The author Steve Sheinkin tells the tale of an event happening 160 years ago in this meticulously researched nonfiction book; he delves into the world of body snatchers and counterfeiters and relates the story of a plot to steal Lincoln's body and hold it ransom. The story goes: Ben Boyd the noted counterfeiter is arrested, so the boss of the ring, Big Jim, hires a team of counterfeiters, including Terrence Mullen and Jack Hughes, to enact the body snatching plot. Yet Patrick Tyrell of the Secret Service is notified, and he promptly hires Lewis Swegles, famed horse thief, to act as a roper, ie, a spy. The story progresses as Swegles gathers information about the plan and Secret Service agents prepare for the planned date of the event. Written in a conversational style and including many interesting quotes from Tyrell's notes and the characters themselves, this book tells an engaging story and has straightforward language; it is also quite informative. This book is an example of good narrative nonfiction, and it's a great book for people of all ages.

The author Steve Sheinkin tells the tale of an event happening 160 years ago in this meticulously researched nonfiction book; he delves into the world of body snatchers and counterfeiters and relates the story of a plot to steal Lincoln's body and hold it ransom. The story goes: Ben Boyd the noted counterfeiter is arrested, so the boss of the ring, Big Jim, hires a team of counterfeiters, including Terrence Mullen and Jack Hughes, to enact the body snatching plot. Yet Patrick Tyrell of the Secret Service is notified, and he promptly hires Lewis Swegles, famed horse thief, to act as a roper, ie, a spy. The story progresses as Swegles gathers information about the plan and Secret Service agents prepare for the planned date of the event. Written in a conversational style and including many interesting quotes from Tyrell's notes and the characters themselves, this book tells an engaging story and has straightforward language; it is also quite informative. This book is an example of good narrative nonfiction, and it's a great book for people of all ages.

A whimsical, strange, and absurd book this is, about a child with floating abilities. Barnaby was born on a Friday at 12 a.m. and has floated for many years. His parents are in quite a situation: they try sending him to The Graveling Academy for Unwanted Children but it burns down in a massive fire that nearly kills him. They send him to the neighborhood school; strangely, he gets in the newspapers for first being the 10 millionth person to climb the Sydney Harbor Bridge, and subsequently for his quaint floating condition. The two parents agree to get rid of Barnaby, and it is his mother who finally cuts off his sandbags, which normally prevent him from floating, and leaves him to float to his doom. Now the story starts getting interesting: Barnaby is picked up by two women who own a coffee farm in Brazil. The rest of the book is spent detailing Barnaby's attempts to get back home to Sydney. Somehow, things keep happening, thus ruining his chances of getting on the flight to Sydney. This book is so weird that it was funny: the fact that the principal would allow a teacher to take their students to climb a bridge is unbelievable. Additionally, the author's humor was fun to read. However, the book was repetitive, stressing the same simple theme again and again, which, of course, is "be yourself". Many things don't scientifically make sense: for example, it is stated somewhere that Barnaby floated up to a spacecraft–this does not make sense because he would have died before that. Also, it is just frustrating how in that same exact chapter the astronauts keep saying "We are in middle space". There is no such thing as middle space and it means that the author does not know a lot about astronomy. But all in all, THE TERRIBLE THING THAT HAPPENED TO BARNABY BROCKET was one of the better books I've read.

A whimsical, strange, and absurd book this is, about a child with floating abilities. Barnaby was born on a Friday at 12 a.m. and has floated for many years. His parents are in quite a situation: they try sending him to The Graveling Academy for Unwanted Children but it burns down in a massive fire that nearly kills him. They send him to the neighborhood school; strangely, he gets in the newspapers for first being the 10 millionth person to climb the Sydney Harbor Bridge, and subsequently for his quaint floating condition. The two parents agree to get rid of Barnaby, and it is his mother who finally cuts off his sandbags, which normally prevent him from floating, and leaves him to float to his doom. Now the story starts getting interesting: Barnaby is picked up by two women who own a coffee farm in Brazil. The rest of the book is spent detailing Barnaby's attempts to get back home to Sydney. Somehow, things keep happening, thus ruining his chances of getting on the flight to Sydney. This book is so weird that it was funny: the fact that the principal would allow a teacher to take their students to climb a bridge is unbelievable. Additionally, the author's humor was fun to read. However, the book was repetitive, stressing the same simple theme again and again, which, of course, is "be yourself". Many things don't scientifically make sense: for example, it is stated somewhere that Barnaby floated up to a spacecraft–this does not make sense because he would have died before that. Also, it is just frustrating how in that same exact chapter the astronauts keep saying "We are in middle space". There is no such thing as middle space and it means that the author does not know a lot about astronomy. But all in all, THE TERRIBLE THING THAT HAPPENED TO BARNABY BROCKET was one of the better books I've read.

The plague has killed everyone except people under the age of 12., and now Lisa Nelson and her brother Todd just want to survive. Lisa has lots of nice ideas, and this is because she thinks a lot. She has already gotten many supplies from supermarkets and abandoned houses and is constantly thinking of more places. The main part of the book starts when she decides that Grand Avenue needs a militia to protect them from marauding gangs. First, they install defense measures, then they start training to fight and defend their home, Grandville, as they are now calling it. The city in the title gets started when Lisa discovers that the local Glenbard High School is easier to defend than Granville. Taking charge as the leader, with Charlie Craig and Jill, three other important characters, as council members, she decides to build a settlement of children who want safety. Many gangs attack and are repelled; however, the Chidester Gang is particularly stubborn and threatens to conquer the City of Glenbard. For me, the book was a little too direct and non-descriptive. Nevertheless, the story is quite relatable even though it was written during the seventies, and the themes(self-reliance and leadership) were complex enough and portrayed pretty well. An issue with this book was that the climax was only 40 pages whereas the rest of the book talked about building the city. This book is good for people who like action and adventure.

The plague has killed everyone except people under the age of 12., and now Lisa Nelson and her brother Todd just want to survive. Lisa has lots of nice ideas, and this is because she thinks a lot. She has already gotten many supplies from supermarkets and abandoned houses and is constantly thinking of more places. The main part of the book starts when she decides that Grand Avenue needs a militia to protect them from marauding gangs. First, they install defense measures, then they start training to fight and defend their home, Grandville, as they are now calling it. The city in the title gets started when Lisa discovers that the local Glenbard High School is easier to defend than Granville. Taking charge as the leader, with Charlie Craig and Jill, three other important characters, as council members, she decides to build a settlement of children who want safety. Many gangs attack and are repelled; however, the Chidester Gang is particularly stubborn and threatens to conquer the City of Glenbard. For me, the book was a little too direct and non-descriptive. Nevertheless, the story is quite relatable even though it was written during the seventies, and the themes(self-reliance and leadership) were complex enough and portrayed pretty well. An issue with this book was that the climax was only 40 pages whereas the rest of the book talked about building the city. This book is good for people who like action and adventure.

This book starts off strangely: a giant radioactive cancer-treating thing is aimed at Ross Maloy. It is then found out through flashbacks that he has a rare type of life-threatening cancer known as a mucoepidermoid carcinoma of the lacrimal gland, which is quite hard to spell. When school starts, however, Ross finds that, alas, everyone is painfully aware of his eye cancer, and he has to wear a hat too. A cowboy one. On Halloween, Ross finds that memes have been made. He is now known as "Cancer Cowboy". Yet to come is even worse news: Ross's best friend since 1st grade, Abby, is moving to Missouri and Ross's friend Issac is nowhere to be found. How shall Ross cope with this strange turn of events? Wink was really a book with lots of interesting characters, for example, Jimmy, the bully who is just misunderstood, and who becomes sort of Ross's friend at the end. Furthermore, it was really interesting to see how Ross coped with the challenges brought on by cancer and everything else. However, I did not like the author's use of incomplete sentences that are similar to, "Someone does something, ... Then sits down." But overall, it was a really interesting story about school and had nice drawings of Batpig and elephants and evil nachos and just a great book for people who like funny realistic fiction.