Muffin's book journal

6

2005-04-25T19:12:00.000-07:00

6. A static character does not change in any significant way. Name one character in your book who would be considered a static character. Explain why he/she is static. A static character I would say is defiantly be the man in the yellow suit. When you first meet him he doesn’t seem to care all that much about anything other than finding the Tucks. As the story goes on we realize that he wants the Tucks to take him to the spring. All he cares about is how he wants to find the Tucks and make them show him where the spring is and how he doesn’t want to die. He wants to live forever and he doesn’t see a bad side to that at all. He said that he wouldn’t have to worry about disease or getting hurt because none of that would matter if he drank out of the spring. He seems like a mean person who is a little selfish and he stays that way throughout the book so far. The only reason why he wants to help the Fosters is so that he will be able to find the Tucks. Now that he owns the Fosters woods he is getting closer and closer to finding where the Tucks and the spring are. He also knows that the Tucks aren’t mean and that they care enough about Winnie that they wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to her, so they would probably do anything so that she doesn’t get hurt or in trouble.

5

2005-04-22T19:08:00.000-07:00

A dynamic character changes during the course of a story as a result of the events which occur. Name one character in your book who would be considered a dynamic character. How does this character change?
In the beginning of Tuck Everlasting we meet Winnie as a shy girl that seems to be very lonely. She just wants to escape her life how it was in the beginning of the book, so she wanders off one day. She ends up running into Jesse Tuck. His brother and him take her to their house which is in her woods and Winnie is very scared. She tells them that her father is very wealthy and that he will give them whatever they want. After spending what may have been a couple of days or weeks with the Tucks she grows to like them. After awhile she seems to start to like Jesse and she isn’t scared of them anymore, she actually likes being with them now.

4

2005-04-20T19:06:00.000-07:00

A round character is complex and has many different personality traits Name one character in your book who would be considered a round character. Describe the personality of this character.
A round character in this book could be many people. I’m choosing Miles because when he first saw Winnie he was extremely angry at Jesse for letting her seem him and talking to her. He seems like a very mean guy when Winnie first encounters him but then you see a different side of him when he told Winnie about his wife. He sat down with her and told her about his son and daughter and how old they would be by now. When he talked about his wife and children I could tell that he loved them a lot and that he wasn’t just a mean guy who didn’t care about anything. He had lost a couple of people that were really close to him and when he talked about that you could tell that he missed them and felt a huge sense of loss.

3

2005-04-18T19:03:00.000-07:00

An antagonist is the character or force which blocks the main character. Who or what is the antagonist of your book? How does the antagonist work against the book's protagonist? The antagonist in my book would be this strange man in a yellow suit. He came to Winnie’s house one day and asked her if she has heard of the name Tuck. We then find out that he wants to find them because he knows something about them. The Fosters even sold him their forest because he knows that the Tucks live in it, so when Winnie was “kidnapped” he went to the constable and told him that he knew where the Tucks had taken her. The man in the yellow suit told the constable how far they had taken her and everything, so we find out at this point that the Tucks will probably be caught and blamed for her kidnapping. This man goes against the Tucks and he makes them out to be the bad person in everything that has happened.

new 2

2005-04-10T15:06:00.000-07:00

The protagonist in the book Tuck Everlasting could be two different people. I have only read a couple of chapters in my book, so im not for sure which it would be, either Jesse or Winnie. Jesse is the son of Tuck and Mae. He also has a brother named Miles, I found this out in one of the first chapters, but Winnie or Winifred is a Foster. In the first couple of chapters you don't know the name of her parents but she seems like a lonely girl who probably doesn't have any brothers of sisters. She talks to a toad and this is why I think she is very lonely. I have not read further to know anymore information about her yet.

New 1

2005-04-08T10:22:00.000-07:00

The title of the novel is Tuck Everlasting. There are 139 pages in this book. Its Copyright 1975by Natalie Babbitt. This book looked interesting to me because it looked like a moving story about living forever and that seems really interesting to me. I got the clues that the book is about living forever by reading the back of the book.

Nine

2005-03-16T10:05:00.000-08:00

1) WHO is the main character of the novel? How does the character change over the course of the story? How would you describe this character’s personality?
The main character is a woman named Eleanor. In the beginning of the novel she is extremely shy and seems to be trapped. In the end she knows who she is and in a way emerges out of a “cocoon” that she needed to escape from for most of her adult life. All of her emotions and her past sort of entangled her and kept her from moving on and actually experiencing life. Her personality is shy, lonely and to herself. She thinks that if there isn’t anything important to say then why try talking at all.

2) WHAT is the novel about?
The novel is about a group of people coming to live in a house which is believed to be haunted. This novel is also about changes in life, trying to get along with others, and helping even your enemies out when they need someone.

3) WHERE does the story take place? What is the setting(s) and how does it add to the novel. How does the location relate to the characters and theme? What time period or era? How can you tell? If the novel involves more than one setting, choose the most important one and explain why.

The story takes place in a couple of different places. The main place where this story takes place is at least an hour from town in Hill House. If you needed help or screamed no one would be there to help you. It makes you think about if you actually did need someone to help you they wouldn’t be able to hear you. It makes the story more intense. The time period is in the present time because they drive cars and they talk about where they live. The setting that involves Hill House is the most important because that is where most of the story takes place.

4) WHEN does the climax of the novel occur? Tell me about it.

I think that the climax of the novel is at the end. There are many high points in the story that could be the climax, like when Eleanor went to the top of the tower and the stairs were not sturdy and she could have died. Luke and Theo had to try and get her down before she fell off.

5) WHY did the author write this story? What point is the author trying to make? Link your why response to a theme.

I think that the author wrote this story to show us about people’s lives. I also think the author wrote it to show us that we shouldn’t be selfish and that we should not just think about ourselves, but the lives of others. This book is about good and bad changes and I think the author wanted us to see that.
Rate your Novel. I rate my novel a 8 because it was interesting and had a lot of detail. I didn’t give it a 9 or 10 because in some points of the novel it got boring. I also didn’t give it the highest rate because I liked the movie better than I liked the novel.

Day Eight

2005-03-13T19:03:00.000-08:00

Five objects Theodora would put in her suitcase would be things that relate to fashion and how to make her look better. The first item would be clothes, lots and lots of clothes. She is into fashion so for her to have lots of clothes is a normal thing for her. Makeup would also be one of the objects in her suitcase because she wants to make herself look as good as possible. Hair things would defiantly be in her suitcase also because like I said before she cares what she looks like. I think that jewelry would also be in there if not already on her. She seems to be self conceded, stuck up and she would like to show off what she has. The last thing I think that she would have in her suitcase would be a picture of herself. She doesn’t really seem to care about other people; it always has to be about Theodora. If she were to carry a bag it would be huge and decorated with beads or a pattern of some sort. She would also want it to be name brand and extremely expensive.

Day Seven

2005-03-04T17:49:00.000-08:00

The conflict in The Haunting is that Eleanor feels like an outsider. When she comes to Hill House she feels like she can start over and then she meets Theodora and the other guests. The house starts to do weird things now (or so it may seem) and they are sort of starting to believe that the house might be haunted. Then, later as I read more you can tell that all of the guests staying at Hill House can feel that something just doesn’t seem right in the house and that it might actually be haunted. But more than anything the conflict is between Eleanor and Theodora. In this point of the book you can tell quite easily that they both have a thing for Luke and the struggle in the novel is over him, at least for Eleanor it is a big struggle or conflict at this time.

Day Six

2005-03-03T10:20:00.000-08:00

"I purpose," the doctor said, setting down my napkin, "that we take our coffee in our little parlor. I find that fire very cheerful."
I giggled. "Mrs. Dudley's gone, so let's race aroud fast and get all those doors and windows open and take everything down from the shelves-."
"The house seems different when shr's not in it," Eleanor said.
"Emptier." Luke looked at her and nodded; he was arranging the coffee cups on a tray, and the doctor had already gone on, doggedly opening doors and propping them. "Each night I realize suddenly that we four are alone here."

five

2005-02-27T17:31:00.000-08:00

The setting of The Haunting, I think is in a smaller city or town. I think it is also in our time or maybe a couple of years ago. The author uses a scene of place throughout the novel to show how Eleanor, the main character, grew up. The author then brings us to a place in her present where she is grown up but still isn’t treated that way by her sister and brother-in-law. Then, the author takes us to Hill House where Eleanor is around people that don’t treat her like she is still a little kid. I think that all three places described so far are important to this novel. When it talks about her home as a child you start to understand why she is so shy and as the story progresses you understand that even more. Finally, when she goes to Hill House it shows us how she is starting to talk again and that she is not a weirdo like other people may think she is.

Fourth Day

2005-02-17T09:58:00.000-08:00

"No human eye can isolate the unhappy coincidence of line and place which suggests evil in the face of a house, and yet somehow a maniac juxtapostition, a badly turned angle, some chance meeting a roof and sky, turned Hill House into a place of dispair, more frightening because the face of Hill House seemed awake, with a watchfulness from the blake windows and a touch of glee in the eyebrow of a cornice."

This quote is important to the reader because it describes Hill House without having to say what it looks like physically. It also gives you a creepy feeling, in my opinion, which also describes the feeling of the house. When it said a badly turned angle you get the feeling that the house is evil or that it might even be haunted. This quote is important because it starts to describe how the house is awake and that it isn't just a regular old house.

"When they were silent for a moment the quiet weight of the house pressed down from all around them. Eleanor, woundering is she were really here at all, and not dreaming of Hill House from some safe spot impossibly remote, looked slowly and carefully around the room, telling herself that this was real, these things existed, from the tiles around the fireplace to the marble cupid; these people were going to be her friends."

This quote shows us that the house is kind of like a person and that it is alive. In this quote Eleanor feels like she is in a dream. I think that this is improtant becasue she doesn't feel like it is real and that she deserves this oppertunity. Eleanor feels for the first time since she was little that she might actually have friends. This is so unreal for her that she actually has to try and convince herself that it is real. This quote shows you how Eleanor has had a hard life.

Third Day

2005-02-15T19:13:00.000-08:00

After reading this far into the novel The Haunting, I have learned a lot about the character Eleanor. She is the main character but the author reveals her character in various ways. So far the author talks about her childhood and in one incident it talks about how stones fell onto her house when she was younger. Eleanor and her sister didn’t really care about the stones as much as the neighbors and sightseers who came to watch. Then Eleanor and her sister were removed from that house to the house of a friend. (This is the reason Dr. Montague wrote a letter to Eleanor inviting her to come stay at Hill House for an experiment to find evidence of psychic phenomenon.) I think that this incident is part of the reason why Eleanor is the way she is when she is older. She is very shy and the author said that straight out. She doesn’t say anything when there is nothing to say, which I think means that she might be worried about what people think of her. Eleanor has also been treated very unfairly. Her sister still treats her like a child and doesn’t think that she is responsible enough. When Eleanor had to take care of her mother, her mother would call her in the middle of the night by hitting her cane against the wall. The author talks about how she can still hear the knocking sound on the wall. She has had a rough life and she doesn’t have one friend. Eleanor is a loner, but she doesn’t really pity herself and she doesn’t come off depressed either, although I think she may be.

second

2005-02-07T13:47:00.000-08:00

The main character is a young woman named Eleanor. The author also gives a brief summary of the other characters in this novel but does not really descibe them in depth. Eleanor has been treated very unfairly in her life so far, she has no friends and she is very shy. The setting is in our time and all of the characters go to this very old house that Dr. Montague believes to be "haunted". In the first 30 pages the author does not really describe the house yet but all of the characters have met and are sitting down and talking about what is going to happen.

First day

2005-01-27T10:17:00.000-08:00

The title of the novel is The Haunting by Shirley Jackson. There are 246 pages in this book. Its Cover Art Copyright 1999 Dream Works and published in Penguin Books 1999. This book looked interesting to me because it looked like a scary haunting tale. I got the clues that the book is about a house that is haunted and that a few people go to live there for awhile.