A Child Called "It" pgs 1-33

I lost interest in the last book I was reading and decided to try another one. Everyone has always told me how good the book A Child Called "It" was so I decided that I'm going to read it. The first chapter, The Rescue, starts off with this young boy getting abused my his mother because he has not finished his chores in time. She smacks him around and gives him a good beating. Because of this he's late to school and so he has to go straight to the office. The nurse does her daily routine of checking the young boy, Dave, for bruises and marks. This had been going for about a year, since his mother started abusing him. She found some more cuts and Dave gets caught in a lie when he tells the nurse that he ran into a door and it was an "accident." Dave's teachers, the nurse, and the principle sit down and talk with him about his mother. He ends up telling them the truth about her and is then sent back to class. He's only in class for a short period of time before the kids start making fun of him for the way he smells and how dirty he is. His mother makes him wear the same shirt every day to embarress him and it has holes in it, as well as his shoes. He's then called back down to the office where he's greeted by a police officer. He starts to panic and begs them not to call his mother because he'll only get it worse when he gets home. They assure him that they're not going to tell his mother so he tells the officer the truth about her. The officer escorts Dave out of his school while kids are laughing and pointing. When they get to the police station and the officer asks Dave for his mother's phone number he panics. He assures him that he'll be okay and gives him some cookies, which Dave savors every bite of. The officer calls Dave's mother and tells her that Dave will not be coming home that night and gave her a number to call if she had any questions. They begin driving on the highway and the officer told Dave that from now on he's free. This gave Dave a great deal of comfort, but he couldn't actually believe it. The second chapter, Good Times, is about Dave and his family before his parents split. His Dad who was a firefighter, his mother before she was abusive, and his two brothers he thought of as another version of the Brady Bunch. He talks about how his family used to be and how happy his mother used be. They used to do everything together and his mother would teach him and his brothers about everything. They had a beautiful home and his mother had a garden that the whole neighborhood envied. Every Christmas his families house was the best decorated and they did everything as a family. They decorated the house and the tree and that was his favorite holiday. He also loved going on vacation with his family and his mother used to love organizing them. His favorite place to go was to the Russian River that he distincly remembered going to when he was in kindergarden with his family. It was more like a flash back of the good times he had with his family when he was younger before things got bad. So far I think the book is sad, especially since it's a true story. No one should every have to go through such a thing and seeing how his life dramatically changed so quickly is scary. The difference between the two chapters is tremendous and it shows just how bad his mother gets. I'm excited to keep reading but then again it makes me cringe.

Diction 3.1

Here, Bullet by Brian Turner

a.) gristle, clavicle, aorta, adrenaline, inexorable, esophagus, rifling, puncture
b.) Elevation: Complicated, multi-syllabic
Connotation: harsh, cacophonous
c.) Claim:
The clinical complexity of Turner's language in the poem Here, Bullet tells a rugged cacophonous story and leaves the reader with a disturbing feeling.