Book: Golden Compass Summery

Chapter 1

Lyra (the protagonist) is a little girl that is raised in a rich "college". Apparently, in this book, people have spirit animals called, "Daemons". These are creatures that have the ability to change in different species of animals while they are still young, but once their human partner is old enough they need to take on one form and stay that way. Anyway, right now Lyra and her Daemon are creeping through the hallways of the "college" (very rich and grand building" trying to find the retiring room. She knew that her uncle "Lord Asriel" would be meeting with the Master of the College in a specific room today for "political reasons". This room is called the retiring room and no women or lower class men are allowed inside, however, Lyra doesn't care and looks around before hiding under the table when someone enters the room. It was the master and his butler, the master ordered a special type of wine that he knew Lord Asriel liked and the butler brought it in. Then, he asked the butler to leave and come back later. When the master was all alone Lyra saw him put some type of white powder inside of the wine that Lord Asriel was supposed to drink.

Chapter 2f

Since Lord Asriel was probably one of the most important officials out there and also her uncle Lyra knew she had to do something. But after the Master left she ran into the wardrobe with her Daemon and told herself she was going to stay and somehow stop her uncle from drinking that poisonous wine (she assumed it was poisonous because if it wasn't then why did he tell the butler to leave?). After about 5 minutes of rustling inside of the closet, Lord Asriel appeared inside of the retiring room. It seemed like he missed the dinner that all of the higher officials were having and so he decided to wait for them. The butler came to greet her uncle and then left after fixing the lamp that was in the room. Lyra saw that her uncle was looking at the glass of wine and started to walk towards it when she burst out of the closet and yelled for him to stop. He immediately turned around and got very mad saying "What the hell are you doing!". Lyra explained how the drink as poisonous and he thanked her greatly.

Chapter 3

Eventually, all of the officials gathered in the room and the Master seemed to be surprised that he wasn't dead. He was whispering with the Librarian and they had a very good friendship and knew about the plan. Now obviously the librarian didn't want Lord Asriel to die but couldn't exactly say that to the Master since he could still possibly be fired. Lyra's uncle asked her to keep track of what the Master was saying since she was still hiding inside of the wardrobe. And now it was time for Lord Asriel to explain why he was here. The old man said that he wanted to show this group of people who work at the college a little presentation filled with images. There used to be a man named Grumman and he did an expedition to the far North where he saw the Northern Lights and actually had "Dust" on his hand! I still don't know much about it seems to be really special and old to them. Like an artifact. And this Grumman man was killed by a group of people called, "Tarders" that decapitated him. The folks in the room were amazed by this and were curious to know more. When everyone left Lyra got out of the wardrobe and reluctantly went back to her bedroom by her uncle.

Chapter 4

The master gave Lyra a device called the Alethiometer. This device is actually a compass but the Master didn't explain how it worked so Lyra didn't know what to do with it. She seemed very surprised about it. The night before she was at a dinner party with 3 very important women who were supposed scholars at the college. One of them was named, " Ms Coulter" and her job was to send kids who were willing, to go to the North. However, Lyra and the people who she works for don't know that in reality she actually tricks them into going with her in exchange for a food and other luxuries. The master told Lyra that is was time to go and learn more stuff from places other than the college and let Ms Coulter be the one to help Lyra learn about the Solar system and the geography of the North. The master gave Lyra this compass but warned her to never show it to Ms Coulter, and then he left.

Chapter 5

Ms Coulter took Lyra everywhere in London while teaching her stuff like how to be a lady and educational topics as well. Lyra loved her life of care and luxury at first but as the days went by she started to feel as though she was Ms Coulter's pet. And was always curious as to why the Master didn't want the lady to know about the compass. Apparently, it is an extremely rare item that has only been made 6 times. One day, Ms Coulter decided to have a cocktail party but as she was telling Lyra to take off her shoulder bag Lyra refused, saying it was very dear to her, but in reality, the compass was inside of it. Ms Coulter's daemon (a gold monkey) grabbed Lyra's daemon and almost killed it but Lyra begged for it to stop so Ms. Coulter ordered her to take off the bag and kiss her on the cheek. Lyra knew that she had to escape and did exactly that while the party was still taking place.

Chapter 6 

Lyra started running really far away from the cocktail party and eventually made it across the river where she a saw a coffee shop. She had a lot of money since Ms Coulter wasn't afraid to give her some and got a cup of coffee and a ham sandwich. Thankfully, there was a man in a top hat that was near her and said he'd pay for her lunch. Lyra had no problem with that since she'd need to save up her money and she knew that if this guy was a kidnapper she could easily outrun him so she said thank you. As they sat down the man in the top hat asked what her name was and why she was out in the night alone. Lyra answered saying that her name was Alice and that he should mind her own business. Later on, she told him her father was a murderer and the guy started glancing around which gave her time to escape. That was when she met a group of men who are actually related to the kids that she used to play with back near the college. And they helped her continue to escape.

Chapter 7

So from this point in the story, Lyra stays with the men who help her escape and finds out that they are actually gyptians. Now in this book, "gyptians" are basically treated like how blacks were back in the old days so they treated as the "lesser" being. Anyway, along with the group of men, there was also a woman who Lyra called, "Mama Costa". Since the gyptians are known for being on the water and using ships instead of walking on the land like everyone else they have meetings by connecting their ships in circles and listening to John Fa (leader of the Gyptians) in the middle. The meetings are apparently called the "Ropings" for the Gyptians and when Lyra came they decided to have one. It was going to be because of all the kids being kidnapped and taken to a town in the North without the permission of the parents. So John Fa decided that all the head of the 6 families would gather up men to fight and also provide a decent sum of gold to pay the expense of this journey. 

Chapter 8

But Lyra stayed behind and was learning about her backstory. Apparently, Lord Asriel wasn't actually her uncle. In addition, Ms Coulter and Lord Asriel are actually her parents though she found it hard to believe at first. According to Lord Fa, he has had spies in Oxford college (where Lyra grew up) and knows almost everything about her. It seems that the story where Lyra's parents both died in an airship incident was a lie. Lyra is now very confused and amazed at the same time. The pastry chef that worked in the kitchen at Oxford college was actually half Gyptian so he was indeed another spy but was always kind. Now let me make sure you hear this right, just because they're spies doesn't mean they are bad people. Because the pastry chef certainly made the best food for Lyra and treated her kindly. 

Chapter 9

After this talk with Lord Fa about Lyra's childhood she also wanted to talk about the item that the Master gave to her before she left to join Ms Coulter which turned out to be the biggest mistake of her life. This compass is an ancient device that it also super rare and hard to use. You would need to learn more than 1000 different meanings for all of the symbols on the compass and also be calm enough to make the three-pointed handles move. Either way, Lyra has started working diligently to make the handles move and decided that one day she could control it. Anyway, there was a second Roping and in this meeting, all of the leaders or heads of the families gathered enough gold and troops that in total it resulted in about 100 men willing to fight. Tony, who was one of the men that helped Lyra escape) also volunteered to fight. Lyra was welcomed to come since she had the compass and was the daughter of Lord Asriel but was warned to not cause any trouble.

Part 2

Chapter 10

And now Lyra's journey to the North has begun. While on the ship with Lord Fa, Farder Coram explained what he was going to do once he reached the town that they were headed for. He knew that there was a consul there for witches and had apparently saved the life of one of these witches long ago. Now, it seems as though that particular witch has become a sort of clan leader and all Farder Coram needs to do is contact her through the consul. The consul was a man named, "Dr, Lanselius" and the only witch part of him was his eyes. His daemon was a green serpent and it matched the color of his eyes. Anyway, the man was intrigued by how Lyra could use the golden compass given to her by the Master and asked for a demonstration. After he was satisfied he gave Farder Coram all the information he needed and promised to inform the witch whose name was "Serafina".

Chapter 11

Before they left Farder Coram explained to him the reason they were even in the North in the first place and Dr, Lanselius said that they could hire a bear to help them fight the gobblers. Farder Coram didn't believe him at first since he thought that all the bears were on the side of the gobblers or at least paid to help them, but there was one outcast that didn't agree with the gobblers and coincidently lived very close by (in the town). Iorek was the name of the bear and he was apparently tricked to work in this since one day he got drunk while drinking beer and the townsfolk stole his armour. Now, bears don't have Daemons but their armour (which is made from the "sky") seems to hold a very strong meaning for them. Probably just as strong as a daemon. The bear said that he would fight with them in exchange for Farder Coram and Lyra to find his armour and they agreed.

Chapter 12

Now Lord Fa got some information on this guy from the townspeople and they said that the bear was an indentured servant. But Lyra knew the truth because she heard the bear's story and even used her Golden Compass to see if he was lying (he wasn't). But Lord Fa was still hesitant about helping find the bears armour. Thankfully, they were able to find out the location of the armour which was said to be in the basement of the priest's house and the bear took it back. But as it was travelling with Lyra back upstairs there was a group of police officers and the priest ready with their guns. Iorek almost killed the priest but luckily for the man Lyra begged the bear to stop and come with her to the ship where they could get ready to fight in the war. Iorek agreed and decided not to look back at all the policemen as he and Lyra walked away.

Chapter 15,

Lyra is now finally in the facility and started to get used to it. She met with a doctor and they measured her just like the day before. She was a bit confused as to why the measured each person and their daemon every day but later came to ask a couple of different questions relating to this topic. The first question she asked the doctor was why they cut people's daemons from their human companions, and the doctor told her that was a bunch of rubbish. But Lyra knew it wasn't true. Then she asked some more questions about Dust and why they want to know how much each person has in them. At this point, the doctor was extremely agitated but did his best to not show it. Soon enough, a fire drill came about and Lyra went with the nurse outside but later lost the adult in the chaos. All the kids were trying to enjoy a bit of freedom before the drill ended and clearly, the staff had no idea how to control them.

Chapter 16,

Lyra found Roger and Billy Costa (which were her friends back at Oxford College) and told them of her plan to help free the daemons that were in cages separated by their human partners (which were most likely either dead or ghosts like Tony). Serafina's daemon which was a majestic goose met Lyra outside of the facility and the little girl asked the animal for her help to open the door that held the daemons. the goose gracefully set off the laboratory alarm but the other adults didn't know it was ringing since the fire drill was still happening. So Lyra was able to successfully rescue around 10 daemons and the goose carried them with her back to wherever she was going. Before the witch's daemon left it told Lyra that the witches and gyptians were safe and that they were going to come to rescue her the very next day. Lyra thanked it and left to join the rest of the kids as if nothing ever happened.

Chapter 17,

When Lira or aka "Lizzie" met the kids she saw that they were all quiet or quietly whispering to one another. Some of them even looked scared, then she realized why. Ms Coulter was inside of a helicopter and heading towards the facility. While she saw the faces of the children and most of them pretended to look happy, she seemed not see Lyra in all of the chaos. Lyra was relieved and then told all the girls in her room about the escape plan but made sure that none of them said anything. The very next day, Ms Coulter found out where she was but seemed to put up her best sympathy act. That was when the witches and Iorek broke into the facility and Lyra ran with her daemon to them while smashing all of the fire alarm bells to cause a commotion. But in reality it was a que for the children to get their clothes redya and run towards the exit.

Monkyi's summer Diary

08/28/18

I woke up feeling so energized and ready to start my day! So I got out of bed looked out the windows it was so sunny and beautiful! Then I went to my brothers room to stay hi to him. Then I went to the bathroom to wash my face so that I am more awake for the day because I was still a bit sleepy and tired so It is good that I sprinkle some water on my face! So I grabbed some some rubbed it all over my hands and put it on my race and then I washed my face! Once I finished washing my face, I felt way more I awake for the day so I just brushed my teeth so that my teeth are nice and clean! Once I finished brushing my teeth, I felt way more clean and my teeth were ice and healthy! Then I went to my room to change my clothes. Today I went with a plain T- shirt and some shorts. Then I went downstairs to the playroom to brush my hair because it was very tangly. SO once they were soft I did a side ponytail. I finished doing my hair, and then I went to the kitchen to make my breakfast because breakfast is the most important meal of the day. For breakfast I had Frosted Flakes one of my favorite cereals in the world! So I grabbed all my ingredients to make my  cereal. Once I finished eating my cereal, I went to the playroom to start my homework. I read three chapters of my book, and then I went to the computer to start my writing!

Now I am going to talk about yesterday! I woke up feeling so excited and happy to start another great day.! So I got out of bed, and then I went to the bathroom to wash my face so that I was awake and energized for the day. Then I brushed my teeth, so that my teeth are clean and healthy. Once I finished brushing my teeth, I went to my room to change my clothes. I wore a yellow shirt and then a flowered skirt. Once I finished changing my clothes, IU went downstairs to the kitchen to make my breakfast! For breakfast, I had Frosted flakes! They tasted so good! Once I finished eating my delicious breakfast. I, went to the playroom to start my homework! For my homework, I read a few chapters of my summer reading book called quest of the cubs! Once I finished reading my book, I went to the computer to write my post! Once I finished writing my post, I practice my piano. I have been practicing a song called Happy birthday to you. I actually figured out how to do the song faster! then once my dad came home, I showed him he was proud. Then I relaxed on my phone.

Then me and my brother  went to the park. When we got to the park, I Saw my friends and we played a few games. We played teacher which was pretty funny! And one of my friends bought a toy it is really cool I don’t know what it is called but it is really fun to play  with. Then we went home and said hi to my dad. He said we could eat pizza for dinner! SO we heated up some leftover pizza and then ran some milk to.! I love pizza! Once I finished, eating my pizza I relaxed until it was bedtime. Once it was time to go to bed, I went upstairs to my room and changed into my pajamas! And then I went to bed! GOOD NIGHT! \

Bye guys!

Book: Boxcar children. Diary

The Boxcar children: Book

08/26/18 Summer reading

Today I want to talk about the book that I have been reading called, “ The Boxcar Children: The Detour of the Elephants”. When I first read this book I thought that it would be placed in Africa. However, I didn’t look very closely and notice bamboo near the elephants. That meant that it must’ve have been somewhere in Asia. After realizing that was all the information I could gather from the front cover and I immediately dived right into the first chapter. So basically, the Boxcar children are a group of kids who have started to work with an organization that returns missing artifacts into their original owner or place (could be a house, museum, etc). I used to the read the first Boxcar Children books when they didn’t even have a house and the pictures on the front cover looked like sketches.

Apparently, there are a group of people called the “Argents” that always try to stop the Boxcar children from delivering the artifact. The Argents’s goal is to always steal the artifact from themselves and potentially sell it for real cash (that’s what I think they would do with it). In this book the Boxcar children have an old Chinese artifact that resembles a sort of Chess Piece. Their job is to return this artifact to “Dr. Zhang” and then leave off without a trace. Along the way the Argents try to steal the artifact but one of the group members (0f the children) had a smart idea for everyone to carry bags so when the argents came they wouldn’t know which one to steal. And it just so happened that while they were heading up the Great Wall of China one of the Argents took the wrong bag.

That is as far as I have gone in the book and there is still another half to it but right now I want to talk about my Playstation Four situation. Now my father claimed to have thrown my console and controllers in the garbage because I stayed 4 minutes past my bedtime. There is a very tiny part of my brain that thinks he’s lying but I highly doubt that. He said he was happy to see me go outside with my mother to New York and spend time with everyone. I can’t help but feeling said that the one form of communication I have to play with my friends from school is gone but I have to admit it’s brought some positive changes to my life (as of right now). I just wanted to let my dad know if he’s listening to me reading this or is doing it himself that we could always just sell the games that I have in the suitcase to Gamestop and make some cash off of that. I was actually planning on doing that right now but since it’s locked I can’t. Anyway, until next time. 

Book: Four Fallen, reading experience

These are the stories of the Four Fallen and their human partners. 

08/27/18

Conor: Conor is stuck being a servant for Devin Trunswick who is part of the “Royal Family”. Conor is part of the “Fenray” generations and his father decided to make Conor a servant so that he could pay off his debts. Conor was forced to serve the “Trunswick” family for 3 years and as of right now he still has another year and a half. Today was the day of the Nectar ceremony and three participants were allowed to see if they would summon a spirit animal. Those three candidates would be Conor, Devin, and another member of the royal family. Conor was always hoping that he would get an animal that could help horde the sheep or protect them for the wolves. So when he drank the nectar and summoned the great wolf Briggan it really surprised him. And best of all, Devin didn’t summon an animal, so the look in his face was so funny. 

Rollan: Rollan never liked to steal but at certain times it was needed. The rest of the kids in his block steal way more than he does because they aren’t afraid but Rollan has some sort of pride against it. He’s an orphan (spoilers: his mom comes back in the end of the book) and is part of a group of kids. They always look out for each other and one day one of the kids was really sick. They needed the medication from an apothecary and Rollan promised to get it somehow. At first he made up his mind and was going to work in exchange for the medication but the owner said that he already had servants for that. Then, he tried to guilt trap the owner by asking what he would do if he was an orphan but even that didn’t work. In defeat, Rollan walked away but before doing so he saw one of the boys sneak in the back and grab the medicine. 

It all happened so fast, the man grabbed a hold of Rollan while one of his employees chased after the boy but didn’t catch up. Rollan sweared he knew nothing about this but the man didn’t believe him. In court the judge asked him whether he had taken part in the nectar ceremony. The kid replied in a no and said there was no point since he was in jail, but the judge said that no matter what circumstance kids are in they will always be eligible to take part in the ceremony. So Rollan agreed to take it, some of the guards were betting that he wouldn’t get a spirit animal and Rollan started to doubt himself. However, when it was his turn to drink the nectar a flash of lighting sparked behind him and perched on his arm was a bird! But not just any bird, the great beast Essix!

Rinchen Sangpo's diary

One day at home with sister, reading book and walk to park:

08/28/18

I usually don’t talk about stuff like this but yesterday I sincerely enjoyed going outside to the park. Normally, I would just stay there for an hour and just walk around while my sister plays with her ridiculous friends. But for some reason, towards the end of our time playing I decided I wanted to play some soccer and a couple of the other kids near me were very enthusiastic about the idea. We ran straight towards the back of the playground where there were two sets of chairs (one on each side). My team wanted a goalie and because I’m not as good of a player I decided to fill in (the other reason was that they all sucked as goalie). If they were shooting from far range then I could easily block it. I know that if it was a real soccer goal I’d probably only block penalty kicks since that’s my specialty. However, things turned out good for me and I saved my team more than 10 goals.

One of the players from the enemy team (a man by the way) told me that I was definitely a good goalie. I blocked every single on of their shots. The only times they scored was when our legs were literally touching. The guy invited everyone to come over to the park at Sunday so that we could practice soccer and he promised to bring water. The guy was really nice and he seemed to really enjoy playing with us so me and a couple of the other kids agreed. But don’t worry, he wasn’t the only adult. There were 2 others and in the end they won. It was me and three other kids versus him and two of his other adult friends. Either way, I was acknowledged by people who were older and most likely better than me at the game. That really made me feel happy and walking back home I was super pumped for Sunday.

Anyways, this last paragraph will probably be about the this book called, “Case File 13”. Unfortunately, my dad and sister left 30 minutes ago to return the library books so I only got to read a little bit about it but in my opinion it was way more interesting than I thought it would be. The book is about 3 kids named, “Nick, Angelo, and Carter” who are best friends and always celebrate Halloween by wearing the most awesome costumes. However, Nick had to go to his great aunt’s funeral so he didn’t go trick or treating with his friends. He thought that this was going to be a pretty boring trip but little did Nick know that his great aunt was actually part of something much more mysterious. A Voodoo Queen, she had the power to put curses on people and kill them, or she would help others. But most of the time it was curses. Anyway, Nick obtained an amulet before leaving that made him into a zombie and the kid is now having trouble dealing with it. That’s it for my writing.

The darkest minds, Reading note for school report.

Book Report: The Darkest Minds

08/29/18

The author of “The Darkest Minds” is a woman named, “Alexandra Bracken”. “The Darkest Minds” takes place in many different locations but some of the main ones are the mall, Camp Thurmond, and the area of the Slip Kid. Out of all the characters the “Slip Kid” is the one that the main characters are most fond of at the beginning of the book but towards the end he loses their trust. Speaking of the main characters their names are Ruby, Zu, Chubs, and Liam. Each of these characters have a certain power or ability that has mysteriously been given to them. They use these powers to overcome the challenges and foes across their journey. The main idea of this book (most commonly recognized by the movie) is that there are a group of kids trying to make their way through the world by practicing their abilities, and the end goal would be to reunite with their families. 

Now for those that have read it to the very end you already know that’s not the case so let me give you a quick run down of everything that happened. The newest generation of humans (kids) were infected by a disease called “The Everheart”. It killed those that were unlucky enough to have it and left most kids terrified. But the ones that survived gained powers that no one could ever have imagined. The government addressed the situation by telling the citizens to hand over their children. That way they could be examined and hopefully cured by scientists. Most of the parents bought this but the ones that didn’t still got their children taken away from them, forcefully for that matter. Now Ruby was taken to the facility and classified as dangerous for her ability to erase people’s mind or read them. However, an adult rescued her from the camp “Thurmond” where they were being tested. 

Eventually the adult gave Ruby some clothes to wear and told her to change into them at a gas station. However, while she was changing Ruby saw a little girl called, “Zu” and followed the girl who was running away from her. Ruby just didn’t want to be alone and Zu let her inside the van that she was hiding in. That’s when the two boys “Liam and Chubs” came to meet up and they were just as surprised as Zu was. Liam informed Ruby about the Children’s League and that the woman who rescued her was working for them. They take kids from Thurmond to use has their own test subjects and fighters. From that point on Ruby sticked alongside the group and played her part in trying to find the “Slip Kid”. All in all I like this book because although it may seem like just another superhero story it has lots of emotion and romance to go with it (if you read the book you’ll see). 

Dairy: my friend birthday

08/23/18

Yesterday was a lot of fun and in today’s post I’m going to be telling you why! So it was my friend’s birthday party, and this has been like the 3rd party I’ve gone to this summer. He invited me and a couple of our other friends at a place called, “RPM Raceway”. It’s a place where people go ahead and drive go karts in a competitive scene. And if you didn’t like driving the go-karts then you could’ve played in the arcade that they had. My dad drove my sister and I there an hour before the actual birthday kid arrived so we just played on the arcade. I genuinely enjoyed it and loved the experience of being on the racetrack. It was the thrill of the speed that really caught me off guard in my first race. I wasn’t expecting it to be that fast. And I know for a fact that regular cars as faster than go-karts so it’s going to be a while before I drive one.

The birthday kid’s mom let us drive two times and I thank her for it. It was exhilarating to say the least. After we raced twice we checked the leaderboards and I got last place both times. But I’m not even salty because the difference between first place and last was by one second. Literally anyone could have one that. It took me 30.588 seconds to drive a whole lap and the first place (birthday kid) took 29.122 seconds. You can see how little difference that is right! Afterwards, his mom wanted everyone to take a picture with Wade (birthday kid) and eat the cake. I’m not trying to say the food was bad because they had pizza and mini-hot dogs but the cake just wasn’t up to my standards. In my opinion the pizza was fine.

They also had two “special” games that were just added in the “RPM Raceway”. One was a “VR” (Virtual Reality) game that took place in a space setting. The mission was to shoot as many “monsters” as possible and get rid of the boss before the time limit. The other “special” game was a racing game that when you turned the steering wheel the actual seats moved as well so it felt like a real driving experience. Unfortunately, I couldn’t enjoy it and just played “Pool” and “Air Hockey” with the rest of the kids. Once the party was over the birthday kid’s mom took me, Reginald (another kid), and Wade to their house so we could relax and eat McDonalds. I knew that it was getting late and Reginald was going to stay there so I just left, but not before saying goodbye to his step-dad who was the only adult in the apartment.