Customer Reviews

Words of Stone

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This was a great book. It was thoughtful, intriguing, and a bit sad. My 9 year old son read it for his 4th grade class, and I was fascinated myself. My son said that learning about these two characters (Blaze and Joselle) teaches you a lot about friendship.

This book was about a shy, fearful boy named Blaze. Ever since his mother died and he got burned in a small carnival fire, Blaze was never the same. Soon, disturbing messages written in stone appeared in his yard. They were about his mom and the fire. But he unknowingly made friends with the perpetrator, Joselle, who might as well be motherless herself. Will they ever reconcile after Blaze discovers Joselle's horrid secret? Check it out. The language is beautiful, and I could identify with Blaze because I'm quiet and fearful myself. Go get it right now!

Words of Stone is an outstanding read aloud for middle grade students. I have used this book in a Reader's workshop situation in which students have read books that feature characters in conflict. Henkes writes with awesome description, suspense and lets the reader really get to know the characters, which is what we want our young student authors to learn how to do! I loved this book when I read it and I continue to use it, and many other Kevin Henkes books when teaching 5th grade reading and writing. Hooray for a home-state author! A great book for modeling reading strategies and writing techniques, plus keeping the students hanging on the edge of the story.

I read this book ten years ago, when I was only 9. Looking back I have realized that it's effect on me was profound. This book is a marvel of children's literature, with deep characters, and symbolism.

This something that is sure to stick with you for a long time. Even having forgotten about it, I realize that what I learned from it was unforgettable.

Have you ever done something to a friend that you later regretted? In Words of Stone, Josselle, a main character, writes something horrible about her friend Blaze, that she wishes she could take back, especially after they become such close and faithful friends. The 10 year-old Blaze lives a sorrowful life. Josselle also is an outcast, and her no-nonsense attitude helps her little. When the two meet, they strongly support each other and find the true meaning of friendship.

I cherished this book and an example of friendship spread across the pages. Kevin Henkes offered me vivid descriptions in Words of Stone that made me feel I was on the hillside with Josselle or under a Locus Tree with Blaze. If you crave realistic fiction, then this will be a memorable story for you. This is also a quality reading book packed with fun and vocabulary.

Words of Stone is a 4 ½ star book that all deserve to read. I have often come across a story that caught my emotions, but few of them held my emotions to the end of the story. This was on of those stories.

Blaze is a quiet, shy 10 year old who's mother died of cancer when he was 5. Every July 5th since then Blaze has tried to ride the ferris wheel with a new imaginary friend, and every year, he can't. He then buries his imaginary friend and invents a new one. Joselle is a tough girl who's mother recently dumped her with her grandma, Floy, and runs away with her boyfriend. Joselle is angry and tries to hide her anger from Floy. When Blaze and Joselle meet they become good friends, until Blaze finds out that Joselle had done something terrible to him. I like this book a lot, but when blaze and Joselle meet, both characters change a lot.

Gentle, imaginative Blaze has literally buried, beneath stones he has set in a circle, the several imaginary friends who have failed to help him overcome fears dating back years, to his mother's death. He can't swim and is apprehensive of dogs; he's not ready to confide in his nice dad or to paint on the canvas Dad has provided. And he's never managed to get back on the Ferris wheel he rode with his mother just before she died. Meanwhile, Joselle ironically calls her self-centered mom ``The Beautiful Vicki.'' Off with yet another man, Vicki has dumped Joselle with her grandmother. A brash Gilly Hopkins of a child, Joselle nonetheless reaches out to her new neighbor, and the two form a tentative friendship that is helping both until Blaze catches Joselle in a lie--a self-protective habit his example has been inspiring her to overcome--and bitterly rejects her. Still, each has helped move the other toward healthy self-determination; and, in a remarkable conclusion that gathers the story's images and themes together in a few graceful paragraphs, their mutual betrayal is succeeded by a believable reconciliation.

As a fourth grade teacher I give this book a high rating. It got the students to think about family and friendship. It touched on some issues that they will encounter as they get older.

Iam in the middle of "Words Of Stone", and it is just a page turning thriller.

This book teaches children that it is important to keep a good friendship.