Book 17: Captains Courageous

Captains Courageous by Kipling recounts the adventures of a spoiled son of a railway tycoon, who falls overboard from a steamer, and is picked up by a fishing boat.  The captain resolutely refuses to turn the back to shore despite all of Harvey's promises of rewards, and after a solid punch in the face by the captain, Harvey agrees to work aboard the ship for the remainder of the season for a small salary.  Needless to say, the hard work and company do wonders for the boy's character.  At the end of the season, his parents are overjoyed to find their son safe, and his father, for the first time, actually takes an interest in Harvey and begins to form a relationship with him.

If you like some of Kipling's other stories, I would say this one is worth trying.  It's definitely more of a guy book, but I found it interesting and consider it worth the time to read.  I would put the age recommendation at 12 and up.

Book 16: Getting Things Done

Getting Things Done:  The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by Allen is a system designed to clear the mind of all the clutter of jostling projects, responsibilities, things to do, etc. and funnel it into a manageable system of actionable items to be completed.  The system has 5 steps:  collecting, processing, organizing, reviewing, and doing.  Collecting involves pulling out all of the things that need to be done or for larger items jotting down what needs to be done and adding that paper to the in pile.  Then starting on blank paper and brainstorming all of the things that need to be done that may not have a physical item associated with them.  Processing involves taking that pile and determining what the next action for each item needs to be.  Items with no action are trashed or filed as either possibilities or reference.  Items that have actions are done if they require less than two minutes, delegated, or defer either to a specific calendar day or a series of next action lists.  Organizing details how to set up the lists required and file any related material.  The lists are set up based on where the work needs to be done:  call items, office items, house items, etc.  Reviewing involving setting aside a time weekly to go over the current lists and go through the previous steps with any new items that come in.  Doing involves identifying when you have open time and accomplishing the items on the list based on the time available, energy level, etc.

The book is geared toward professionals in an office environment but can certainly be adaptable to the home as well.  I decided to start with my desk area last week.  I collected everything on my desk, actually found the desktop again, and cleaned out all of my drawers.  I'm slowly processing the items as I have time.  I also made a list of all of my open projects and did some brainstorming on what I need to do to get a few of them rolling again.  It's definitely going to take more than one read to incorporate his techniques, but I also feel like I picked up plenty of helpful information on the first read through.

Book 15: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Aiken is a richly descriptive tale of two young cousins, Bonnie and Silvia.  Silvia comes to live at Willoughby Chase as a companion for her cousin Bonnie.  Shortly after her arrival, Sir Willoughby and his wife leave for a sea voyage taken in an attempt to improve the health of the latter.  Bonnie and Silvia are left in the care of a cousin, Mrs. Slighcarp, who has been hired to act as their governess and to manage the affairs of Sir Willoughby until his return.  Scarcely have the lord and lady left when the wicked intentions of the governess are revealed.  She dawns the lady's fine dresses, fires all the trustworthy servants, and begins to sell off all the possessions of the house.  Bonnie and Silvia try to send a message to a nearby doctor for assistance, but the note is intercepted.  Mrs. Slighcarp immediately moves the girls to a work house run by one of her friends.  With the help of Bonnie's friend Simon, the girls are able to escape and slowly make their way to London where Silvia's elderly aunt lives.  Once in London, they enlist the aid of a friendly doctor in the building to care for Aunt Jane, to help them in capturing Mrs. Slighcarp's accomplice, Mr. Grimshaw, and to bring in the police and Sir Willoughby's lawyer for assistance in dealing with the misdeeds of the scheming pair.  Upon return to Willoughby Chase, they find the home turned into a school.  Mrs. Slighcarp and her workhouse friend are apprehended, and Sir Willoughby and his now healthy wife return home at the same moment.

I would recommend the story for ages 8 and up.  I did it as a read aloud for my older boy, and he seemed to enjoy it (despite the fact that the main characters were girls).

Book 14: The Neverending Story

The Neverending Story by Ende begins as a lonely, imaginative boy named Bastian steals a book entitled "The Neverending Story" from a book seller and decides to hide out in the school attic instead of attending classes to read.  Within the book, the land Fantastica is in deep trouble.  Patches of nothing are appearing all over the places and swallowing up everything around them.  The Childlike Empress, who is the leader of Fantastica, is also very ill, and though physicians have come from all over Fantastica, none have been able to help her.  The empress sends a messenger to a young boy named Attian telling him that he must take her amulet and seek out a human boy to save them.  After several random adventures, Attian returns to the empress, who must then take her own journey to summon Bastian into Fantastica when he refuses to come himself.  Once Bastian gives the empress a new name, the patches of nothing disappear.  She gives him the amulet with the instructions to follow his wishes to find his way home.  The only problem is that each time he makes a wish, he loses part of his memory and forgets himself.  He wishes for all the usual things:  to be the strongest, to be the wisest, to be feared by others, etc. and attempts to set himself up as the new emperor of Fantastica.  Then, he chases Attian and the luckdragon, who raised an army to stop him, and finds himself at the city of previous emperors.  Here he finally learns the truth about the amulet.  If he doesn't find his way home before his final wish wipes out the last piece of memory, then he will be stuck in Fantastica wandering mindlessly about the city.  Eventually he runs out of wishes and is rescued by Attian, who helps him return home.

To be honest, I found the book a bit rambling and tedious.  The characters are highly imaginative and interesting.  The basic concept of saving Fantastica and then finding the way to return home seemed promising, but the randomness of the plot where the instructions are to follow your wishes made the book a bit frustrating to me.  It was impossible to tell if the characters were on the right track, if they were making any progress, and when they or even if they would achieve their objective.  There are also several points in the story where the author is talking about a certain person or place and then abruptly says something to the effect of 'but that is another story' and drops the topic without developing it.  Now granted, if he had developed all of those rabbit trails, it would have made the book much longer, and I probably would have given up on it; but it was just aggravating to have him abruptly turn the story back on point using the same mechanism over and over.   I'll probably still let my kids read the book and would say it is for probably ages 10 and up, but it is not a book that I'll read again.

Book 13: The Coral Island

The Coral Island by Ballantyne is a delightful older adventure story set in Victorian times.  Young Ralph, who comes from a long line of seafarers, sets out on his first voyage.  On board ship, he quickly becomes friends with Jack (18) and Peterkin (14 I believe).  While in the South Pacific, their ship is overtaken by a storm and wrecked on a coral reef around a nearby island.  The captain and a few of the crew members are swept out to sea in a smaller boat, while most of the crew is drowned.  The three young men band together to jump clear of the ship and swim to shore.  Once ashore, they work together to establish a camp, provide for their needs using the available, abundant resources, and explore their new home.  At one point, they even manage to construct a boat to explore other nearby islands as well.  When a boat of natives that includes women and children is chased on shore by a second band of natives composed entirely of warriors, the boys risk their lives to come to their aid.  Later, a group of pirates land on the island, and Ralph is taken away on their ship.  Eventually, he escapes and returns to his friends after several of his own adventures, and they determine to attempt a daring rescue of a native woman, who has become a Christian, from her pagan cannibalistic captors.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it for ages 13 and up.  It is filled with lots of action, ingenuity, and inspiring self-reliant spirit as well as sections of exquisitely detailed descriptions of the beauty of a South Pacific island.  My one caution and the reason for my age recommendation is that the book is very upfront about the bloody and cannibalistic native culture that existed during that time.  Ballantyne does a good job of relaying some of the more gruesome aspects of human sacrifice and cannibalism without being overly detailed and gory at these points.  Definitely worth the time to read and since it's an older book is available online for free in ebook and Kindle formats.