My first novel, The Island, was inspired by a chance visit to a tiny island leper colony off the coast of Greece on our summer holiday. It was a...
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“Speak” written by Laurie Halse Anderson is a very capturing novel. It explores the life of a teenage girl with loads of emotional baggage. Anderson uses dialogue as well as spelling in interesting ways. For example, the main character of Melinda rarely chooses to speak, so while she is involved in a conversation, with her mother for example, Anderson uses play like dialogue to emphasize the lack of words spoken. Also, she chooses to spell words phonetically with no particular rhyme or reason, but it gives the reader a sense of character. It allows one to connect with Melinda. Although I do not particularly choose to read as often as I should I found this book to be extremely enjoyable, and quite difficult to put down. It had realistic emotion and circumstance, and I believe that is quite important. Upon my completion of “Speak” I willingly chose to read another one of Laurie Halse Anderson’s novels because I felt that the quality of this one was so superb.
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Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
KaityF, May 28, 2008
“Speak” written by Laurie Halse Anderson is a very capturing novel. It explores the life of a teenage girl with loads of emotional baggage. Anderson uses dialogue as well as spelling in interesting ways. For example, the main character of Melinda rarely chooses to speak, so while she is involved in a conversation, with her mother for example, Anderson uses play like dialogue to emphasize the lack of words spoken. Also, she chooses to spell words phonetically with no particular rhyme or reason, but it gives the reader a sense of character. It allows one to connect with Melinda. Although I do not particularly choose to read as often as I should I found this book to be extremely enjoyable, and quite difficult to put down. It had realistic emotion and circumstance, and I believe that is quite important. Upon my completion of “Speak” I willingly chose to read another one of Laurie Halse Anderson’s novels because I felt that the quality of this one was so superb.(12 of 25 readers found this comment helpful)