We are back...

Holidays are over, school is back.
 I love the holidays gives me a chance to read- to escape into a book and savour it. I managed two these holidays- And The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini and The Other Hand by Chris Cleave. Both are about redemption, both are about a journey, both are about a young female who is by circumstances disempowered and both these stories trace how they deal with and regain that which was lost to them.
Khaled Hosseini is a master story writer and this book is like the best coffee ever, it sits in your pallet and you mull on it, discover its depth and a few days later a new link reveals itself in your mind- this man is a clever writer.
Chris Cleave is a master wordsmith, the way he uses minimal words to express big ideas and emotions is genius. This book has to sit beside The Visitor- the DVD, as it explores the world of the detention centre and the hunting down of illegal immigrants that resides in them. It paints the Wests paranoia with foreign invaders of the desperate kind, but it also celebrates those who defend these people as co-humans with dignity and compassion. Le Havre works here as well, the more of a global village we try to be, the more these stories will become part of our reading diet.
Both these books  intertwine other stories of life, love, death and politics and both are great reads.
My E-Reader is already loaded for next holidays- Perfect by Rachel Joyce , Jodi Picoults -Storyteller and for a a bit of variety- Band-Aid for a Broken Leg by Damien Brown.
As for this term- if it is new- we have it, if it is coming we have ordered it, Inferno, Zoo Keepers Wife, Revenge wears Prada, the new TimeRiders book, the new Young Sherlock Holmes, extra copies of City of Bones and Ender's game. bring it on I say!! Oh- well done CHS students- we had 9% more fiction issued than we did last year and KINGS took out the house comp for the term!