True Colors Review

True colors, a novel written by Kristin Hannah, is a story of love, jealousy, family, and community.

"This envy of hers was expanding, taking up too much space in her chest. Sometimes, when she thought about everything Vivi Ann had taken from her, she couldn't breathe."(p89)

"Somehow, impossibly, Vivi Ann had broken all those rules, and a good man's
heart, and still paid no price. Golden." (p192)

Life is far beyond perfect for Winona Grey. Being single and overweight, she is constantly jealous of her sister Vivi Ann. Vivi Ann is beautiful and wins the heart of Luke Connnelly, Winona’s true love. Jealousy causes Winona to be malicious towards her sister; while Luke and Vivi Ann were dating, she fantasizes daily that they would break up and Luke would come running to her for a shoulder to lean on. When Winona finds Vivi Ann sleeping with Dallas, she betrays her by telling Luke right away, not giving her a chance to tell him herself.

The only thing that Winona never doubts is her intelligence. Thinking that she knows what is the best for everyone, her actions cause others to get angry at her. One time Vivi Ann actually slaps her and tells her that she never wants to see her again. She recommends to her father of selling his land while many times he told her that he would never do so. When Vivi Ann thinks of a plan to raise money for the ranch Winona tries to dismiss it because she was angry that she did not think of it herself. During the time Dallas was convicted of murder she tried to convince Vivi Ann that Dallas had to be the murderer, not caring of her sister’s pain. Hypocritically, she steps into case after Dallas spends more than a decade in jail.

In the end, Winona redeems herself. She finds flaws in Dallas’s conviction and goes to court as his lawyer against the will of her father. When the trial fails, she approaches the state attorney. Dallas gets dismissed and Winona is able to compensate for the pain that she caused Vivi Ann. She was also able to have a happy ending too; Luke comes back and asks her for a second chance.

The author's purpose of writing this book is to describe life in a small town and to encourage hope, love, and forgiveness. Growing up in Oyster Shores, the Grey sister's relationship remains strong throughout the years They walk to church every Sunday morning and go dancing and drinking together. Because the town is small, everyone is acquainted with one another. It made me kind of yearn for that type of lifestyle. It seems a a lot more peaceful and fulfilling than living in the city where people are preoccupied with making money and fashion, ultimately caring about themselves.

After Dallas gets arrested, the story is at a standstill. Vivi Ann stays single, never recovering from her pain. Noah gets blamed for starting fights and turns into what people call "like his father". Aurora divorced her husband for infidelity and Winona attempts to find love and fails. This situation creates a very gloomy mood. It had me wondering how the story will turn around.

" "...We're the Greys. That matters. Show us your true colors, who you used to be." " (p 554)

Hannah's purpose was achieved in writing this book. When things seems hopeless, miracles happened. Dallas's cased reopens and is eventually dismissed, Luke asks Winona for a second chance, and Noah is able to answer the "Who am I?" question in the journal that Mrs. Ivers gave him. The ending is beautiful; it encourages hope that pain is temporary. Despite her jealousy, Winona loves her sister and family. Through the good times and the bad, the Grey sisters stick together to the very end. Also, Dallas displays an amazing act of forgiveness; he forgives Myrtle Michaelian, whose mistaken testimony had convicted him.

People can be so beautiful when they demonstrate amazing acts. They show their greatest potential as human beings despite the obstacles in their way; they show their true colors. This is my initial interpretation of the title. I think that the author's meaning of true colors is one's true self. For Winona, her sisters, and her dad, there true colors was their identity as Greys and relationship as a family.

This book catches the interest of the reader from the beginning to the end. From how good the book is, I am surprised that it did not win any awards. I really like Kristin Hannah's style of writing. She does not include unnecessary details that bore the reader. It is easy to understand, descriptive and causes emotions to stir.

This book is very easy to understand. Unlike some other ones that I have read, there were no parts where I had no idea what was happening. Hannah uses simple vocabulary and also adds in a lot of dialogue. The dialogue creates a comforting, laid back mood, with the sisters making jokes about one another from time to time. She is very descriptive in her writing; all the situations and people along with their characteristics and apparel are explained thoroughly.

While I was reading, I felt many different emotions. These emotions included pity suspense, anger, and happiness. Knowing that Vivi Ann is beautiful and gets all the good things, I pity Winona, who is fat and lonely. Even though Winona acts badly, I have a harm time blaming her because if I would do the same in her shoes. During the long years Dallas stayed in jail, I was eager to find out how the story ends. I thought to myself, "There's no way it's going to be a happy ending." However, the story ends perfectly with one of Noah's journal entries. He too had found his true colors.

"And my dad said. Yeah. It's about time I taught my son to play poker. His son. That was when I had my answer, when I finally knew who I was. " (p558)

True Colors

True colors, a novel written by Kristin Hannah, portrays the life of the Grey sisters.

"From this vantage point, Myrtle saw Dallas' right side. Winona had always had a photographic memory, and she'd sworn it noticed Dallas's tattoo when she hired him. She would have sworn it was on his left arm."(p444)

I was horrified and in disbelief when I read this. I was sure that Dallas was the murderer and he only never admitted it. It was terrible thinking that he spent more than a decade in jail for a crime that he did not commit. I was wondering why he never pleaded innocent. It also shows how flawed the justice system is. The crime scene and the witnesses' accounts were not thoroughly investigated. People assumed that Dallas was the murderer because he was Indian.

While the years were passing by I was depressed at what was happening. Vivi had not healed from the pain of losing Dallas. She took pills and drank alcohol to ease her pain. Noah grew up and started fights at school. The people of the community said that he was just like his father. Dallas was still in jail. Even Aurora, who was doing fine in the beginning of the story suffered a failed marriage. I had no hope that the story would turn around.

"His son. That was my answer, when I finally knew who I was." (p558)

But, the ending was beautiful. I was so happy that Vivi ann. After waiting for so many years, she was find happiness again. Noah was able to answer the "Who am I?" question in the journal that Mrs. Ivers gave him. Dallas demonstrated a beautiful act of forgiveness; he forgave Myrtle Michaelian, whose testimony was the one that condemned him. Winona was also able to find happiness; after years of searching for love and not finding it, Luke came back and asked her for a second chance.

This past week...

This week was one of the most laid back weeks during the past school year. On Monday, there wasn't much to do since we were settling back from spring break. I thought Schindler's List was an interesting movie, but it was depressing to watch. I cannot understand how people can treat other humans so unhumanely; they are shot just by the point of a finger from a German officer. Even though Schindler saved 1100 Jews, I have a hard time seeing him as a hero. Because he is a womanizer, I can't see the good things that he did.

On Wednesday, the sophomores continued the Holocaust week by listening to survivors of the massacre of the Jews. One of them was Helen Fargus. Even though I should have given her my undivided attention, I had a hard time sitting still. I am amazed how people are able to survive in concentration camps, toiling long hours with consumption of only meager amounts of bread, soup, and coffee. Helen said that she asked a boy if he ever felt really hungry before and he said that he did when he forgot his lunch. I started questioning myself that question. The only time that I ever felt hungry was when I participated in World Vision's 30 hour famine. I almost fell walking from lack of energy. It 's painful to imagine how hungry those at the concentration camps; they had to endure mental and physical craving of food day after day.

Yesterday , I got to hang out with Michelle afterschool, which I haven't done in almost two weeks. I really missed her while she went to Italy. I didn't have an eating buddy Thursday and Friday afterschool on the week before spring break. On the night before she left Michelle, Elaine, Ryan, Priscilla, Grant and I were suppose to have dinner together, but Michelle ended up not coming. She said that she was going to make it up to me by treating me. Right afterschool, she went with me to my dance rehearsal and then we went to her place to pick up her brother. We went to Kai's and she treated me to teriyaki chicken.

Today was the Unity Week Assembly. I was so excited for the performance of Jai Ho. However, my morning began horribly. I couldn't find my leggings, so I frantically looked around. Later I had to call a friend and thankfully she let me borrow hers. I ended up being late for zero period and not being able to dress, but at least I took the test. The assembly was so fun; I never got tired no matter how many times I watched the acts. My favorite ones were the Chinese fan dance and the salsa. Michelle and Frank did such a good job dancing together. It was fun wearing the costumes even though it felt kind of weird putting the red dot on the forehead. The two assemblies went by so fast and so did the rest of the day.

True Colors 1&2

"Somehow, impossibly, Vivi Ann had broken all those rules, and a good man's
heart, and still paid no price. Golden." (p192)

I really sympathize with Winona. Like her, I developed a hate towards Vivi Ann. It's unfair that she is so beautiful and gets everything that she wants. She even cheats on Luke for Dallas and is accepted back by her family and the community with little harsh gossip. She is favorited by her father and karma never seems to get her. She is a perfect example of how unfair life can be. The situation Winona is in, being jealous of her sister is something that I can relate to easily. I constantly feel jealous of those around me, thinking why I couldn't have the life of this person or that person. Jealousy is an ugly thing and it brings out the worst in people like it did to Winona.



Even though I feel pity towards Winona, there are many flaws in her character that can make people hate her and that she needs to change. She is malicious trowards Vivi Ann; while Vivi Ann was dating Luke , she often fantasized that they would break up and he would come running to her for a shoulder to lean on. She always boasts of her inteliengence and therefore is unwilling to accept other people's ideas or criticism. Her greatest weakness is her pride. When Dallas saw through her like transparent glass and knew that she was jealous deep down inside, she tried to deny it. She even stains his reputation by spreading his criminal records around.See complains that she fat, but yet she does nothing about it. She continuously binge eats when she is stressed.

"During the course of the trial , the state will prove beyond reasonable
doubt that Dallas Raintree... went to Catherine Morgan's home and killed
her."(p273)"

"It was the clearest picture of his past that she'd ever s gotten: she imagined
him as a young boy, abused for a long time and then suddenly alone in the world
being told by adults that he was bad to the bone. Abuse can make an animal
mean."(p221)

I have a hard time siding with Vivi Ann that Dallas did not murder Cat Morgan. All the eveidence points to him as guilty of charged. Coincidentally, the gun in his car was gone, he had given the gun to Cat, and he did not attend the Grey family gettogether on the night of the killing. Based on his past criminal records and how he was abused as a child by his father, it is hard not to assume that he is the obvious killer. It is true. Abuse does make an animal mean and humans too. Since had been beaten with electrical cords, burned with cigarettes, and watched his father kill his mother while he was only a child, he should be emotionally scarred. With a record of having seen a psychiatrist , it is likely that he has anger management issues or is mentally ill. I also thought of the possibility that it might be one of those incidents in which the shock of murdering someone caused him to forget the whole thing all together.

" "Luke but ... I love you. If you'd just try, we could be happy together."..."I
love you. tpp" he said, lowering his voice to add, "as a friend." "(p210)

Winona finally admits her true feelings instead of trying to to hide them like before. I feel so bad for her though, being rejected after conquering her pride. I don't understand why he loves Vivi Ann so much when he should like Winona; they had been best friends for like forever and he only asked Vivi Ann out in the first place becuase she was beautiful. He shows how weak he is by later moving away again to avoid his pain of losing Vivi Ann to Dallas. I wonder if he will come back later in the story and if he does what will happen.

writing reflections+ plans of next year

My current goals as a writer are to be more creative, captivating, emotional, and productive. I want to be able to approach subjects in a variety of ways. I feel as if my writing is "flat"; there is no shift in mood from the beginning to the end. I even find myself getting bored while looking over my blog posts. I am envious of how bestselling authors are able to get the attention of millions of readers by writing about things that no one have ever thought about. I want to use my writing to express my emotions, but I often find that it is easier to use physical actions as an outlet. When I choose a topic or am given a prompt, I usually take long periods of time to finish. Since the blog post criteria has been raised, I have been struggling to produce 500 words. I have difficulty forming paragraphs since I have to think of more topic sentence and elaborate on them.

The purpose of my blog is to record all the aspects of my life that I have chosen to share. I write this blog mainly for my English class because it is a requirement. I would have never gotten or used one on my own. Even though, I write this blog for school, I also write it for myself. My blog holds alot of treasure memories in each post. In the future, I will be able to look back and think how far that I have come and how I have changed as a writer and as a person in general. I am not sure what topics I will write about for the last quarter of this school year and I don't plan to think too hard about it. With so many things happening daily, I am sure something of interest will pop up. Even though I do not know what I will write about, I do have expectations; I want to write about events that have impact even though I am not sure what they would be. In my posts I realized that most of the stuff that I write about, especially anime, are meaningless.

My goals for the next school year is to do better academically. The classes that I signed up for are 0 period Spanish 3, English 3P, Ap Physics, Ap Calculus, Ap US History, and Contemporary dance. I accidentally signed up for physiology to fill in the extra spot in my schedule, but I realized later on that I can only take one science class. For my alternative electives I chose psychology, careers in heath, and I forgot the other one that I picked. I'm kind of worried that I will not be able to handle the course load toughness, but at the same time I want that challenge in order to polish my diligence and studying skills.

This past year I have spent too much time watching anime. All the hours that I wasted could have been used for meaningful work. Next year, I plan to participate in more clubs. I enjoyed all the community service that I have done with the Red Cross this past year and I want to be able to do even more. I am very excited and hopeful for the 2010-2011 school year and will try hard to make the best of it.

The Lovely Bones Book Review

What was the author's purpose in writing the book? How can you tell? How well was the purpose achieved?

Alice Seabold's purpose in writing The Lovely Bones is share her portrayal of heaven, warn others that tragedies do exist, and to give hope to those that have been inflicted with pain from the death of a loved one. George Harvey is put in t he story to caution others of dangerous predators. She shows that there are those kinds of people out there that appear innocent, but are actually criminals or murderers. Children, especially, should be aware of of strangers.

There is a twist in Seabold's heaven compared to most people's imagination of heaven. Most people believe that heaven is a place with God and all the other descriptions of it that are written in the Bible. In Susie's heaven you can look down upon Earth anytime, continuing to be with your loved ones as as they live their daily lives. Also, she does not mention a hell. Seabold probably believes either that humans are ultimate good and are undeserving of eternal suffering, a hell does not exist, or that people that are generally considered moral go to heaven.

"These were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connection- sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at a great cost, but often magnificent- after I was gone." (p363)

In the quote, it is clear of the meaning of the title. Even though tragedies are unavoidable, she hopes that the victims will be able to see a new light and hope for the future. Though Susie's bones and memories of her were symbols of heartache, they were able to result in something good. Through her death, her family and friends depended on each other for support and new relationships were formed. Ruth and Ray, who were loners found friendship with one another. Lindsey leaned on Samuel's shoulder and eventually were engaged. In the end, both the one in heaven and those on Earth learned to let go of each other. Though the story started out horrifically, it was able to end beautifully.

I think that her purposes were well achieved. I think that if someone who has just gone through a mourning period and read this, he would feel less burdened. He would have hope that his loved one is in a better place. Also, thinking that he are being watched by that loved one he would strive to live his life to the fullest in attempt to make that person happy.

Pick a character that interested you. Describe the character in depth.

In my opinion, the most interesting character in the story is Abigail Salmon. She represents how a typical person would respond to the death of a loved one. Being a mother, Susie's death must have affected her the most. To know that the child that came out of her body, that she nurtured, and gave the best to is gone was devastatingly painful. It was a scar that could never heal even with time. She falsely believes that by running away, her problems will vanish into thin air. She takes radical action in traveling thousands of miles to the West Coast to escape what haunts her.

Though I did not understand while I was reading this, there appears to be something intriguing about her. Jack calls her "Ocean eyes", not because they are blue, but because once you look into them you seem to drown in emotion. I wonder what she has or experienced that cause her eyes to arouse such feelings in others. While Susie was playing with her camera one day, she captures a picture of her mother sitting on the porch. Susie realizes that her mom looks different; for the first time she looks like Abigail. That means that she normally puts up a mask to not reveal her true self.

Abigail Salmon stirred my emotions by making me angry while I was reading. I could not help but feel disapproval towards her. She has an affair with Len Fenerman using pain to justify her actions. She later returns to her husband without ever telling him of her involvement with the police officer. She also leaves her children for seven years, not taking on the responsibilities as a mother. Her immoral behaviors, though not as extreme as Mr. Harvey's, made her stand out among the other characters.

What are the weaknesses of this book, in your opinion?

Though this book is a national bestseller, it has failed to meet my high expectations. It is unable to capture my attention. I was only interested in the first chapter where the murder takes place and then the rest of the book was a drag. I had to force myself to continue; once I actually fell asleep while reading it. Seabold puts in too many unnecessary details that do nothing, but make the story longer. Susie, the main character is not given enough action either; all she ever does is sit at the gazebo and gaze down upon Earth.

Even though Seabold puts a twist in the story, I think that there are parts that are unrealistic. Since the story seemed to be a rational one that could possibly happen in real life, I think that the idea of having Susie return to Earth in Ruth's body is awkward. It is also useless because all she does is make love with Ray; she does not even communicate with her family. The parts where Ruth sees spirits leaving Earth and writing down the descriptions in her diary was weird. It made me think that Ruth was insane.

Though the story begins with suspense, the ending is a flop disappointment. It is not anywhere near what I had expected. I had imagined a scene where the police officers are restraining Mr. Harvey and handcuffing him after finding solid evidence against him. They bring him to the Salmon's house where he is interrogated for his crimes. He confesses of his methods of killing his victims. The sirens attract neighbors that surround the house. In the end though, Mr, Harvey dies by falling on an icicle. That was a pathetic death. Though karma gets him, his one life does not compensate for all those that he had taken.

The Lovely Bones #3

Finally! I am finished with this book! It took a lot of effort because it was so boring. Alice Seabold puts unnecessary details that make the story draggy. When I am reading I think to myself, " Just hurry up and get to the part where Mr. Harvey is arrested!"

"Then suddenly, Franny and Holiday were gone...I came to realize that the marvelous weight weighing me down was the weight of the human body."(p342)

This part took me by surprise. While I was reading, I wondered if Susie would ever be able to see her family again and then this happens. Susie's spirit is inside Ruth's body. However, it is only for a short period of time until she is forced to be among the dead again. Even though it was only for a while, I think it satisfied her longing of earth. I expected that she would call her parents and tell them the details of Mr. Harvey, but all she did was spend time with Ray and make a phone call to Buckley. Susie is always looking down upon Earth which makes me wonder if their are spirits surrounding me wherever I go. This gives me a feeling of self-consciousness and goosebumps.

"But as she walked forward into the room, everyone else- her so, her daughter, her mother- fell way... She held his hand and cried silently, letting the tears come freely. " Hello ocean eyes," he said."(p305-306)

This was the moment that I was waiting for since the chapter "Snapshots" between Chapters sixteen and seventeen. When Susie's mom left the family to go to New Hampshire and then to California, I had a feeling of disapproval towards her. She goes back to her husband without ever confessing that she had an affair with Len Fenerman. She leaves her children for seven years, not doing her duty as a mother.

"a moment later the icicle fell. The heavy coldness of it threw him off balance just enough for him to stumble and pitch forward. It would be weeks before the snow in the ravine melted enough to uncover him." (p371)

I had imagined a big scene in the end with the police restraining Mr. Harvey and taking him to the Salmon's house. They would curse at him and grieve for Susie. My hunches were wrong though. His death turned out to be a quiet one. Karma got him in a way, but I think that he got off too easily considering he was only paying one life for all those that he had taken.

How were you expecting the story to end? Were you satisfied with the ending?