Classics Book Giveaway: Ends June 25th, 2014

Katie’s Sunday Afternoon by James Mayhew

Exploring art is fun in Mayhew’s fourth book about a little girl who jumps into paintings. Children will come away with a deeper appreciation for fine art, as they join in Katie’s museum romp. It’s a Sunday afternoon, and Katie is bored. But Grandma knows just what will cheer her up — a visit to the art museum. There, Katie once again finds herself on an unbelievable adventure through the paintings of renowned post-impressionist painters Georges-Pierre Seurat, Camille Pissarro, and Paul Signac. Children will enjoy learning about art, as they join in on Katie’s exciting journey.

Thumbelina by Susan Jeffers

Join tiny Thumbelina on her magical journey from lost child to beloved bride in this glorious large-format picture book. Born in a flower, Thumbelina braves the enormous, dangerous world until, through her kindness and courage, she is delivered to a kingdom of people just her size. When Susan Jeffers’s original version was first published in 1979, School Library Journal called it in a starred review “a remarkable, lovely version of one of the author’s most beloved tales.” New jacket art, recolored and newly rendered interior art, and gold foil borders all add to the value and elegance of this reissue.

Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

David Balfour has never had an adventure. He has never spent a night camping in the Scottish Highlands. He has never sailed the high seas. He has never fought in a battle. In fact David Balfour has never even left home. All he knows is a quiet country life.  All this changes after the death of his parents. He suddenly learns that he, David Balfour, is a man of wealth and standing, and that he is not destined for a simple life after all. All he needs to do to assume this new station in life is to travel to the town of Cramond, Scotland, to collect his inheritance from his father’s younger brother, an uncle he had not even known existed. But David soon discovers that this is not as simple as it sounds, as he struggles to survive and outwit his treacherous uncle in this classic adventure story.

The Ugly Duckling retold by Stephen Mitchell

Once upon a time, there was a maligned misfit who grew into the most glorious creature of them all. Never has such a fairy tale transformation touched more hearts than the one in “The Ugly Duckling,” one of Hans Christian Andersen’s most familiar and cherished stories. Now, in the hands of esteemed translator Stephen Mitchell, an iconographic fable regains all the humor and pathos of its very first telling. And with their vivid, arresting collage illustrations, Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher bring an oft-told tale to soaring new life.

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

The most popular pirate story ever written in English, featuring one of literature’s most beloved “bad guys,” Treasure Island has been happily devoured by several generations of boys—and girls—and grownups. Its unforgettable characters include: young Jim Hawkins, who finds himself owner of a map to Treasure Island, where the fabled pirate booty is buried; honest Captain Smollett, heroic Dr. Livesey, and the good-hearted but obtuse Squire Trelawney, who help Jim on his quest for the treasure; the frightening Blind Pew, double-dealing Israel Hands, and seemingly mad Ben Gunn, buccaneers of varying shades of menace; and, of course, garrulous, affable, ambiguous Long John Silver, who is one moment a friendly, laughing, one-legged sea-cook . . .and the next a dangerous pirate leader!

The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

What is the world like far in the future? Is there peace? Is there horror? – The Time Traveler’s dinner guests listen in silence to his unbelievable tale. Has he truly traveled through Time on a machine? Is the future a dream, where the gently Eloi play all day? or a nightmare, haunted by something that lurks underground? – Perhaps only Time will tell.

~~~~~

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Giveaway Rules

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There will be 2 winners.

This Giveaway is Open to the USA Only!

Winners will be selected by Random.org

Giveaway Ends June 25th, 2014

Comments like these would be deleted – Great contest, please enter me, Love to win this! This is so cute!

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Winners are selected via Random and notified by email. You have 48 hours to respond;

If no response, the prize is forfeited and an alternate winner is chosen.

~~~~

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This Giveaway Has Ended

The first winner will have their selection of 3 books and the second winner will have what’s left.

#23 – Audra O’Hara

#11 – Donna Acre

3rd Classic Book Giveaway: King Solomon’s Mines. Ends Aug 31st

Mymcbooks welcomes you to the 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1 – 31. You can win from a list of classic books every week by taking part in the Classic Reading for Kids Giveaway. This is our last week and we feature Sir Henry R Haggard Classic – King Solomon’s Mines. Ends August 31st.

About the Author: Sir Henry Rider Haggard, KBE (22 June 1856 – 14 May 1925) was an English writer of adventure novels set in exotic locations, predominantly Africa, and a founder of the Lost World literary genre. He was also involved in agricultural reform around the British Empire. His stories, situated at the lighter end of Victorian literature, continue to be popular and influential. Henry Rider Haggard, generally known as H. Rider Haggard or Rider Haggard, was born at Bradenham, Norfolk, the eighth of ten children, to Sir William Meybohm Rider Haggard, a barrister, and Ella Doveton, an author and poet. He was initially sent to Garsington Rectory in Oxfordshire to study under Reverend H. J. Graham, but unlike his older brothers who graduated from various private schools, he attended Ipswich Grammar School. This was because his father, who perhaps regarded him as somebody who was not going to amount to much, could no longer afford to maintain his expensive private education. After failing his army entrance exam, he was sent to a private crammer in London to prepare for the entrance exam for the British Foreign Office, for which he never sat. During his two years in London he came into contact with people interested in the study of psychical phenomena. In 1875, Haggard’s father sent him to what is now South Africa, to take up an unpaid position as assistant to the secretary to Sir Henry Bulwer, Lieutenant-Governor of the Colony of Natal. In 1876 he was transferred to the staff of Sir Theophilus Shepstone, Special Commissioner for the Transvaal. It was in this role that Haggard was present in Pretoria in April 1877 for the official announcement of the British annexation of the Boer Republic of the Transvaal. Indeed, Haggard raised the Union flag and read out much of the proclamation following the loss of voice of the official originally entrusted with the duty.

At about that time, Haggard fell in love with Mary Elizabeth “Lilly” Jackson, whom he intended to marry once he obtained paid employment in Africa. In 1878 he became Registrar of the High Court in the Transvaal, and wrote to his father informing him that he intended to return to England and marry her. His father forbade it until Haggard had made a career for himself, and by 1879 Jackson had married Frank Archer, a well-to-do banker. When Haggard eventually returned to England, he married a friend of his sister, (Mariana) Louisa Margitson in 1880, and the couple travelled to Africa together. They had a son named Jack (who died of measles at age 10) and three daughters, Angela, Dorothy and Lilias. Lilias became an author, edited The Rabbit Skin Cap and I Walked By Night, and wrote a biography of her father entitled The Cloak That I Left (published in 1951).

He died on 14 May 1925 at age 68. His ashes were buried at Ditchingham Church. His papers are held at the Norfolk Record Office. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._Rider_Haggard

 

King Solomon’s Mines (1885) is a popular novel by the Victorian adventure writer and fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. It tells of a search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers led by Allan Quatermain for the missing brother of one of the party. It is the first English adventure novel set in Africa, and is considered to be the genesis of the Lost World literary genre.

The book was first published in September 1885 amid considerable fanfare, with billboards and posters around London announcing “The Most Amazing Book Ever Written”. It became an immediate best seller. By the late 19th century, explorers were uncovering ancient civilisations around the world, such as Egypt’s Valley of the Kings, and the empire of Assyria. Inner Africa remained largely unexplored and King Solomon’s Mines, the first novel of African adventure published in English, captured the public’s imagination.

Allan Quatermain, an adventurer and white hunter based in Durban, in what is now South Africa, is approached by aristocrat Sir Henry Curtis and his friend Captain Good, seeking his help finding Sir Henry’s brother, who was last seen travelling north into the unexplored interior on a quest for the fabled King Solomon’s Mines. Quatermain has a mysterious map purporting to lead to the mines, but had never taken it seriously. However, he agrees to lead an expedition in return for a share of the treasure, or a stipend for his son if he is killed along the way. He has little hope they will return alive, but reasons that he has already outlived most people in his profession, so dying in this manner at least ensures that his son will be provided for. They also take along a mysterious native, Umbopa, who seems more regal, handsome and well-spoken than most porters of his class, but who is very anxious to join the party.

Travelling by oxcart, they reach the edge of a desert, but not before a hunt in which a wounded elephant claims the life of a servant. They continue on foot across the desert, almost dying of thirst before finding the oasis shown halfway across on the map. Reaching a mountain range called Suliman Berg, they climb a peak (one of “Sheba‘s Breasts”) and enter a cave where they find the frozen corpse of José Silvestre (also spelt Silvestra), the 16th-century Portuguese explorer who drew the map in his own blood. That night, a second servant dies from the cold, so they leave his body next to Silvestra’s, to “give him a companion”.

They cross the mountains into a raised valley, lush and green, known as Kukuanaland. The inhabitants have a well-organised army and society and speak an ancient dialect of IsiZulu. Kukuanaland’s capital is Loo, the destination of a magnificent road from ancient times. The city is dominated by a central royal kraal.

They soon meet a party of Kukuana warriors who are about to kill them when Captain Good nervously fidgets with his false teeth, making the Kukuanas recoil in fear. Thereafter, to protect themselves, they style themselves “white men from the stars” – sorcerer-gods – and are required to give regular proof of their divinity, considerably straining both their nerves and their ingenuity. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Solomon’s_Mines

Giveaway Rules

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There will be 1 winner  

This Giveaway is Open to the USA Only!

Winner will be selected by Random.org

Giveaway Ends August 31st

Comments like these would be deleted – Great contest, please enter me, Love to win this! This is so cute!

Mandatory: Leave a comment about the review below. Leaving a helpful comment relating to this book would be appreciated and valid to the giveaway.

Giveaway Guidelines and Disclaimer  

Winners are selected via Random and notified by email. You have 48 hours to respond;

If no response, the prize is forfeited and an alternate winner is chosen.

This Giveaway Has Ended

Winner is #2 – Carol L

3rd Classic Book Giveaway: The Mayor of Casterbridge. Ends August 24th.

Mymcbooks welcomes you to the 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1 – 31. You can win from a list of classic books every week by taking part in the Classic Reading for Kids Giveaway. This week we feature Thomas Hardy Classic – The Mayor of Casterbridge. Ends August 24th.

About the Author: Thomas Hardy, OM (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist, in the tradition of George Eliot, he was also influenced both in his novels and poetry by Romanticism, especially by William Wordsworth Charles Dickens is another important influence on Thomas Hardy. Like Dickens, he was also highly critical of much in Victorian society, though Hardy focused more on a declining rural society.

While Hardy wrote poetry throughout his life, and regarded himself primarily as a poet, his first collection was not published until 1898. Initially therefore he gained fame as the author of such novels as Far from the Madding Crowd (1874), The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886), Tess of the d’Urbervilles (1891), and Jude the Obscure (1895). However, since the 1950s Hardy has been recognized as a major poet, and had a significant influence on The Movement poets of the 1950s and 1960s, including Phillip Larkin.

The bulk of his fictional works, initially published as serials in magazines, were set in the semi-fictional region of Wessex and explored tragic characters struggling against their passions and social circumstances. Hardy’s Wessex is based on the medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom and eventually came to include the counties of Dorset, Wiltshire, Somerset, Devon, Hampshire and much of Berkshire, in south west England. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hardy

 

 

About the Book: The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886), subtitled “The Life and Death of a Man of Character”, is a tragic novel by British author Thomas Hardy. It is set in the fictional town of Casterbridge (based on the town of Dorchester in Dorset). The book is one of Hardy’s Wessex novels, all set in a fictional rustic England. The novel is often considered one of Hardy’s greatest works.

At a country fair near Casterbridge, Wessex, a young hay-trusser named Michael Henchard overindulges in rum-laced furmity and quarrels with his wife, Susan. Spurred by alcohol, he decides to auction off his wife and baby daughter, Elizabeth-Jane, to a sailor, Mr. Newson, for five guineas. Once sober the next day, he is too late to recover his family, particularly since his reluctance to reveal his own bad conduct keeps him from conducting an effective search. When he realizes that his wife and daughter are gone, probably for good, he swears not to touch liquor again for as many years as he has lived so far (21).

Eighteen years later, Henchard, now a successful grain merchant, is the eponymous Mayor of Casterbridge, known for his staunch sobriety. He is well respected for his financial acumen and his work ethic, but he is not well liked. Impulsive, selfish behavior and a violent temper are still part of his character, as are dishonesty and secretive activity.

All these years, Henchard has kept the details surrounding the “loss” of his wife a secret. The people in Casterbridge believe he is a widower, although he never explicitly says that his first wife died. He lies by omission instead, allowing other people to believe something false. Over time he finds it convenient to believe Susan probably is dead. While traveling to the island of Jersey on business, Henchard falls in love with a young woman named Lucette Le Sueur, who nurses him back to health after an illness. The book implies that Lucette (Lucetta, in English) and Henchard have a sexual relationship, and Lucetta’s reputation is ruined by her association with Henchard. When Henchard returns to Casterbridge he leaves Lucetta to face the social consequences of their fling. In order to rejoin polite society she must marry him, but there is a problem: Henchard is already technically married. Although Henchard never told Lucetta exactly how he “lost” his wife to begin with, he does tell her he has a wife who “is dead probably dead, but who may return”. Besotted, Lucetta develops a relationship with him despite the risk. Yet just as Henchard is about to send for Lucetta, Susan unexpectedly appears in Casterbridge with her daughter, Elizabeth-Jane, who is now fully grown. Susan and Elizabeth-Jane are both very poor. Newson appears to have been lost at sea, and without means to earn an income Susan is looking to Henchard again. Susan, who is not a very intelligent or sophisticated woman, believed for a long time that her “marriage” to Newson was perfectly legitimate. Only recently, just before Newson’s disappearance, had Susan begun to question whether or not she was still legally married to Henchard.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mayor_of_Casterbridge

Giveaway Rules

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There will be 1 winner  

This Giveaway is Open to the USA Only!

Winner will be selected by Random.org

Giveaway Ends August 24th 

Comments like these would be deleted – Great contest, please enter me, Love to win this! This is so cute!

Mandatory: Leave a comment about the review below. Leaving a helpful comment relating to this book would be appreciated and valid to the giveaway.

Giveaway Guidelines and Disclaimer  

Winners are selected via Random and notified by email. You have 48 hours to respond;

If no response, the prize is forfeited and an alternate winner is chosen.

This Giveaway Has Ended

Winner #3 – Teresa Young

2nd Classic Book Giveaway: The Prince and the Pauper. Ends Aug 17th

Mymcbooks welcomes you to the 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1 – 31. You can win from a list of classic books every week by taking part in the Classic Reading for Kids Giveaway. This week we feature Mark Twain Classic – The Prince and the Pauper. Ends August 17th.

About the Author: Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910),^[2] better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist. He wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), the latter often called “the Great American Novel.”

Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri, which provided the setting for Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. After an apprenticeship with a printer, he worked as a typesetter and contributed articles to his older brother Orion’s newspaper. He later became a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River before heading west to join Orion in Nevada. He referred humorously to his singular lack of success at mining, turning to journalism for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise. In 1865, his humorous story, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” was published, based on a story he heard at Angels Hotel in Angels Camp California where he had spent some time as a miner. The short story brought international attention, even being translated to classic Greek. His wit and satire, in prose and in speech, earned praise from critics and peers, and he was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty.

Though Twain earned a great deal of money from his writings and lectures, he invested in ventures that lost a great deal of money, notably the Paige Compositor, which failed because of its complexity and imprecision. In the wake of these financial setbacks he filed for protection from his creditors via a bankruptcy filing, and with the help of Henry Huttleston Rogers eventually overcame his financial troubles. Twain chose to pay all his pre-bankruptcy creditors in full, though he had no responsibility to do this under the law.

Twain was born shortly after a visit by Halley’s Comet, and he predicted that he would “go out with it,” too. He died the day following the comet’s subsequent return. He was lauded as the “greatest American humorist of his age,” and William Faulkner called Twain “the father of American literature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain

About the Book: The Prince and the Pauper is a novel by American author Mark Twain. It was first published in 1881 in Canada, before its 1882 publication in the United States. The novel represents Twain’s first attempt at historical fiction. Set in 1547, it tells the story of two young boys who are identical in appearance: Tom Canty, a pauper who lives with his abusive father in Offal Court off Pudding Lane in London, and Prince Edward, son of King Henry VIII.

Tom Canty (youngest son of a family living with the dregs of society in Offal Court) has always aspired to a better life, encouraged by the local priest (who has taught him to read and write). Loitering around the palace gates one day, he sees a prince (the Prince of Wales – Edward VI). Tom is nearly caught and beaten by the Royal Guards; however, Edward stops them and invites Tom into his palace chamber. There the two boys get to know one another, fascinated by each other’s life and their uncanny resemblance. They decide to switch clothes “temporarily”. Edward leaves in a hurry before the boys are caught at their game, snatching up an article of national importance (which the reader later learns is the Great Seal of England). Soon Prince Edward is trying to escape the brutality of Tom’s abusive, drunken father; Tom, posing as the prince, tries to cope with court customs and manners. His fellow nobles and palace staff think “the prince” has an illness which has caused memory loss, and fear he will go mad. They repeatedly ask him about the missing “Great Seal”, but he knows nothing about it. However, when Tom is asked to sit in on judgments his common-sense observations reassure them his mind is sound.

Edward soon meets Miles Hendon, a soldier and nobleman returning from war. Although Miles does not believe Edward’s claims to royalty, he humors him and becomes his protector. Meanwhile, news reaches them that King Henry VIII has died and Edward is now the king.

As Edward experiences the brutish life of a pauper firsthand, he becomes aware of the stark class inequality in England; in particular, he sees the harsh, punitive nature of the English judicial system when women are pilloried and flogged. He realizes that the accused are convicted on flimsy evidence (and branded – or hanged – for petty offenses), and vows to reign with mercy when he regains his rightful place. When Edward unwisely declares to a gang of thieves that he is the king and will put an end to unjust laws, they assume he is insane and hold a mock coronation.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prince_and_the_Pauper

Giveaway Rules

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There will be 1 winner  

This Giveaway is Open to the USA Only!

Winner will be selected by Random.org

Giveaway Ends August 17th 

Comments like these would be deleted – Great contest, please enter me, Love to win this! This is so cute!

Mandatory: Leave a comment about the review below. Leaving a helpful comment relating to this book would be appreciated and valid to the giveaway.

Giveaway Guidelines and Disclaimer  

Winners are selected via Random and notified by email. You have 48 hours to respond;

If no response, the prize is forfeited and an alternate winner is chosen.

This giveaway has ended

Winner is #3 – Gwen

3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1 – 31

Mymcbooks welcomes you to the 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1 – 31. You can win from a list of classic books every week by taking part in the Classic Reading for Kids Giveaway. This week we feature Jules Verne Classic – Around the World in Eighty Days. Ends August 10th.

About the Author: Jules Gabriel Verne (French: [ʒyl vɛʁn]; 8 February 1828 – 24 March 1905) was a French novelist, poet, and playwright best known for his adventure novels and his profound influence on the literary genre of science fiction.

Born to bourgeois parents in the seaport of Nantes, Verne was trained to follow in his father’s footsteps as a lawyer, but quit the profession early in life to write for magazines and the stage. His collaboration with the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel led to the creation of the Voyages Extraordinaires, a widely popular series of scrupulously researched adventure novels including Journey to the Center of the Earth, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and Around the World in Eighty Days.

Verne is generally considered a major literary author in France and most of Europe, where he has had a wide influence on the literary avant-garde and on surrealism. His reputation is markedly different in Anglophone regions, where he has often been labeled a writer of genre fiction or children’s books, not least because of the highly abridged and altered translations in which his novels are often reprinted.

Verne is the second most translated author in the world (following Agatha Christie), and his works appear in more translations per year than those of any other writer. Verne is one writer sometimes called “The Father of Science Fiction,” as are H. G. Wells and Hugo Gernsback  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_Verne

About the Book: Around the World in Eighty Days (French: Le tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours) is a classic adventure novel by the French writer Jules Verne, published in 1873. In the story, Phileas Fogg of London and his newly employed French valet Passepartout attempt to circumnavigate the world in 80 days on a £20,000 wager (roughly £1,324,289 today) set by his friends at the Reform Club. It is one of Verne’s most acclaimed works.

The story starts in London on Tuesday, October 1, 1872. Fogg is a rich English gentleman and bachelor living in solitude at Number 7 Savile Row, Burlington Gardens. Despite his wealth, which is £40,000 (roughly £2,650,000 today), Fogg, whose countenance is described as “repose in action”, lives a modest life with habits carried out with mathematical precision. Very little can be said about his social life other than that he is a member of the Reform Club. Having dismissed his former valet, James Foster, for bringing him shaving water at 84 °F (29 °C) instead of 86 °F (30 °C), Fogg hires a Frenchman by the name of Jean Passepartout, who is about 30 years old, as a replacement.

Later on that day, in the Reform Club, Fogg gets involved in an argument over an article in The Daily Telegraph, stating that with the opening of a new railway section in India, it is now possible to travel around the world in 80 days. He accepts a wager for £20,000 (roughly £1,320,000 today) from his fellow club members, which he will receive if he makes it around the world in 80 days. Accompanied by Passepartout, he leaves London by train at 8:45 P.M. on Wednesday, October 2, 1872, and thus is due back at the Reform Club at the same time 80 days later, Saturday, December 21, 1872.

The itinerary
London, United Kingdom to Suez, Egypt	rail   and steamer across the Mediterranean Sea	7   days
Suez to Bombay, India	steamer   across the Red   Sea and the Indian Ocean	13   days
Bombay to Calcutta,   India	rail	3   days
Calcutta to Victoria, Hong Kong	steamer   across the South China Sea	13   days
Hong Kong to Yokohama, Japan	steamer   across the South China Sea, East   China Sea, and the Pacific Ocean	6   days
Yokohama to San  Francisco, United States	steamer   across the Pacific Ocean	22   days
San Francisco to New York City, United States	rail	7   days
New York to London	steamer   across the Atlantic Ocean and rail	9   days
Total		80   days

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Around_the_World_in_Eighty_Days

Giveaway Rules

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There will be 1 winner  

This Giveaway is Open to the USA Only!

Winner will be selected by Random.org

Giveaway Ends August 10th 

Comments like these would be deleted – Great contest, please enter me, Love to win this! This is so cute!

Mandatory: Leave a comment about the review below. Leaving a helpful comment relating to this book would be appreciated and valid to the giveaway.

Giveaway Guidelines and Disclaimer  

Winners are selected via Random and notified by email. You have 48 hours to respond;

If no response, the prize is forfeited and an alternate winner is chosen.

Giveaway Winner #1 – Lisa

Upcoming Event: The 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event August 1st – 31st, 2013

Upcoming Event: The 3rd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event

Classic Reading for Kids – August 1st – 31st, 2013   Join Mymcbooks https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/classic-reading-for-kids/ as I continue to celebrate the classics.   I promise to feature a list of classic books, author’s spotlight and giveaways!

List of classic books

The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

King Solomon’s Mines by H. Rider Haggard and more!

Classic Reading for Kids Book Reviews/3 Books Giveaway – Ends March 17th, 2012

Family Literacy and You & Mymcbooks Blog welcome you to our 2nd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event March 11 – 17th

Join Mymcbooks https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/classic-reading-for-kids/ and Classic Children’s Books http://familyliteracy2.blogspot.com/ as we continue to celebrate the classics this week.

Author the Author: Louisa May Alcott (November 29, 1832 – March 6, 1888) was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women and its sequels Little Men and Jo’s Boys. Little Women was set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts, and published in 1868. This novel is loosely based on her childhood experiences with her three sisters. Alcott was the daughter of noted transcendentalist and educator Amos Bronson Alcott and Abigail May Alcott. She was born on November 29, 1832  – her father’s 33rd birthday. In a letter to his brother-in-law, Samuel Joseph May, a noted abolitionist, her father wrote: “It is with great pleasure that I announce to you the birth of my second daughter… born about half-past 12 this morning, on my [33rd] birthday.” Though of New England heritage, she was born in Germantown[1], which is currently part of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was the second of four daughters: Anna Bronson Alcott was the eldest; Elizabeth Sewall Alcott and Abigail May Alcott were the two youngest. The family moved to Boston in 1834,[2] After the family moved to Massachusetts, Alcott’s father established an experimental school and joined the Transcendental Club with Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisa_May_Alcott

About the Book: Little Women is a novel by American author Louisa May Alcott (1832–1888). The book was written and set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts. It was published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869. The novel follows the lives of four sisters – Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy March – and is loosely based on the author’s childhood experiences with her three sisters. The first volume Little Women was an immediate commercial and critical success, prompting the composition of the book’s second volume titled Good Wives, which was successful as well. The publication of the book as a single volume first occurred in 1880 and was titled Little Women. Alcott followed Little Women with two sequels, also featuring the March sisters, Little Men (1871) and Jo’s Boys (1886). Click link to read more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Women

About the Author: Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist. He is most noted for his novels, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), the latter often called “the Great American Novel.” Twain grew up in Hannibal, Missouri, which would later provide the setting for Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. He apprenticed with a printer. He also worked as a typesetter and contributed articles to his older brother Orion’s newspaper. After toiling as a printer in various cities, he became a master riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River, before heading west to join Orion. He was a failure at gold mining, so he next turned to journalism. While a reporter, he wrote a humorous story, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”, which became very popular and brought nationwide attention. His travelogues were also well-received. Twain had found his calling.
He achieved great success as a writer and public speaker. His wit and satire earned praise from critics and peers, and he was a friend to presidents, artists, industrialists, and European royalty. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain

About the Book: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain is an 1876 novel about a young boy growing up along the Mississippi River. The story is set in the Town of “St. Petersburg”, inspired by Hannibal, Missouri, where Mark Twain lived. In the 1840s an imaginative and mischievous boy named Tom Sawyer lives with his Aunt Polly and his half-brother, Sid, in the Mississippi River town of Petersburg, Missouri. After playing hooky from school on Friday and dirtying his clothes in a fight, Tom is made to whitewash the fence as punishment on Saturday. At first, Tom is disappointed by having to forfeit his day off. However, he soon cleverly persuades his friends to trade him small treasures for the privilege of doing his work. Later, he realizes that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. He trades the treasures he got by tricking his friends for whitewashing for tickets given out in Sunday school for memorizing Bible verses, which can be used to claim a Bible as a prize. He received enough tickets to be given the Bible. However, he loses much of his glory when, in response to a question to show off his knowledge, he incorrectly answers that the first two disciples were David and Goliath. Click to read more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Tom_Sawyer

About the Author: Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
A literary celebrity during his lifetime, Stevenson now ranks among the 26 most translated authors in the world. He has been greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Marcel Schwob, Vladimir Nabokov, J. M. Barrie, and G. K. Chesterton, who said of him that he “seemed to pick the right word up on the point of his pen, like a man playing spillikins.”
Stevenson was born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson at 8 Howard Place, Edinburgh, Scotland, on 13 November 1850, to Thomas Stevenson (1818–1887), a leading lighthouse engineer, and his wife, the former Margaret Isabella Balfour (1829–1897). Lighthouse design was the family profession: Thomas’s own father (Robert’s grandfather) was the famous Robert Stevenson, and Thomas’s maternal grandfather, Thomas Smith, and brothers Alan and David were also among those in the business. On Margaret’s side, the family were gentry, tracing their name back to an Alexander Balfour, who held the lands of Inchrye in Fife in the fifteenth century. Her father, Lewis Balfour (1777–1860), was a minister of the Church of Scotland at nearby Colinton, and Stevenson spent the greater part of his boyhood holidays in his house. “Now I often wonder”, wrote Stevenson, “what I inherited from this old minister. I must suppose, indeed, that he was fond of preaching sermons, and so am I, though I never heard it maintained that either of us loved to hear them. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Louis_Stevenson

About the Book: Kidnapped is a historical fiction adventure novel by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. Written as a “boys’ novel” and first published in the magazine Young Folks from May to July 1886, the novel has attracted the praise and admiration of writers as diverse as Henry James, Jorge Luis Borges, and Seamus Heaney. A sequel, Catriona, was published in 1893.
As historical fiction, it is set around 18th-century Scottish events, notably the “Appin Murder”, which occurred near Ballachulish in 1752 in the aftermath of the Jacobite Rising. Many of the characters, and one of the principals, Alan Breck Stewart, were real people. The political situation of the time is portrayed from different viewpoints, and the Scottish Highlanders are treated sympathetically.
Beginning with some of the earliest reviews of Kidnapped in 1886, it has been thought the novel was structured after the true story of James Annesley, a presumptive heir to five aristocratic titles who was kidnapped at the age of 12 by his uncle Richard and shipped from Dublin to America in 1728. He managed to escape after 13 years and return to reclaim his birthright from his uncle in one of the longest court-room dramas of its time. As Annseley biographer Ekirch says, “It is inconceivable that Stevenson, a voracious reader of legal history, was unfamiliar with the saga of James Annesley, which by the time of Kidnapped’s publication in 1886 had already influenced four other 19th-century novels, most famously Sir Walter Scott’s Guy Mannering (1815) and Charles Reade’s The Wandering Heir (1873).” To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kidnapped_(novel)
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Little Bear

Giveaway

Ends March 17th 

3 Winners selected via Random.org

(US Only)

First Winner will receive The Adventure of Tom Sawyer

Second Winner will receive Little Women

Third Winner will receive Kidnapped

This giveaway close at mid-day on March 17^th and the winners will be selected via Random.

This Giveaway Has Ended! for a list of winners check https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/giveaway-winners/

Classic Reading for Kids Book Reviews/3 Books Giveaway – Ends March 14th, 2012

Family Literacy and You & Mymcbooks Blog welcome you to our 2nd Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event March 11 – 17th

Join Mymcbooks https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/classic-reading-for-kids/ and Classic Children’s Books http://familyliteracy2.blogspot.com/ as we continue to celebrate the classics this week.

About the Author: Jules Gabriel Verne (French pronunciation: [ʒyl vɛʁn]; February 8, 1828 – March 24, 1905) was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre.He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870), A Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873). Verne wrote about space, air, and underwater travel before air travel and practical submarines were invented, and before practical means of space travel had been devised. He is the second most translated author in the world (after Agatha Christie). Some of his books have also been made into live-action and animated films and television shows. Verne is often referred to as the “Father of Science Fiction”, a title sometimes shared with Hugo Gernsback and H. G. Wells. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_Verne

About the Book: A Journey to the Center of the Earth (French): Voyage au centre de la Terre, also translated under the titles Journey to the Centre of the Earth and A Journey to the Interior of the Earth) is a classic 1864 science fiction novel by Jules Verne. The story involves a German professor (Otto Lidenbrock in the original French, Professor Von Hardwigg in the most common English translation) who believes there are volcanic tubes going toward the center of the Earth. He, his nephew Axel (Harry), and their guide Hans encounter many adventures, including prehistoric animals and natural hazards, eventually coming to the surface again in southern Italy.

From a scientific point of view, this story has not aged quite as well as other Verne stories, since most of his ideas about what the interior of the Earth contains have since been soundly refuted; however, a redeeming point to the story is Verne’s own belief, told within the novel from the viewpoint of a character, that the inside of the Earth does indeed differ from that which the characters anticipate. One of Verne’s main ideas with his stories was also to educate the readers, and by placing the different extinct creatures the characters meet in their correct geological era, he is able to show how the world looked a long time ago, stretching from the ice age to the dinosaurs. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Journey_to_the_Center_of_the_Earth

 

About the Author: James Fenimore Cooper (September 15, 1789 – September 14, 1851) was a prolific and popular American writer of the early 19th century. He is best remembered as a novelist who wrote numerous sea-stories and the historical novels known as the Leatherstocking Tales, featuring frontiersman Natty Bumppo. Among his most famous works is the Romantic novel The Last of the Mohicans, often regarded as his masterpiece. James Fenimore Cooper was born in Burlington, New Jersey, the son of William and Elizabeth (Fenimore) Cooper. His father was a United States Congressman. Shortly after his first birthday, his family moved to Cooperstown, New York, a community founded by his father.

At 13, Cooper was enrolled at Yale, but he did not obtain a degree due to being expelled. His expulsion stemmed from a dangerous prank that involved him blowing up another student’s door. Another less dangerous prank consisted of training a donkey to sit in a professor’s chair. He obtained work as a sailor on a merchant vessel, and at 18, joined the United States Navy. He obtained the rank of midshipman before leaving in 1811.

At age 21, he married Susan DeLancey. They had seven children, five of whom lived to adulthood. His daughter, Susan Fenimore Cooper, was a writer on nature, female suffrage, and other topics. She and her father often edited each other’s work.The writer Paul Fenimore Cooper was a great-grandson of James Cooper. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Fenimore_Cooper

 

About the Book: The Last of the Mohicans: A Narrative of 1757 is a historical novel by James Fenimore Cooper, first published in February 1826. It is the second book of the Leatherstocking Tales pentalogy and the best known. The Pathfinder, published 14 years later in 1840, is its sequel. The story takes place in 1757, during the French and Indian War (the Seven Years’ War), when France and Great Britain battled for control of the North American colonies. During this war, the French called on allied Native American tribes to fight against the more numerous British colonists.

Cooper named a principal character Uncas after a well-known Mohegan sachem (a head chief) who had been an ally of the English in 17th-century Connecticut. Cooper seemed to confuse or merge the names of the two tribes—Mohegan and Mahican. Cooper’s well-known book helped confuse popular understanding of the tribes to the present day. After the death of John Uncas in 1842, the last surviving male descendant of Uncas, the Newark Daily Advertiser wrote, “Last of the Mohegans Gone,” lamenting the extinction of the tribe.  The writer did not realize the Mohegan people still existed. They continue to survive today and are a federally recognized tribe based in Connecticut. The Mahican were based in the Hudson River Valley and continue to survive today as a federally recognized Indian tribe as the Stockbridge-Munsee Community in Wisconsin.

The novel was one of the most popular in English in its time, although critics identified narrative flaws. Its length and formal prose style have limited its appeal to later readers, yet The Last of the Mohicans remains widely read in American literature courses.

The character Chingachgook speaks a line that holds the title, saying, “[W]hen Uncas follows in my footsteps, there will no longer be any of the blood of the sagamores, for my boy is the last of the Mohicans.”  The title is also referred to near the end of the book, when Tamenund says, “I have lived to see the last warrior of the wise race of the Mohicans.” To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_of_the_Mohicans

 

About the Author: Charlotte Brontë born 21 April 1816 – 31 March 1855) was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood, whose novels are English literature standards. She wrote Jane Eyre under the pen name Currer Bell. Charlotte was born in Thornton, Yorkshire in 1816, the third of six children, to Maria (née Branwell) and her husband Patrick Brontë (formerly surnamed Brunty or Prunty), an Irish Anglican clergyman. In 1820, the family moved a few miles to the village of Haworth, where Patrick had been appointed Perpetual Curate of St Michael and All Angels Church. Charlotte’s mother died of cancer on 15 September 1821, leaving five daughters and a son to be taken care of by her sister Elizabeth Branwell.

In August 1824, Charlotte was sent with three of her sisters, Emily, Maria, and Elizabeth, to the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge in Lancashire (Charlotte later used the school as the basis for the fictional Lowood School in Jane Eyre). The school’s poor conditions, Charlotte maintained, permanently affected her health and physical development and hastened the deaths of her two elder sisters, Maria (born 1814) and Elizabeth (born 1815), who died of tuberculosis in June 1825. Soon after their father removed them from the school. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlotte_Bront%C3%AB

 

About the Book: Jane Eyre is a novel by English writer Charlotte Brontë. It was published in London, England, in 1847 by Smith, Elder & Co. with the title Jane Eyre. An Autobiography under the pen name “Currer Bell.” The first American edition was released the following year by Harper & Brothers of New York. The Penguin edition describes it as an “influential feminist text” because of its in-depth exploration of a strong female character’s feelings.

The novel merges elements of three distinct genres. It has the form of a Bildungsroman, a story about a child’s maturation, focusing on the emotions and experiences that accompany growth to adulthood. The novel also contains much social criticism, with a strong sense of morality at its core, and finally has the brooding and moody quality and Byronic character typical of Gothic fiction.

It is a novel often considered ahead of its time due to its portrayal of the development of a thinking and passionate young woman who is both individualistic, desiring for a full life, while also highly moral. Jane evolves from her beginnings as a poor and plain woman without captivating charm to her mature stage as a compassionate and confident whole woman. As she matures, she comments much on the complexities of the human condition. Jane also has a deeply pious personal trust in God, but is also highly self-reliant. Although Jane suffers much, she is never portrayed as a damsel in distress who needs rescuing. For this reason, it is sometimes regarded as an important early feminist (or proto-feminist) novel. To read more click link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Eyre

 

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To win more books visit Classic Children’s Books http://familyliteracy2.blogspot.com/

 

Howard B Wigglebottom and the Monkey on His Back

 

Giveaway

Ends March 14th @ Mid-day

Winners selected via Random.org

(US Only)

First Winner will receive A Jorney to the Centre of the Earth

Second Winner will receive The Last of the Mohicans

Third Winner will receive Jane Eyre

This giveaway close at mid-day on March 14^th and the winners will be selected via Random.

 This Giveaway Has Ended

 

Winners

#5 – domestic diva

#4 – Tonya May

#7 – Lisa

Maryam

Upcoming Event: The 2nd Annual Classic Books for Children Event March 11th – 17th

Classic Reading for Kids – March 11 – 17

Join Mymcbooks https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/classic-reading-for-kids/ and Classic Children’s Books http://familyliteracy2.blogspot.com/ as we continue to celebrate the classics.

We promise to feature a list of classic books, author’s spotlight, giveaways and more!

List of Books from Mymcbooks

A Scribner Storybook Classic –Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

Scholastic Classics – The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

Scholastic Classics – Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Classic – The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper

Classic – Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Classic – A Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne

 

 

 

Classic Books for Children Giveaway: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. Ends Sept 30th

We would like to thank all our readers for taking a journey with us into the classics. We hope to see you same time next year for our 2nd Annual Classic Books for Children Giveaway events/reviews and giveaways. I will like to end this Classic Books for Children Giveaway month with Great Expections by Charles Dickens. First lets take a look at Dickens Farewell Readings and his death.

Farewell readings
Between 1868 and 1869, Dickens gave a series of “farewell readings” in England, Scotland, and Ireland, until he collapsed on 22 April 1869, at Preston in Lancashire showing symptoms of a mild stroke. After further provincial readings were cancelled, he began work on his final novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood. In an opium den in Shadwell, he witnessed an elderly pusher known as “Opium Sal”, who subsequently featured in his mystery novel. When he had regained sufficient strength, Dickens arranged, with medical approval, for a final series of readings at least partially to make up to his sponsors what they had lost due of his illness. There were to be twelve performances, running between 11 January and 15 March 1870, the last taking place at 8:00 pm at St. James’s Hall in London. Although in grave health by this time, he read A Christmas Carol and The Trial from Pickwick. On 2 May, he made his last public appearance at a Royal Academy Banquet in the presence of the Prince and Princess of Wales, paying a special tribute to the passing of his friend, illustrator Daniel Maclise.
Death of Charles Dickens
On 8 June 1870, Dickens suffered another stroke at his home, after a full day’s work on Edwin Drood. The next day, on 9 June, and five years to the day after the Staplehurst crash, he died at Gad’s Hill Place never having regained consciousness. Contrary to his wish to be buried at Rochester Cathedral “in an inexpensive, unostentatious, and strictly private manner”, he was laid to rest in the Poets’ Corner of Westminster Abbey.[39] A printed epitaph circulated at the time of the funeral reads: “To the Memory of Charles Dickens (England’s most popular author) who died at his residence, Higham, near Rochester, Kent, 9 June 1870, aged 58 years. He was a sympathiser with the poor, the suffering, and the oppressed; and by his death, one of England’s greatest writers is lost to the world.” Dickens’s last words, as reported in his obituary in The Times were alleged to have been: “Be natural my children. For the writer that is natural has fullfilled all the rules of art”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Dickens

Giveaway

Great Expectations is a novel by Charles Dickens. It was first published in serial form in the publication all the year around  from 1 December 1860 to August 1861. It has been adapted for stage and screen over 250 times. 

Great Expectations is written in the first person from the point of view of the orphan Pip. The novel, like much of Dickens’s work, draws on his experiences of life and people.

Plot Summary:

On Christmas Eve, around 1812, Pip, a boy around the age of six, encounters an escaped convict in the village churchyard while visiting his mother’s, father’s and younger brothers’ graves. The convict scares Pip into stealing food for him and a file to grind away his leg shackles. He warns Pip not to tell anyone and to do as he says or he will cut out Pip’s heart and liver. Pip returns home, where he lives with his older sister Mrs. Joe, whose name is later revealed to be Georgiana Maria, and her husband Joe Gargery. His sister is very cruel and beats him as well as her husband with various objects regularly; however, Joe is much kinder to Pip. Pip’s sister, called Mrs. Joe throughout the novel, often reminds Pip that she was the one who “brought him up by hand”. Early the next morning, Pip steals food and drink from the Gargery pantry (including a pie for their Christmas feast) and sneaks out to the graveyard. It is the first time in Pip’s life he has felt truly guilty.

During Christmas dinner with the minister Mr. Wopsle, Mr. and Mrs. Hubble, and Uncle Pumblechook, Pip’s and Mrs. Joe’s moderately wealthy uncle, nobody notices the missing food or brandy until Uncle Pumblechook drinks some brandy and spits it out. Pip realizes that he filled the brandy jug not with water, but with tar-water (a foul-tasting tonic made of pine tar and water often used for medicinal purposes), instead. He had brought some of the brandy to the convict and had to replace it somehow. Pip sits at the table being told how lucky he is by all the relatives all the while in fear that someone will notice the missing pie. However, the moment his sister goes to the pantry to retrieve the pie and discovers it is missing, soldiers approach the house and ask Joe to repair their handcuffs and invite Joe, Pip and Mr. Wopsle to come with them to hunt for some escaped prisoners from the local jail. As they hunt through the marshes outside the village, they accost two convicts while engaged in a fight. One of them is the convict helped by Pip; the convict freely confesses to the theft of the file and “some wittles” (i.e. victuals) in order to shield Pip. The police take the two to the Hulk, a giant prison ship, and Pip is carried home by Joe, where they finish Christmas dinner. A while after Pip’s encounter with the convict, Pip’s life returns to normal. He continues to attend the local school which is run by Mr. Wopsle’s great-aunt, and becomes friends with Biddy, an orphan who was adopted by the Wopsles; even though no more was said of the incident with the convict and he has been absolved of any wrongdoing, he still feels guilty for the theft. A wealthy old woman named Miss Havisham asks Pip’s Uncle Pumblechook to find a boy of a certain age and bring him to her home to play. Pumblechook immediately selects Pip and brings him to Miss Havisham’s, who lives in the village in Satis House. Miss Havisham is a spinster who wears an old wedding dress with one shoe on and has all the house clocks stopped at 20 minutes to nine. She has not seen sunlight in years and claims that she just wants to see Pip play cards with Estella, a young girl she has adopted. To read more click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Expectations

Family Literacy and You & Mymcbooks Blog welcome you to our 1st Annual Classic Reading for Kids Giveaway Event and final book giveaway/reviews/biography.

GIVEAWAY

This Giveaway is Open to the US ONLY – Start 24^th – Ends 30^th

Please follow the Mandatory Rules.  Rules NOT followed will be deleted.

 

1. Mandatory: Read the book description  and leave your comment and email address in the comment field below.

2. Mandatory: Follow Family Literacy and You

3. Mandatory: Enter for a chance to win by clicking on

 A copy of Great Expectations will be given to 1 winner selected by Random.org

This giveaway has ended. Check Giveaway Winners under Categories for the winner.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Family Literacy and You!

Drop by Family Literacy and You to learn about the Turn of the 19th Century authors

Family Literacy and You presents Pinocchio

Book Review and Giveaway: The old wood-carver Geppetto decides to make a wonderful puppet which can dance and turn somersaults, but by chance he chooses an unusual piece of wood – and the finished puppet can talk and misbehave like the liveliest child. But Pinocchio is brave and inquisitive as well as naughty, and after some hair-raising adventures, he earns his heart’s desire. To read more click

 

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Classic Books for Children Giveaway: David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. Ends Sept 17th

3 Votes stars  

Family Literacy and You & Mymcbooks Blog welcome you to our 1st Annual Classic Reading for Kids Event.

We want to make sure that you and your child don’t forget the classics books. We will feature books reviews and biography of chosen classic authors. We’ll also giveaway free classic books for the month of September. We will feature 1 giveaway a week and the winner will be selected via random.org

Mymcbooks has chosen Charles Dickens. We feature our 2nd classic book for the week of the 11th . This week is David Copperfield.

 

David Copperfield is the character after which the 1850 Charles Dickens novel, David Copperfield, was named. The character is widely thought to be based on Dickens himself, using many elements of his own childhood.

David Copperfield is first introduced in the novel when he is born on a Friday in March in the early 19th century. The pet of his mother Clara Copperfield and faithful nursemaid Peggotty, David lives an idyllic life for the first few years of his life, even though he is fatherless – David Copperfield Sr. died 6 months before his son’s birth. David’s happy childhood is marred by the arrival of his stepfather, Edward Murdstone, and David suffers both physical and mental abuse from his new guardian.

David is soon sent off to Salem House school for biting Murdstone, and is consistently bullied until he befriends the popular James Steerforth. David performs well and is the resident storyteller, until he is forced to return home upon the death of his mother and baby half-brother. Because of his hate for the child, Murdstone and his sister decide to send David to work in the family bottling factory.

Life at the factory is miserable, even though David is befriended by the penniless Mr. Micawber. and he soon runs away to his Aunt Betsey Trotwood in Dover, Aunt Betsey adopts him and sends him to Dr. Strong’s private school in Canterbury, where David meets his best friend Agnes Wickfield, as well as the slimy Uriah Heep.

The rest of the novel outlines David’s struggles through life and his involvement in other plotlines, including his friendship and consequent disillusionment with James Steerforth; his assistance to the destroyed Peggotty family; his concern and suspicion for the Wickfield, Micawber, and Strong families as they are being harassed by Uriah Heep, and the development of his beginning writing career. As David juggles these problems he also must deal with his passionate, sincere, but highly impractical love for the innocent Dora Spenlow. After a humorously sentimental courtship, David marries Dora, whom he loves despite her uselessness in household chores. She soon falls ill and dies, leaving David single and heartbroken. He travels throughout Europe, during which time he publishes his first (unnamed) novel with the help of old school-friend Thomas Traddles, and during this odyssey realizes he loves Agnes Wickfield, praying she loves him too. Upon his return he proposes to her, and the two quickly marry. They later move into a house in London along with their young children, which include at least three girls (Little Agnes, Dora, and Betsey Trotwood Copperfield) and at least two boys. They live a wealthy lifestyle on David’s successful writing career. To read more  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Copperfield_(character) and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Dickens

GIVEAWAY

This Giveaway is Open to the US ONLY – Start 11^th – Ends 17^th

Please follow the Mandatory Rules.  Rules NOT followed will be deleted

Mandatory: Leave your comment and email address in the comment field below

Mandatory: Follow Family Literacy and You Visit http://familyliteracyandyou.blogspot.com/ 

 A copy of David Copperfield will be given to 1 winner selected by Random.org

Family Literacy and You!

Drop by Family Literacy and You to learn about the Turn of the 19th Century authors

 Family Literacy and You second  book is Stuart Little

Stuart Little is no ordinary mouse. Born to a family of humans, he lives in New York City with his parents, his older brother George, and Snowbell the cat. Though he’s shy and thoughtful, he’s also a true lover of adventure.

Stuart’s greatest adventure comes when his best friend, a beautiful little bird named Margalo, disappears from her nest. Determined to track her down, Stuart ventures away from home for the very first time in his life. He finds adventure aplenty. But will he find his friend? To read more and enter the giveaway click http://familyliteracyandyou.blogspot.com/

This giveaway has ended! Click to find who won: https://mymcbooks.wordpress.com/category/giveaway-winners/

 

1. I love hearing and reading about the great Authors from our past. Following FLAY with GFC under Lucky47 and email subscriber.
   Carol L
   Lucky4750 (at) aol (dot) com

   Comment by Carol L. | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 5:27 pm –>| Edit | Reply

2. My oldest grand son is reading the classics as part of a reading project in school. If I win this will be a great addition to his reading project.
   I liked Family Literacy on Facebook and I visited their site and entered a contest to verify my visit.
   grace at blessedelements dot com

   Comment by Grace | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 5:32 pm –>| Edit | Reply

3. I love this author.
   I’m an email subscriber and follower of Family Literacy and you.
   Thanks for the giveaway.
   wandaelaine at gmail dot com

   Comment by trinityrose | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:11 pm –>| Edit | Reply

4. I would love to add this book to my library of classic stories we plan to read this year. We are reading the old Mr Poppers Penguins right now.

   Comment by Daily Woman | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:15 pm –>| Edit | Reply

5. This is a great idea. I’ve been collecting classics for several years.

   Comment by Cherese Vines | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:31 pm –>| Edit | Reply

6. This would certainly benefit my ESL students. I’d love to pique their interests and then include it in the classroom library for them to read.

   bgcchs(at)yahoo(dot)com

   Comment by Benita | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:45 pm –>| Edit | Reply

7. We’re about to embark on a series of classics for our read-aloud time. This would be a great addition.

   lovelydomesticdiva (at) gmail (dot) com

   Comment by domestic diva | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:48 pm –>| Edit | Reply

8. I’m following Family Literacy and You via GFC.

   bgcchs(at)yahoo(dot)com

   Comment by Benita | September 10, 2011 <!– @ 7:49 pm –>| Edit | Reply

9. I must admit that this is one Dickens story that I do not know! I’d love to share it with my kids as I read aloud to them, and myself.
   I also follow Family Literacy & You.
   ohmiss14 at yahoo dot com

   Comment by Alicia C. | September 11, 2011 <!– @ 10:42 am –>| Edit | Reply

10. I have never read David Copperfield. I believe this would be something both me and my son could enjoy. If I don’t win I think the library is calling.

    Stuart Little is awesome ‘) one of our favorite classics!

    Comment by Larissa | September 11, 2011 <!– @ 1:15 pm –>| Edit | Reply

11. i follow you on blogspot janell wagner

    Comment by janell wagner | September 11, 2011 <!– @ 5:06 pm –>| Edit | Reply

12. Great giveaway. Here is a post I wrote about Classic Lit for Kids http://manoflabook.com/wp/?p=2114

    manoflabook at gmail dot com

    Comment by Man of la Book | September 11, 2011 <!– @ 7:26 pm –>| Edit | Reply

13. Oh my gosh, I remember reading David Copperfield for the first time when I was in school! Such a powerful novel! I would love to win a copy to read to my preteen sons!!

    I am a GFC follower of both you and Family Literacy and You

    jwitt33 at live dot com

    Comment by Julie Witt | September 13, 2011 <!– @ 6:21 pm –>| Edit | Reply

14. Following by email. My daughter loves to read and I’ve been having her read the classics this school year. Thanks for the giveaway.

    Comment by Amy W. | September 16, 2011 <!– @ 8:45 am –>| Edit | Reply

15. I follow Family Literacy and You on Google Friend Connect under the username lilyk.

    mslilyk@hotmail.com

    Comment by Lily Kwan | September 17, 2011 <!– @ 6:19 am –>| Edit | Reply

16. I love this classic book!

    Comment by Diana Hatch | September 17, 2011 <!– @ 8:07 am –>| Edit | Reply

17. I would love to read this with my kids. Gfc follower ticklemetiffyyyy

    Comment by Tiffany U | September 17, 2011 <!– @ 8:56 am –>| Edit | Reply