Goddess Bootcamp

The Bookworm Says....YES!!!!! Goddess Bootcamp by Tera Lynn Childs was a great book. It is a sequel to Oh My Gods, and they were both excellent. Phoebe Castro is enjoying her summer, before she has to enter level 12. You see, Phoebe lives on a small Greek island of Serfopoula. Se is also the goddess Nikes great grand-daughter. All of the people on the island are part god, maybe not as closely related as Phoebe, but still related. She is beginning training in the morning with her dreamy boyfriend Griffin for the Pythian Games trials. The Pythian Games are like the Olympics, and she has to try out for the team. Phoebe also has troubles controlling her powers. Past incidents include: thinking about the ocean, and making it so her serious stepdad Damian was no longer in his office in a suit, but outside her door in a bathing suit. Damian gets a call from the gods saying she must take a test, and pass it or else... So he makes the only reasonable decision. Phoebe should be sent to Goddess Boot Camp. On the first day of camp, she is horrified when she steps inside. The room is full of 10 year olds. (Phoebe is 17) She thinks it can't get any worse, but then the counselors walk in. Adara Spencer, Griffins ex, and her enemy. Stella Petrolas, her evil stepsister. Then, a ragged, rebel boy named Xander. She struggles through camp, and suspects Griffin of cheating on her with Adara. One day, she is at home with Stella, and the doorbell rings. There is a note to Phoebe with a sequence that her friend identified as a call number for the library. She went to the library, and the book is in the secret collections. This book is about her dads trial at Mt. Olympus that got him killed. The librarian agrees to show her, but the book is missing. Later, Phoebe receives an email about the book, but when she goes to print it, it is blank. She goes to the schools computer geek, and asks him to find the sender. He is unable to, so she does what the email says. "Go to the courtyard at 12:00pm". She goes, and it is Damian. He gets her the book, but she chooses not to read it, afraid of what it says. A few days later at the Pythian Games, something strange happens. She is in third place, and confident because the top 3 get on the team. All of the sudden, a brunette girl shows up in front of her. No matter how hard she tries, she can't catch the lead. When her feet hit the finish line, she is heavily embraced. The brunette was an apparition. That was her test. She passed. And she made the Pythian Games team. This was a great day. I would recommend this book to almost anybody, but especially if you are interested in Greek history. But- I would advise reading Oh My Gods first.

The Graveyard Book

The Bookworm says......Maybe. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman was an okay book. I was reading it for a school assignment, and I'm not sure I would have just picked it up and read it. In The Graveyard Book, a little boy is sleeping, and a man called Jack went into his home and murdered his family. The little boy escaped, and crawled to the graveyard. Next, a ghost couple called The Owens, found him, and decided to protect him. They gave him the gift of the graveyard, and named him Nobody Owens, Bod for short. The reader realizes that this boy is the main character. One day a little girl named Scarlett is visiting the graveyard with her parents. She and Bod run off, and go down into a crypt. While down there, they are visited by The Indigo Man and The Sleer. They escape, but it was close. The next day, Bods guardian Silas leaves, and puts Bod in the care of Miss Lupescu. One night during Miss Lupescu’s stay, some ghouls snatched Bod up and took him to Ghulheim, the ghoul city. Miss Lupescu in the form of a grey dog saves him. When they got home, Bod went back down to visit The Sleer. He steals its brooch, and tries to sell it to an antique shop with the hopes of buying a ghost named Liza a headstone. The worker at the antique shop locks Bod in a back room. The worker calls The Man Jack that murdered Bods family but with the help of Liza the witch ghost, Bod escapes.

Bod gets home to the graveyard, everyone is acting strange. Not talking, just working and cleaning. Whenever he asks them a question or says hello, they sing a song that ends in “Lets all dance the Macabray”. Later on that night, they do just that. They had a great time, and Bod met some living children. This made him decide that he wanted to go to a real school, instead of being taught by Silas. So he does, and immediately sees bullying at its finest. He tries to stop it, and they target him. He outsmarts the bullies, and they vow not to bully again. Bod decides he has run his course at real school, after a run-in with the police. After a few years, there is exciting news. Scarlett has moved back from Scotland! She and Bod are at a local historian, Mr. Frost’s house having tea, and Bod goes to see a letter concerning his parent’s murder. Mr. Frost pulls out a knife, and tries to kill Bod. Mr. Frost is The Man Jack. He and his crew chase Bod and Scarlett back to the graveyard. This is the climax of the book. Scarlett hides with The Sleer, and Bod outsmarts The Man Jacks crew. They lure The Man Jack into the crypt, and resolve the conflict by tricking him into staying with The Sleer forever. All in all, it was a pretty good book. But,it was a little bit frightening, so I wouldn't recommend it for younger children.