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Name of book: Twilight:Director's Notebook-The Story Of How We Made The Movie

Author: Catherine Hardwicke

No. of pages: 176 (hardback)

Ratings out of ten? 10!

Summary: Well the title says it all basically. This book is literally a little notebook belonged to the director with all her personal notes and illustrations. This book contains EVERYTHING about the movie and a little 'behind the scenes' access! From the way Edward's hair was originally to be to the stunts they had to pull off to the visual effects... It has everything:)... The book contains tons of pictures and amazing sketches of how they eventually made the movie. It basically gives a desciption of all the characters,the scenes,the locations where they shot scenes in and lots more. It's based on the novel 'Twilight' by Stephenie Meyer but this book would suit best to those who saw the movie. The book tells it exactly how it is from mostly everyone's piont of view and the author gives an excellent intoduction to it by explaining how she got into directing Twilight.

Front cover: see picture.

My thoughts: I adored this book and couldn't put it down for five minutes! In my opinion, the best feature of the book are the sketches and pictures which gradually became the movie. I would also recommend this book for anyone who hopes to be involved in film making when they're older! You might find that the book is a bit sloppy and everything's just ploncked on the page at first but that's what a notebook really is.. So don't mind the arrows pointing to different pictures or a random coffee shop menu in the middle of the page-read it! There is no bad points really!

While I was reading this book I felt blown away by the sketches and just amazed by the enormous amount of effort,time and money (actually they were on a tight budget while filming this movie) that had to be put in to the movie. I wanted to read on and on and on........

Would you recommend this book to others and why? Yes, I definately would. Refer to text above for convincing! I enjoyed this book so much because it was first-hand information (not like the rumours you eould see in magazines) and because it was a change from a normal book as it was a notebook! I thouroughly enjoyed it and would hugely recommend it!

Some of the qoutes in the book were good and I just need to share them to those who never read it before....!

''All of Cat's pens are chewed up!'' - This was written by the director's assistant,Patrick Smith,and he was explaining to us what was in Catherine's bag..one thing included her chewed pens. Even though that's kind of gross I thought it was quite humerous and that a lot of nerves and anxiety must've been in the atmosphere when working on the movie.

''When I mentioned that I was working on a litle movie called Twilight-all the hi-skoolers SCREAMED!'' - This was written by Catherine and I found this extremely funny and to add to the humour Catherine put a picture beside it of the 'hi-skoolers' (who were all girls) who screamed :)

     ''Andy supervised this final shot in the sequence from the helicopter using a spacecam. In the big sphere is a gyro-stabilized remotely controlled camera capable of shooting at virtually any angle. If you don't believe me, you can GOOGLE it. (I did.)'' - This tells it of exactly how it's done (and that Catherine googled it too!)

This is probably my one of my favourite quotes from Twilight. It is at the part in the novel where she thinks Edward might be a vampire but also has two other things going on in her mind......!(It's said by Bella Swan.)

About three things I was absolutely positive.

First, Edward was a vampire.

Second, there was a part of him - and I didn't know how dominant that part might be - that thirsted for my blood.

And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.

(This quote is displayed at the back of the book if you want to have a look at it yourself!)

Twilight

I got wrapped up in the world of Bella & Edward, like a lot of people when they heard that the movie was coming out and before! I have to say that I didn't mind at all escaping into the world of Vampires and the little town of Forks whenever I opened the book(which was quite frequently I must add!). If I was to sum up the book in one word, I wouldn't be able to 'cause to me, the book says a thousand words.... I hope you find my book review helpful and if you haven't read 'Twilight' yet, then you probably will when you see all the reviews on it(I'm sure not just me read and love the book now!)....

Name of book: Twilight

Author: Stephenie Meyer

No. of pages: 434. This does not include the sneak-peek of the sequel 'New Moon' and the end of the novel!

Ratings out of ten? 10!

Summary: A human falls in love with a vampire. A vampire falls in love with a human. Bella Swan is a normal,17 year old teenager who moves to Forks to live with her father. In the book's opening,she lives with her mother,Renée and her partner Phil in Arizona but she is on the way to the airport and about to get jetted off to Forks. The past three summers she stayed with Charlie (her father)for 2 weeks but this year she was actually living there,school and a new car-truck-included in the package(the truck was a hme-coming gift from Charlie)! It is on her first day of school that she sees the Cullens-Edward,Alice,Jasper,Rosalie & Emmet. Dr. Carlisle Cullen and his wife Esme adopted them when they were younger. Edward and Emmet are brothers(Cullens) and the blond haired twins,Jasper and Rosalie are Hales but all of them together make the Cullens! Ever since Bella and Edward caught each others eyes,they couldn't take their eyes off each other anymore. Bella is so curious about Edward's chalky pale skin tone,his colour-changing eyes and his inhumanly beauty ever since she saw him and is wondering why he is ignoring her in Biology class. Edward has one dark identity hidden from her and she is determined to uncover his secret. It's clear that as you read into the book more,you realise that they have fallen in love,but a forbiden and irresistible love. Falling in love with a vampire has a lot of dangers and risks but Bella doesn't care at all as long as she's with Edward forever. Bella realises that the closer she becomes to Edward, the more she is putting herself and others around her in danger. Will Edward and Bella be 'together,forever' or will it be too late to turn back?

Front cover: The covers of the books in the Twilight series I think are very clever and unique. If you saw the book on a bookshelf it would immediately attract you.

My thoughts on the novel: I adore this book and I especially love the way the author puts so much detail in her writing,whether it be the colour of Edwards eyes or the tone in someone's voice. This made the imagery in my head very vivid and clear. The images in the movie Twilight are not exactly the same as the book but are close. I loved the part in the novel when Bella and Edward are sitting in the meadow and Edward is confessing all about himself and his family and finally reveals himself in the sunlight(Chapter 13-Confessions)! I found when Edward and Bella couldn't be together because of someone going after her really sad and depressing :(

The main characters in the novel are Edward, Bella, Charlie and James. My favourite character is Edward because of his love for Bella and his supernatural talents. I like Bella too but I found her personality confusing sometimes.

The main themes in the novel are love,friendship and vampires.

While I was reading this novel I felt like I wanted to read on and on and on. After I was introduced to each character I wanted to know more about that character-mostly Edward,Bella and James.

Would you recommend this book to others and why? Yes, I would definately recommend this book to others because it's different from any other books you might come across. It's definately a rare one! As there is so much detail put into the book,especially at the start when she is describing Edward, people might find it a bit difficult to get into but be patient and read a bit more as it is all well worth it!

Name of book: Lucky Star

Author: Cathy Cassidy

No. of pages: 243

Ratings out of ten? 10

Summary: This fantastic book by Cathy Cassidy is yet another one of her great creations! If you have already read 'Dizzy' by Cathy Cassidy, you'll see that some of the characters pop up from that book in here and one of them is the main character, Mouse. This book is not a sequel to Dizzy exactly - you don't have to read Dizzy to read this book - but it does pick up on the story of Mouse. This book is about a boy called Mouse - as you guessed! - who doesn't go looking for trouble but trouble has a way of finding him. He meets a girl called Cat and eventually falls for her. The only thing is that Mouse doen't live in a very nice area so he doesn't have the same privilige as some peolpe. Cat on the other hand, lives in a posh and very nice area so they sometimes have to hide their friendship one way or the other. While Mouse is trying his best to stay out of trouble, Cat is doing her best to land herself in it. Mouse has one big secret that he keeps to himself and never tells Cat it even though there the best of friends. But everyone has there secrets...don't they?

Front cover: The front cover has a backround of shiny silver with symbols round it . It has a big ferris wheel on it and of course the author'sname and the title on it It has a little message on it saying 'One boy. One girl. Waiting for their chance to shine...' In my opinion, I think that this book would attract a lot of people to read because of it's cover.

My thoughts on the novel: I loved this book, especially the idea that the author wrote about Mouse again! In the book Dizzy, Mouse was such an interesting character and I'd say a lot of people wanted the author to write about Mouse again. The happiest part of the novel was when Mouse and Cat were together, walking around London and going on wild adventures! I liked when one of my favourite characters from Cathy Cassidy books, Dizzy, came in with another character(from the same book) called Finn. Whe I read Lucky Star after I read Dizzy, I thought Mouse was very like Finn when he was that age. The saddest part of the novel was when Scully took away his dog that he always mistreats from Mouse. When Mouse found the dog on the road(that's when he met Cat too) he deceided to keep him and call him Lucky because he nearly got run over by Cat! Lucky was Mouse's best friend and a part of the family now so he was extemely upset.

The main characters are Mouse, Cat, Lucky, Scully and Mouse's mam. My favourite character was Cat because she was there for Mouse when he was upset and she's always thinking positive which makes the book happy in a way when something bad is happening. Also, she is a really good friend and considering from where the area where she is from, she isn't stuck up or snobby and she doesn't act posh at all.

The main themes of the book are friendship, family, fear, fighting back and adventure!

While I was reading this novel I felt that I definately wanted to read on..... I never put the book down! I felt really sorry for Mouse for what he had to put up with when he was younger(and in the book you'll find out what happened!) and what he has to put up with now, like where he lives and what he has to face up to everyday when he wakes up.

Would you recommend this book to others and why? I would absoulutely recommend this book to others because you'll really reading it and even if you're not really into reading that much you will never be able to look away from the book for five minutes! The text is easy to read and it's decorated lovely-inside and outside!

A Kingdom Far Beyond 

I chose this title over a book called 'Kensuke's Kingdom'(niamhm's book review's!) because what happens in ths book is far beyond anything you could imagine.The friendship is unbelieve for two people who only met each other a good few days and the adventures that they take on together are somtimes dangerous but really enjoyable! Michael gets washed up on the island from his boat and the sea takes him far away to an unknown island far off any mainland.I think my title would be a better title for this novel because I think it would attract more people to the book and I also think there is a mystery to the title.If I saw this in a shop or even in our class library in school I would definately pick it up and have a go reading it!I changed the title to this because Kensuke's Kingdom is just one of those titles that you look at the book and say, ''No,I'm not reading that.Boring title'' because you know that it's KENSUKE'S kingdom. I think A Kingdom Far Beyond would be a much much better title because you don't know what the book is about when you look at it for the first time and it's a mystery to be solved!