RAotW #31: Family Literacy Day Edition

Hi all. If you check out the Calendar in your January/February issue of OWL (it’s okay… I’ll wait while you grab it!), you’ll notice that yesterday, January 27, was Family Literacy Day. The event was created to celebrate parents and children reading together to become lifelong learners. Cool goal, huh?

What better way to celebrate this awesome annual event (even if we’re a day late…) than with some perfectly timed Reader Art of the Week?

This week’s art comes to us from blog reader Hannah, 10, and comes to us in the form of an excerpt from her novel. What you need to know: the book is told from the point of view of a 16-year-old girl named Liza Gruen, and before this excerpt begins Liza has just finished a war of words with her rather demanding and judgmental father.

On with the art!:

Chapter 1: Liza (excerpt)

As soon as we got home, I jumped out of the car and made a mad dash for the front door. I flung open the door and ran into the hall, dropped my backpack on to the floor, and stooped down to scratch Chip and Claire behind their ears. Then, I walked into the kitchen and got out the cats’ food, and put food in the dishes.

Then I went back into the hall, picked up my backpack, and went upstairs to my room where I flopped down on my bed. I zipped open my backpack and took out my favorite book: A Teen’s Life. It’s about a girl’s life, like going to school, hanging with her friends, going on dates with her boyfriend, and playing and cuddling with her dog Lilly and her cat Bess. The girl’s name is Nancy. Nancy Bless. Now that’s a good name. I wish I had a name like that. It’s all my parents’ fault that I don’t.

Anyway, I was at chapter 9 and there are 20 chapters in the whole book. After reading one chapter, I put my bookmark into the book, closed it, and put it on my bedside table. I let my eyes wander around my room and I saw my calendar. The picture was of two kittens playing in the fall leaves. Then my eyes wandered down and I saw that today was Friday. Today was Friday! Oh no! I totally forgot I had to babysit at 5:30! And it was 5:30 now!

Awesome! That marks the end of the first chapter of Hannah, 10’s novel, and I love the cliffhanger ending. How late will she be? What will happen when she shows up late? And what will her father say?! I also like the honest portrayal of Liza’s life (which, by the by, happens to be the novel’s title: Liza’s Life).

Thanks so much to Hannah, 10 for sharing the chapter of her novel with us. I’m just sorry that, due to space constraints, I wasn’t able to publish the whole thing!

Happy belated Family Literacy Day, all! Have a great weekend, too.

Craig, owlblog@owlkids.com