase" invited AI to Atlanta, where Mase would record. AI must have been excitied because he also loved rap music. When AI was on the Philadelphia 76ers, it was deemed questionable whether head coach of the sixers at the time Larry Brown and AI would coexist peacefully.
Quote: "It was for six years and $71 million." (Platt 157)
Reaction: This has a really huge impact on AI in some different ways. First of all, with this kind of contract he is being offered, he can take care of his family which is something he has pretty much made his goal to do. His state of mind was to take care of his family and with this money, that would soon happen. This would also change AI in a way that might impact just how he is and would make him realize that it is a true blessing to be in the NBA and make that type of money.

Only the Strong Survive, The Odyssey of Allen Iverson (pgs 51-100)

Summary: The next 50 pages really focuses on some AI's basketball life and also some other situations with one where he does get into trouble off the court. He is actually found guilty of three felony counts of maiming by mob. What people might interpret from that is that he was hurt by a mob. What it really means was that he was hurting others while in a mob. What also happens now is that Allen Iverson is declared a man and he had to take care of his mother and sisters at this point. Allen interpreted that as he needed to start making money in order to take care of the family.
Quote: "You're the man now" "You've got to take care of your mother and sisters." (Platt 66)
Reaction: My reaction to this was that AI took that to heart. I think so because he really did try and start to take care of them by trying to find a job. AI did used to think that the only way he could make money for the family is to sell drugs. I find it interesting how he is balancing this and the summer leaugue, which is basketball played during the summer with people on the pro level.

Only the Strong Survive: The Odyssey of Allen Iverson (pgs 1-50)

Summary: The first 50 pages of the book really produced a lot of concrete background information about Allen Iverson, or "AI". AI was raised in Newport News, VA, which was a small Southern city with a strong migratory connection to New York City. Contained inside of these first 50 pages are AI being compared and spoken to by many people who were popular in pop culture in the 90's. One of those people were Tupac.
Quotation:
" In a sense, Allen Iverson is Tupac with a jumpshot" (Platt 7)

Reaction: What I first thought of when I saw this quote was that the quote was trying to say that AI was extremely gifted. I thought of that because when I think of Tupac, I think of someone who was very skilled and gifted as a rapper. This quote is comparing AI with Tupac and Tupac was a huge hit in the 90's as a rapper. This quote shows that AI is extremely gifted when it comes to the sport of basketball.