A few things about 2 of my Novel Reflections to Ms. Patrice Murphy

Dear Ms. Patrice,

Since you said that I can still make Novel Reflections even if I don't have the Novel Reflections sheets, then please note that I had read for 385 pages when I read the book Alex Rider: Snakehead; and 238 pages when I read the book George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt

George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt

Okay, this blog post is yet another blog post that is a summary of another book. Read this, if you really want to see part of the plot of this book, called "George's Cosmic Treasure Hunt".

During one summer, an English boy named George received an email from his best friend, a girl named Annie, from Florida, USA, urging him to come to Florida because of an emergency, but he needs to pretend that he's coming just for a summer vacation. Once there, Annie revealed to him that when she and her dad was monitoring a probe as it was launched and is now entering Mars, they lost connection to the probe, but connection was reestablished, and now the probe is behaving very strangely on Mars. She also revealed that she had copied a mysterious message from her dad's broken supercomputer, Cosmos, and the sender was from space. After decoding the message, the message instructed them to go to Mars to the probe, Homer, or Earth will be destroyed. Annie then organized a plan to follow the message to Mars.

Who is the mysterious sender of the message? Was the mysterious sender able to destroy planet Earth? And why did the alien send those messages? Read this book and follow George and Annie as they race to find out who the alien is.

Alex Rider: Snakehead

Are you a fan of the Alex Rider series, and wanted to know the plot of this book so much? Read this blog post, and you shall see some of the plot of this Alex Rider book: Snakehead.

Alex landed from space into the ocean on the West coast of Australia. He was picked up by the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk. Meanwhile, a man named Zeljan Kurst, head of the criminal organization Scorpia, briefed Scorpia's executive board on a mission of assassinating 8 celebrities who will hold a "Make Poverty History" meeting on Reef Island. Scorpia will assassinate the 8 people by stealing Royal Blue, a massive bomb, and detonate it above a fault line near Reef Island. The detonation will lubricate the tectonic plates at the fault line, and one of the plates will rise, creating a tsunami that will engulf Reef Island.

At first, Alex was transported to Swanborne, Australia, then Sydney, where he met his housekeeper Jack Starbright. Then, he met the head of the Covert Action Division of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, Ethan Brooke. Ethan asked Alex to join one of Ethan's spies, named Ash, to provide cover for Ash and infiltrate the most powerful snakehead, a type of gang, in Southeast Asia.

Alex traveled to Bangkok, Thailand, where he met Ash. Alex also met an agent of the British secret service, MI6, named Ben Daniels. Ben took Alex to the Bangkok office of MI6, where Alex met Ms. Jones, head of MI6. Ms. Jones briefed Alex on Scorpia planning to assassinate the 8 celebrities at Reef Island, and asked him to foil Scorpia's plan. Can Alex stop Scorpia from assassinating the 8 celebrities on Reef Island?

If you want to know more, read the book.

Old Yeller

Okay, another summary for another book, this time, a classic book, Old Yeller. This book's main protagonist is Travis, who is reluctantly living with a yeller dog, or a dog with a dingy yellow coat.

Travis's dad and a few other men formed a "pool herd" to drive cattle towards a cattle market in Abilene, Kansas, and Travis, a 14 year old boy, was left to take care of his mom and little brother, Arliss. They're very poor farmers, although they have enough to eat. It was after the Civil War in America. Texans were very poor and the Confederate dollars are now worthless. One day, Travis discovered a big yeller dog in the farm. He reluctantly kept the dog since Arliss protested fiercely.

The dog was named Old Yeller, and was proved to be extremely useful, saving the family on several occasions and helped Travis in marking hogs for meat and hunting. One day, the true owner of Old Yeller, a man named Burn Sanderson, arrived to take back his dog.When Arliss resisted, he made a deal with Arliss: They could still keep the dog, and in exchange for the dog, they would cook him supper for the night. After supper, Burn told Travis to beware of a rabies plague going around and any rabic animals, which won't act normally at all.

Burn was right. Travis have to shot a mad bull who he, his mom, and Arliss had watched fighting another bull, and he have to shot one of his cows, who were rabic. When his mom and his friend, Lisbeth, returned from burning the rabic cow, they noticed a mad wolf going after them. Old Yeller held the wolf back, and got bitten. Travis reluctantly shot both the wolf and later, Old Yeller, after his mom convinced him to shoot him.

Travis's dad returned home with cash, and bought Travis a horse on the way home. One of the pups that Lisbeth gave him replaced Old Yeller

The Wind in the Willows

Okay, you guys have seen that I made blog posts comprising of paragraphs. What about blog posts comprising of questions? This my first one that I made, and I'm going to answer the questions.

What did Mole do in the beginning of the novel? He was spring cleaning his home.
Who did Mole lived with for an entire year? Mole lived with the Water Rat.
Why was Toad being watched by Mole, Water Rat, and Badger? Mole, Water Rat, and Badger planned that they're going to try to make Toad humble and stopped wasting money.
What did Toad do that got him in prison? Toad stole a car, after he can't resist the urge to ride one.
What happen to Toad's home when he was in prison? Mole, Water Rat, and Badger was watching over it, but one night, weasels, stoats, and ferrets invaded his home and took it.

To understand more about the book, read it.

Airman

Bonsoir! Or if you want me to say it in English, then, good evening! Okay, have you guys heard of a book called Airman, written by Eoin Colfer? I guess that this book is written for either elementary kids or middle-school kids, or both. Anyway, I like it, since it explains some of the things in there pretty clearly, unlike some other books, and since in the book, it talks about a kid who dreams to be a pilot, to be the first person who built a heavier-than-air machine or an airplane, and I love airplanes! And this blog post, is a summary of this book.

The main protagonist of this book is Conor Broekhart, borned in a flying hot air balloon in the 1878 Paris World's Fair. He lives on the island of Great Saltee on the Saltee Islands. His best and oldest friend and also his love interest is Princess Isabella Trudeau of the Saltee Islands. When he's fourteen, he witnessed Marshall Hugo Bonvilain murdered King Nicholas Trudeau and Conor's and Isabella's tutor, Victor Vigny. Victor Vigny was branded as the murderer, and Conor was forced to dress like him and be put in the prison on the island of Little Saltee.

For two years, he formulated an escape plan, and during the two years, he managed to become a prisoner that seems to be a tough guy, and managed to got material for his escape plan. He escaped on the coronation day of Princess Isabella into a queen, using a coronation balloon he designed. He parachuted from the balloon using a makeshift parachute into a lifeboat of a yacht. The yacht traveled to London, and he met a man called Zeb Malarkey, who gave him the money needed to make his glider and fly back to Little Saltee to stole Conor's hidden diamonds.

Conor planned to get a ship to America, but a released prisoner who had instructed him how to live in a prison persuaded him to stay and rescue his parents and Isabella. The prisoner, named Linius Wynter, got attacked by Hugo Bonvilain and his right hand man. Bonvilain said that the next night, he will invite the Broekharts and Isabella to a dinner, in which he will poisoned them. Linius Wynter reported that to Conor. The next night, Conor, using a makeshift aeroplane he designed, flew to Bonvilain's apartment, where the dinner was being host. His parents and Isabella recognized him at last, and Bonvilain was killed.

A month later, on the morning before he have to leave to Glasgow University to get a science degree, Conor and Isabella shared their first kiss.

Okay, is this book too romantic to you? Now that I summarized it for you to see what the book is about, would you read it? Never mind if this book is too romantic, just read it, and try to enjoy the book. If you can! After I summarized the book for you! Yeah.

Miracles on Maple Hill

This book is for kids, written by Virginia Sorenson. Probably for kids in elementary. Nevertheless, I like this book, because of it's literature and partly, it's plot.

This book is about a girl named Marline, nicknamed Marly, and her life in the countryside of Philadelphia every weekend of school and when school ends, her life in the countryside of Philadelphia in summer and the next school year.

The literature was obviously for kids, but I still like it. It's soft and flows smoothly, so I like the writing style of the author. You could use this book as an example when you're writing a children's book.

Although I like plots that have a clear climax and lots of action, I also like soft and smooth plots with no clear climax or little action for a change. When I was reading this book, I felt more relaxed, so I like the plot of this book.

When you're reading this book, you would probably relaxed. So I suggest that you read this book. Also, if you want to write a children's book. A thick one. Then use this book as an example.

Ethanol: As a fuel

Did you guys know what ethanol (chemical formula: 6 hydrogen atoms, 2 carbon atoms, and 1 oxygen atom for a molecule. No need to know the chemical formula if you don't even understand the words "chemical formula", "atom", "hydrogen", "carbon", "oxygen", and "molecule") is? It's a type of drinkable alcohol. In fact, it's in your wine and beer and other alcoholic beverages. Drinkable as it is, but it's also being used as a fuel for some powerplants, fireplaces, automotive vehicles... It's also in your white board cleaner. Ethanol could dissolve ink pretty well and is safe to be drink, as long as you don't keep on drinking alcohol until your stomach's the size of 6 bowling balls stack on top of each other. But this article is about using ethanol as a fuel. Here’s how most people make ethanol.

The feedstock for making ethanol are living or recently living things, leftover food, and food wastes. To use sewage waste and animal droppings (including human droppings) as feedstock for ethanol, I don’t know if we can do that. Maybe it’s impossible to use them as feedstock for ethanol. Don’t know what feedstock is, search for its definition on www.dictionary.com. Grind the feedstock up into a fine powder and mix the powder with water. Add enzymes to break the powder into tiny particles. Heat the mixture up to breakdown the particles even more and then cool it down. Add some more enzymes, breaking the particles into sugar. Mix yeast with the mixture for 48 hours or so, and voila: ethanol, at least it’s still in the mixture. Filter out the water and remaining particles. Literally! Filter them. Filter the water from the ethanol by using a molecular sieve, which is just another form of a filter. And you got pure ethanol ready to be use instantly as a fuel or mixed with gasoline to be used as a fuel.

There’s one more way of making ethanol. It’s pretty unconventional, since that way of making ethanol was patented recently. The company that patented it is Algenol. A type of algae called cyanobacteria will grow in a tank of salt water. Like other types of algae, it sucks in carbon dioxide, but releases ethanol along with oxygen. The ethanol evaporated and will be piped away to be purified. So you’ll only need carbon dioxide and nutrients for cyanobacteria in order to make ethanol.

So as you can see, ethanol’s a renewable resource. But it has several drawbacks when burned. Burning ethanol would release more carbon dioxide for the same energy amount as gasoline and more ozone-forming pollutants than gasoline. Yes, ground ozone. It could increase the risk of people getting diseases affecting their respitory system, or “breathing system” as I called it, and stunt plant growth. Ground ozone is caused by sunlight reacting with unburned gasoline in the air and nitrogen oxides (A type of molecule. Don’t understand it, better study it right away). Flex-fuel vehicles, vehicles that are capable of using gasoline, ethanol, and any blends of both, aren’t as fuel-efficient as vehicles using only gas (By gas, I meant gasoline).

Although it has several drawbacks, it also have some advantages over gasoline. Burning ethanol releases less carbon monoxide, a toxic gas, and less carbon dioxide than gasoline. It’s a particulate-free burning fuel. Particulate matters are very extra tiny solid particles, like soot, causing an estimated 200,000 deaths per year in Europe alone. It’s a low emission fuel. So using ethanol as a substitute for gas could help in reducing global warming and deaths associated with carbon monoxide and particulate matter. Not just that, ethanol have a higher octane rate than gasoline, meaning more compression of the fuel allowed before burning in an engine. More compression allowed means engines using both ethanol and gas or ethanol-only engines produce more power than gas-only engines.

Most ethanol being used as fuel in the world today is blended with gasoline. In the US and Europe, the blend of ethanol and gas with the highest percentage of ethanol is E85, a blend of 85% ethanol and, usually, 15% gasoline. In Brazil, flex-fuel vehicles are capable of consuming only ethanol. Ethanol is growing in popularity, although blended ethanol and gasoline have a lower octane rate than normal ethanol, but it still have an octane rate equal to or greater than premium gasoline.

 

So, as you can see, ethanol is a very good replacement for gasoline, especially since the world’s running out of crude oil, and gasoline is from crude oil (It’s the black, gooey, and oily liquid underground drilled up from oil rigs. Crude oil could be separated into plastic, gasoline, diesel, jet fuel…). Crude oil is pretty useful, right? Right! Never run out, right? Wrong!!!!!. So I suggest you using ethanol. But keep this in mind: most of the world’s ethanol use crops as feedstock, so using ethanol could change farmland negatively, despite the image below.

Today's LA project presentation

Okay. Hello, everybody! Whew! Luckily for me, it's already evening, since it was a little embarrassing presenting our LA project in front of my LA classmates and teacher. Probably you noticed it, that I said our, since my partner for this project is a little guy who is my best friend in school named Andy. Today, groups in my LA class, including mine, presented our LA projects in front of the class. Me and Andy, presented a video game manual for an imaginary game that have have parts that is also in the book "When my Name was Keoko". In fact, every group in my LA class have to present either a video game manual, a soundtrack, a movie trailer, or a children's book that is based on or have parts that are shared by the book. There are still some classmates of mine in the class who still needs to show their projects.

It's kinda funny watching some people with their projects or students' projects from the LA class before mine. For example, Harry, a classmate of mine in LA class, dropped his video game manual while he was holding it and presenting. Another example is a movie trailer made by 4 boys. Seriously, it's devastatingly funny! Well, part of it is funny and part of it is emotional and dramatic. Those boys would get the trophy for "the funniest LA project I had ever seen". While the "most emotional, dramatic, and awesome LA project I'd seen" trophy goes to a girl in my LA class, called by most people as Jenny. She made a movie trailer for the imaginary "When my Name was Keoko" movie.

Yes, you noticed it, that one girl got that trophy. In the trailer, she didn't act, nor did her friends or anybody else in this school acted. Instead, she used the computer, or if not always, then mostly. She used footages caught in WWII or some other wars and animation. Not that you have to use animation and video clips. The animation, which is partly funny, the video clips, and the background music combined together made the trailer fantastic, and somewhat funny too. It was partly funny since the ending said "Connection lost" while animated "Japanese" soldiers were marching across the screen. They were holding their guns the wrong way. If they try to fire their guns normally, then the gun is upside down. It have some aspects of a real movie trailer. It's so dramatic and seemingly intended-only-for-action-movies, combining with the music, that in one point, I got goosebumps. Not that I'm scared. I just have them.

A group, comprising of a boy named Andrew and a girl named Sarah, made a soundtrack for the imaginary movie "When my Name was Keoko". As a class, we didn't actually get to listen to any soundtrack made by the students for their LA project. But Andrew's and Sarah's soundtrack are pretty detailed, since if you're gonna "buy" the CD, the CD also included an explanation book what songs they chose and why. The songs that they chose fitted with the storyline of the book, and if there is a movie, the movie's storyline. So, good job for Andrew and Sarah.

Josh, David, and Rich made a video game manual together containing 8 levels, not including the bonus ones. I didn't get to read all of their manual. But I can say that they linked the pages together as in pages in a notebook. I wonder where did they go to link the pages together like that. I'm saying this as a complement, not as an insult, ok? Josh, David, and Rich?

Well, that's all I wanna tell for today's LA project presentation.

Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

Bonjour! Did you guys read this Maximum Ride novel? It's a pretty good novel, although it's for young adults. The whole Maximum Ride series was written by James Patterson. It's not an excellent novel, but it's pretty good though. So if the ratings are from 1 to 5, I'll give it a 4.
This book have excellent literature written in first person and third person and very good vocabulary. I learned the work "schmuck" for the first time by reading this book. It also have fast-paced action, since there are a lot of fights and duels in this book. It's pretty interesting, although I don't know how the antagonists would reduce the population of the earth by one half.
It's pretty interesting, since the literature in here is excellent and the vocabulary is also very good. If some of you guys wanna read this book, I recommend you read the first book of the Maximum Ride series first, and the first book of the series is Maximum Ride: the Angel Experiment. Wanna impress your friends, teachers, parents, and relatives by your writing the your vocabulary, read the Maximum Ride series.