Page 161

" The men lay gasping like fish laid out on the grass.  They held to the earth as children hold to familiar things, no matter how cold or dead, no matter what has happened or will happen, their fingers were clawed into the dirt, and they were all shouting to keep their eardrums from bursting, to keep their sanity from bursting, mouths open, Montag shouting with them, a protest against the wind that ripped their faces and tore at their lips, making their noses bleed. "

This suspenseful mystery will keep you on the edge of your seats.  Montag's job as a fireman is to burn books; but throughout this story, you will learn his struggle to keep his sanity as well as what goes along with his job.  The author packs this book with loads of descriptive language, making every little detail important to understanding the real story.  I recommend this book to very engaged readers who love a mystery to solve on their own, not one the book will solve for them.  What could happen in a world with no books?  The real question is are there still books...and if so, where are they?  "It was a pleasure to burn."

Page 165

And on either side of the river was there a tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yeilded her fruit every month; And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Yes, thought Montag, that's the one I'll save for noon. For noon . . .
When we reach the city.

I think this is a very short but effective cliff hanger. Even though the author did not make another book, it still leaves the reader wondering what is going to happen to Montag and his group when they get into the city. This book is basically about how the goverment has banned books because they express fictional or fake feelings that is not real life. So they send out these "firemen" to go burn down the house with the books in them. But the reality of it is that books are essentail to young people like students and even abults to read and learn from them. It gives us an escape and a vocabulary builder. If you like complicated books with a good cliffhanger I would totally suggest this book to you. It is great for both young and mature readers. It really makes you look at how he uses his words and strutures them in his sentences. This book really Flows!

Page 117

Blog post #4
The house fell in red coals and black ash. It bedded itself down in sleepy pink-gray cinders and a smoke plume blew over it, rising and waving slowly back and forth in the sky. It was three-thirty in the morning. The crowd drew back into houses; the great tents of the circus had slumped into charcoal and rubble and the show was well over.
Montag stood with the flame thrower in his limp hands, great islands of perspiration drenching his armpits, his face smeared with soot. The other firemen waited behind him, in the darkness, their faces illuminated faintly by the smouldering foundation.
Montag started to speak twice and then finally managed to put his thought together.
"Was it my wife turned in the alarm?"
Beatty nodded.

In this passage it captures the emotion of Montag and how defeated he feels. He burned down his own house and was betrayed by his own wife. He shows great discription on how the house looks after it's burned down. I kind of feel sorry for the guy trying to rebel against a bad thing and still ending up being defeated. I really like the line " the great tents of the circus had slumped into charcoal and rubble and the show was well over." It shows us how it is not as big and tall as it used to be but now just ash and rocks still flaming in scilence. It felt like he was describing a scene in a movie after an explosion happened and people are just standing around looking at it.

Page#148

Blog #5
Granger nodded. "They're faking. You threw them off at the river. They can't admit . They know they can hold thew their audience only so long. The show's got to have a snap ending, quick!! If they started searching the whole damn river it might take all night. So they're sniffing for a scapegoat to end things with a bang. Watch. They'll catch Montag in the next five minutes!"
"But how-"
"Watch"
The camera, hovering in the belly of a helicopter, now swung down at an empty street.
"See that?" Whispered Granger. "It'll be you; right up at the end of that street is our victim. See how our camera is coming in? Building the scene. Suspense. Long shot. Right now, some poor fellow is out for a walk. A rarity. AN odd one. Don't think the police don't know the habits of queer ducks like that, men who walk mornings for the hell of it, or for reasons of insomnia. Anyway, the police have had him charted for months, years. Never know when that sort of information might be handy. And today, It turns out, IT's very usable indeed. IT saves a face. Oh Go, look there!"
The men at the fire bent forward.
On the screen, a man turned a corner. The mechanical Hound rushed forward into the viewer, suddenly. The helicopter lights shot down a dozen brilliant pillars that built a cage about the man.
A voice cried, "There's Montag! The search is done.

This was my favorite part in the book. It's basically a good summary of how screwed up their entire government is. In this book it shows the entire decline of society. As people's attention spans get shorter and shorter, the use for things such as books dissipates, and gets outlawed. It really makes you appreciate proper  education. I think the author was trying to say something more than just telling a simple story. It's like he's trying to send a message. You shouldn't burn books to fit your lifestyle. Burning books in a figurative sense, but it's still just as applicable to daily life as it is in this. There's something pure and magic about the written word that sometimes shouldn't be tampered with.
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a good read. It requires focus, and often makes you second guess, because it feels like the words were written in a hurry, like spitting pure thoughts onto a page. Even though you might need to second guess yourself a couple times and do a double-take, the language is great. Ray Bradbury is an amazing writer, so if you haven't read this book then it is a must have before you die.

Page #122

Blog #4
Beatty wanted to die.
In the middle of the crying Montag knew it for the truth. Beatty had wanted to die. He had just stood there, not really trying to save himself, just stood there, joking, needling, thought Montag,and the thought was enough to stifle his sobbing and let him pause for air. How strange, strange, to want to die so much that you let a man walk around armed and then instead of shutting up and staying alive, you go on yelling at people and making fun of them until you get them mad, and then...

Beatty was a questionable character to me. Basically he acted like a jerk throughout the entire book, all because he wanted to die. I think he was afraid to die, to die on his own anyways. It wasn't good enough for him to just go out like everyone else, or to take the obvious shortcut. He had to go out with a bang, at another man's hand. He poked and prodded and rolled poor Montag. He made him feel so insignificant and primal that he had done what Beatty wanted after all.

Page #100

Blog #3
Mrs. Phelps was crying.
The others in the middle of the desert watched her crying grow very loud as her face squeezed itself out of shape. They sat, not touching her, bewildered with her display. She sobbed uncontrollably. Montag himself was shaken and stunned.

I find crying hard to describe, mostly because when it happens it's almost surreal. I think this metaphor describes it well. 'They sat in the middle of the desert'. In this story, showing emotion is basically a crime, crying in front of others is socially unheard of, so when it happens, no one knows what to do. 'bewildered with her display.' It's a desert, a dry empty, place, and that's what it was like. I thought this was interesting.

Blog Post #5 (FINAL BLOG)

1.  Always title your blog post with the PAGE # (this will help others avoid reading spoilers).

2.  For your FINAL blog- you can choose ANY section from the book.

3.  Blogs will have 2 parts- Part 1:  passage from the book  Part 2:  commentary

4.  Don't forget to comment/interact with your peer's posts!

5.  You CANNOT choose the same passage as someone else- the first one to post claims it!

For your final blog, you can choose from ANY WHERE in the book.  You are going to do a sort of book review.  Your first paragraph should still be a passage from the book but your FAVORITE passage.  It might be a particularly well written section, or the most exciting part, or a great cliffhanger.  For your second paragraph you do not have to analyze this passage but rather write a paragraph long book review.  Let us know what this book is like and pitch it! If you weren't a huge fan, think about what kind of person might like to read this book.  This should be a STRONG paragraph- not a sentence or two!  

--
Ms. Melin

https://sites.google.com/site/mselmer114/

Page #91

You could feel the war getting ready in the sky that night. The way the clouds moved aside and came back, and the way the stars looked, a million of them swimming between the clouds, like the enemy disks, and the feeling that the sky might fall upon the city and turn it to chalk dust, and the moon go up in red fire; that was how the night felt.

Short and effective this paragraph captures the mood in the story. How your supposed to be feeling and a concious connection to Montag and how he feels. It shows you his mood and how stress minded he is. It is kind of an extended metaphor but just not as long. He feels as if its just him against the world. As there are few people who really want books in this "new" world. He referecnes the moon going up in fire because thats what he feels like. He's just burning everything down with an unreasonable excuse. The feeling that the enemy ships or disks would just attack or drop bombs and turn everything to dusk. That really puts it into perpective and what he's matched up against. This is the part where he doesn't put in a lot of descriptive language but the concept and overall metaphor is what gets his readers.

Page 127

"He began to shuffle idiotically and talk to himself and then he broke and just ran.  He put out his legs as far as they would go and down and then far out again and down and back and dout and down and back,  God! God! He dropped a book, broke pace, almost turned, changed his mind, plunged on, yelling in concrete emptiness, the beetle scuttling after its running food, two hundred, one hundred feet away, ninety, eighty, twenty, Montag gasping, flailing his hands, legs up down out, up down out, closer, closer, hooting, calling, his eyes burnt white now as hid head jerked about to confront the flashing glare, now the beetle was swallowed in its own light, now it was nothing but a torch hurtling upon him; all sound, all blare.  Now- almost on top of him! He stumbled and fell. I'm done! It's over!"

My favorite thing about this passage is the way the author propels the scene forward and forward and then it suddenly stops.  Like we talked about in class, this author effectively uses sentence length variety.  In the middle of the passage, you can see the repetition he uses to create this mass sentence building all the tension.  Then he starts to decrease the length of the sentences and ends with "I'm done! It's over!"  The author frequently uses repetition and parallel sentence structure to propel his writing forward.  By using this technique, the author has the reader experiencing the scene like the character is; second by second. When I read this, my brain tends to skip over some of it, probably because it's waiting for the main event the repetition is leading up to.  I think some use of repetition is good, but overusing it isn't as effective.  I think one reason the author used frequent repetition was to show how insane and frantic this character was. 

Page 93

"He was eating a light supper at nine in the evening when the front door cried out in the hall and Mildred ran from the parlor like a native fleeing an eruption of Vesuvius.  Mrs. Phelps and Mrs. Bowles came through the front door and vanished into the volcano's mouth with martinis in their hands.  Montag stopped eating.  They were like a monstrous crystal chandelier tinkling in a thousand chimes, he saw their Cheshire Cat smiles burning through the walls of the house, and now they were screaming at each other above the din."

The figurative language I thought was effective was the use of imagery and similes.  These vivid descriptions like "vanished into the volcano's mouth" create tension in the reader's head while reading.  I love when the author compares the women to a "monstrous crystal chandelier tinkling in a thousand chimes."  I believe this almost confuses the reader.  But then in the next line it says, "their Cheshire Cat smiles burning through the walls of the house."  I absolutely LOVE this line.  For me, "Cheshire Cat" made it clear these women were like the Cheshire Cat in the sense that they are sneaky and don't reveal their true identity.  By analyzing the figurative language, I can conclude the author sees these women as mischievous and evil; like burning machines.

Blog Post #4 (THIRD QUARTER OF NOVEL)

1.  Always title your blog post with the PAGE # (this will help others avoid reading spoilers).

2.  You will have 4 blogs- each blog will be about a quarter of the book- this second blog should be from the THIRD QUARTER of the book.

3.  Blogs will have 2 parts- Part 1:  passage from the book  Part 2:  analysis of the passage.

4.  Don't forget to comment/interact with your peer's posts!

5.  You CANNOT choose the same passage as someone else- the first one to post claims it!

For your third blog, I'm giving you FREE REIGN.  You may post about ANYTHING.  Just make sure you pull a passage and then comment/analyze/question that passage.  Happy Spring Break!

--
Ms. Melin

https://sites.google.com/site/mselmer114/

Blog Post #3

1.  Always title your blog post with the PAGE # (this will help others avoid reading spoilers).

2.  You will have 4 blogs- each blog will be about a quarter of the book- this second blog should be from the SECOND QUARTER of the book.

3.  Blogs will have 2 parts- Part 1:  passage from the book  Part 2:  analysis of the passage.

4.  Don't forget to comment/interact with your peer's posts!

5.  You CANNOT choose the same passage as someone else- the first one to post claims it!

For your second blog, I would like you to analyze the author's use of figurative language (metaphor, simile, personification).  Some writers are extremely figurative  .  As you read the second quarter of your novel look for the BEST example of figurative language the author uses.  

In part one, write out the example of figurative language (include the surrounding text so that we can have the context of your example).  If your author uses NO figurative language in their writing- instead find a passage where the author could have used figurative language   Include the passage where the figurative language COULD have been.

In part two, explain why the figurative language was so effective.  Think about the feelings it creates in the reader, the picture it shows, or the idea it represents.  You also want to think about the figurative language IN CONTEXT.  How does the figurative language work within the scope of the story?  IF your author has no figurative language, explain how you would have incorporated it into the text OR talk about why his style works literally instead of figuratively.

--
Ms. Melin

https://sites.google.com/site/mselmer114/

Page #43

He tried to count how many times she swallowed and he thought of the visit form the two zinc-oxide-faced men with the cigarettes in their straight-lined mouths and the Electronic-Eyed Snake winding down into the layer upon layer of night and stone and stagnant spring water and he wanted to call out to her, how many have you taken tonight! the capsules! how many will you take later and not know? and so on, every hour! or maybe not tonight, tomorrow night! And me not sleeping tonight or tomorrow night or any night for a long while, now that this has started. And he thought of her lying on the bed with the two technicians standing straight over her, not bent with concern, but only standing straight, arms folded. And he remembered thinking then that if she died, he was certain he wouldn't cry. For it would be the dying of an unknown, a street face, a newspaper image, and it was suddenly so very wrong that he had begun to cry, not at death but at the thought of not crying at death, a silly empty man near a silly empty woman, while the hungry snake made her still more empty.

I think this captures the authors descriptiveness because he describes the feeling of apathy. He is able to accurately show what it's like for someone to feel so empty, to live a life like everyone around you is inanimate. My favorite part about this paragraph is the last sentence. This was the woman Montag was supposed to be in love with, but he didn't even know  her enough to be able to cry at her death. This paragraph shows that all he ever wanted was to have something real, he wanted to care and he wanted to love, but he couldn't because something was holding him back. It's mainly the way he describes it, it's simple, and complicated, and hard to explain, but it gets the point across and it does it beautifully. It might have something to do with the way Bradbury puts it on the paper. I've noticed that he has a lot of really long sentences, there are pauses in between, but his thoughts are never really 'finished', it almost tires the reader out and shoots them into oblivion to think about what they've just read. It works really effectively.

Page 37

"Books bombarded his shoulders, his arms, his upturned face.  A book lit, almost obediently, like a white pigeon, in his hands, wings fluttering. In the dim, wavering light, a page hung open and it was like a snowy feather, the words delicately painted thereon.  In all the rush and fervor, Montag had only an instant to read a line, but it blazed in his mind for the next minute as if it stamped there with fiery steel.  "Time has fallen asleep in the afternoon sunshine."  He dropped the book.  Immediately, another fell into his arms."

One of the reasons I love this passage is because of the comparison between the book and the white pigeon.  I've noticed that Bradbury compares opposites to engage and almost surprise the reader.  When you think of fire, you don't think of a pure, white pigeon.  Using these type of comparisons makes the reader think a little bit more.  You have to uncover the "top layer" of the words, and discover the meaning hidden between the lines.  I also find Bradbury's word choice very thought out.  Not one word is just "there on the page."  It has a specific reason and purpose.  For example, the sentence, "...but it blazed in his mind for the next minute as if it stamped there with fiery steel," demonstrates this technique.  The words "blazed" and "fiery steel" are used to create the vivid image in the reader's head.  It builds the intensity of the moment.  I think that's a good way to describe Bradbury's style.  He produces some of these unfamiliar words, and comparisons, and vivid descriptions to build constant intensity.

Page #45

    A great thunderstorm of sound gushed from the walls. Music bombarded him at such an immense volume that his bomes were almost shaken from their tendons; he felt his jaw vibrate, his eyes wobbly in his head. He was a victim of concussion. When it was all over he felt like a man who had been thrown from a cliff, whirled in a centrifuge, and spat out over a waterfall that fell and fell into emptiness and emptiness and never-quite-touched-bottom-never-quite-no not quite-touched-bottom...and you fell so fast you didn't touch the sides either...never...quite...touched...anything. 

    The thunder faded. The music died.


I like this passage from the book because it uses so much description I can see what's happening. the author does this a lot and I think it's his style because almost every passage I read is description. If they wanted to make a movie just tell someone read the book, you can already see what is going on. He has some vocabulary in here that I had to look up because I wasn't sure what it meant, but It helps explain better what's going on. Also the way he described the aftershock of the concussion was amazing. I've never had a concussion but if I did I hope it isn't how he seemed to explain it because it sounds awful. But I find it cool that he went off into explaining the whole concussion and then drew all his ideas back together but bringing in the thunder storm again. 

Page #50

The Mechanical Hound slept but did not sleep, lived but did not live in its gently humming, gently vibrating, softly illuminated kennel back in a dark corner of the firehouse. The dim light of one in the morning, the moonlight from the open sky framed through the great window, touched here and there on the brass and the copper and the steel of the faintly trembling beast. Light flickered on bits of ruby glass and on sensitive capillary hairs in the nylon-brushed nostrils of the creature that quivered gently, gently, gently, its eight legs spidered under it on rubber-padded paws.
Montag slid down the brass pole. He went out to look at the city and the clouds had cleared away completely, and he lit a cigarette and came back to bend down and look at the Hound. It was like a great bee come home from some field where the honey is full of poison wildness, of insanity and nightmare, its body crammed with that over-rich nectar and now it was sleeping the evil out of itself.
"Hello," whispered Montag, fascinated as always with the dead beast, the living beast.
At night when things got dull, which was every night, the men slid down the brass poles, and set the ticking combinations of the olfactory system of the Hound and let loose rats in the firehouse area-way, and sometimes chickens, and sometimes cats that would have to be drowned anyway, and there would be betting to see which the Hound would seize first. The animals were turned loose. Three seconds later the game was done, the rat, cat, or chicken caught half across the areaway, gripped in gentling paws while a four-inch hollow steel needle plunged down from the proboscis of the Hound to inject massive jolts of morphine or procaine. The pawn was then tossed in the incinerator. A new game began.

I like this passage because it has very descriptive language like it does throughout the whole piece but I like the way he describes and incorporates the hound making it seem very dark and scary and big. Still knowing that Montag is just very afraid of the Mechanical Hound. He uses complicated vocabulary that just seems to fit into every sentence and doesn't feel to overdone. He connects his ideas very fluently with appropriate transitions. He also uses repetition to emphasize specific words. The passage is covered with metaphors and similes that all relate and sound good instead of a random simile that doesn't even make sense. An example is like "and he lit a cigarette and came back to bend down and look at the Hound. It was like a great bee come home from some field where the honey is full of poison wildness, of insanity and nightmare, its body crammed with that over-rich nectar and now it was sleeping the evil out of itself". In this he relates lighting a cigarette and bending down to the hound to a great bee coming home from some field where the honey is full of poison. He actually really makes you think about that and what that would look like in your head. He does this consistently throughout the whole story as far as I've read it.

Blog Post #2 (First Quarter of Novel)

Blog Quick Facts:

1.  Always title your blog post with the PAGE # (this will help others avoid reading spoilers).

2.  You will have 4 blogs- each blog will be about a quarter of the book- this first blog should be from the FIRST QUARTER.

3.  Blogs will have 2 parts- Part 1:  passage from the book  Part 2:  analysis of the passage.

4.  Don't forget to comment/interact with your peer's posts!

5.  You CANNOT choose the same passage as someone else- the first one to post claims it!

For your first blog, find a passage that capture the author's STYLE of writing.  If your author is descriptive with beautiful language, find a passage from the first quarter that shows that!  For your analysis, explain the author's style using examples from the passage.  (The passage and analysis should each be at least 1 paragraph- your whole blog post should be at least 2 paragraphs).

Hello everyone that is in this blog/group! My name is Mitchell Seeram and I picked Fahrenheit 451 as the book club book because I have heard that it was very good and also a summer reading book for high school. I am in 2nd period of Ms. Elmer's class.

You guys probably don't know me so here is some information about me. I am very athletic and love sports. Mainly Basketball, where i'm on an AAU team called "Team Hot Shots Elite". Basketball is mainly my whole life and I work hard to be at where I am. My mom is a science teacher at this school and she really wants me to get good grades and I get basketball taken away so that's why i'm working hard to keep my grades up. I also play trumpet in the band at millennium.
Since the book is only about 190 pages I think its only going to take us two weeks to read it. So we should read about 20 pages a night for 5 days a week and of course you can read ahead.

Hey, bloggers! I'm Giselle and I'm in Ms. Elmer's 4th period class. From the people I see on the blog already, I know both of you.  If someone adds on that doesn't know me, here's a little bit about me.  I enjoy writing songs, playing percussion and piano, singing...in general: music. And I also play volleyball and throw discus in track.  I'm willing to admit I'm a big talker, and this is the first time I've blogged, so it should be interesting!  One of my favorite books is called Deep and Dark and Dangerous.  I really like mysteries, and kind of "dark" books like murder investigations and things of that sort.  I'm not a big fantasy or science fiction reader, but I'm open to new things.

I did see Sara's post before this, so I saw what she thought we should do for planning out our time.  Though it is a rather short book, it has some complex reading and takes a little time to get the story going.  I do think we should finish it before the 4 weeks, but we should take a little more time to go through and analyze the story, especially some "tough" spots.  I think over these next couple of weeks, we all can pitch some ideas about what book to possibly read next (like Sara did), and hopefully agree on one! I wanted to read Lord of the Flies, but I don't know how long that would take.  It's a shorter book like Fahrenheit 451, but it is complex reading as well.  But as this blog gets started, we'll be able to talk with each other more and hopefully come to a unanimous decision.

Talk to you guys soon! I think this will be a good book, I've heard a lot of good things about it.

Happy Blogging

Hello people of this blog, my name is Sara. It's nice to be sharing a book reading with you. I hope you enjoy conversing with me over this course of reading. I'm not sure how many people will actually be on this blog, I'm in 2nd period by the way. Something you might not know about me? I spend a lot of time on the computer. I'm a huge procrastinator, too much for my own good. I like to read though, and I won't forget to read(Probably). My favorite book/book series is the Edge Chronicles. These are the books that I remember reading and loving the most. They're really cool, and weird, kind of fantasy-type books. The author has such creative ideas and it's a really cool series to read. I highly recommend it. Seriously read it when you're done with Fahrenheit 451.

This book is kind of small, I suggest we finish reading it very early. I'm not sure what books you like, but I suggest Clockwork Angel, I'm not sure what it's really about, but something in it interested me. (And Emily says it's a good book) It would probably be easy to finish this book either this week or next week. Happy blogging.

First Blog Posts (Introductions)

Today you will begin your digital discussions with your peers.  Blogging is EASY.  It really is just like posting and commenting on any other social media website.  The first thing I must do is go over again my expectations on any digital forum.  First, I can see EVERYTHING you post.  Please be responsible and respectful with your posts.  You should not have ANY text slang.  This is not a place for LOL or OMG but rather for meaningful discussion on your novel.  

That being said, I would like your first post to be more of an introduction.  In your first paragraph, introduce yourself, tell your group members something you don't think they'd know about you.  Finally, explain your all time FAVORITE book and why you enjoyed it so much.  

In your second paragraph, pitch out a suggested timeline.  Remember our goal is to finish these books 4 weeks from yesterday.  As a group, figure out how much reading is reasonable.  If your group decides they need more time, I'll take that into consideration.  If your group finishes early, you can always choose another book as a group (I have some great book sets left to pick from).  If someone in your group has already pitched a timeline that you think will work you can just agree with them!  

Finally (this may end up as homework for some of you) engage with your group mates.  I'm not requiring 1 or 2 or 3 comments but respond to their posts.  Maybe they have a similar interest or like a book that you liked.  To make these book blogs work, you must not only post, but discuss!  This will get easier once you get into the novels themselves!

Happy Blogging!