The Sword of Summer

By Rick Riordan

Main Characters:

The main characters in “The Sword of Summer are Magnus Chase, a sarcastic, witty, and quick thinking son of Frey that saves the world using the rope Andskoti and his sword, called Sumarbrander or, as the sword likes to call itself, Jack. There is also Samirah-Al-Abbas, a daughter of Loki and a personal Valkyrie(handmaiden of Odin) for Magnus. She is the one who brought Magnus to Valhalla( Norse heaven for fighters who died an honorable death), and she is a fearful fighter. There is also Blitzen, a dwarf in service of Mimir and a fashion designer. He is a daughter of Freya, which makes him a cousin of Magnus. There is Hearthstone, who is an elf in the service of Mimir. He is dumb(in the no talking way), and is very good at casting runes. He had a very harsh childhood, because his brother died and his brother was perfect to his parents, but since Hearthstone was dumb, they treated him like something they couldn’t wait to get rid of.

Setting:

The setting in the sword of Summer is in the nine worlds of the universe. Magnus and his crew traveled through MIdgard(where humans live), Jotunheim(the world of giants), Valhalla(the world of slain heroes that died bravely in combat), Vanaheim(where the Vanir gods live and where slain heroes that were sons or daughters of the Vanir usually go[Magnus was a special case]), and Nidavellir(dwarf land)

Details:

At the beginning, Magnus was just a homeless teenage guy with no idea about this Norse mythology, and hung out with his homeless buddies, Hearth and Blitz(Hearthstone and Blitzen in disguise sent to protect him by Mimir). Then he dies in combat with the king of fire giants, Surt, and gets taken to Valhalla by Samirah. While in Valhalla, the norns recite a prophecy that completely does not make Magnus’ day. Then, Blitzen and Hearthstone come and take him away from Valhalla. They then meet Samirah, who has been kicked out of the Valkyries.They then start looking for The Sword of Summer(Jack) and eventually find it. They have to save the world from Fenris Wolf( the most powerful being in the nine worlds) so they go to Nidavellir to retrieve the rope Andskoti from the elf Junior. Junior challenges Blitz to a competition of elf blacksmithing, and the loser has to pay for it with its head. Blitz wins, and he makes Junior give him Andskoti. They retrieve Thor’s replacement weapon for him and go to the Isle of Heather where they plan to rebound Fenris and they……………..do something, but I can’t tell you what happens

Theme:

I think the author’s message is to accomplish big things, many challenges will have to be overcome

Connections:

Text To Self:

My connection with Magnus is once my friend told me to say “My corpulence is downright brobdingnagian” and then he laughed and laughed and laughed. I don’t know what those words mean, but I think the general idea of it is I am stupid. This relates to Magnus because he was tricked into saying to an eagle(really a giant in disguise) by my troth I swear to bring you an apple of immortality. That means I will bring you an apple of immortality or I will die and go to Helheim(hell).

Opinion of Plot and Theme:

Overall, I really liked the plot of The Sword of Summer. It was very interesting, and you never knew what was going to happen next. Also, the book was very funny, with the sarcasm of Magnus and the other characters. The Sword of Summer is a book I would recommend to anyone with a reading level appropriate for it. I can't wait for the second book to come out, The Hammer of Thor.

Chris Van Allsburg Essay

The author Chris Van Allsburg is a writer of fantasy and mystery. From Zathura to Bad Day at Riverbend  most of his stories are fantasy, and they sometimes have a mysterious twist.  His stories usually have a hidden message in them, like in Probuditi, a book where a boy plays a trick on his sister, only to find his sister played a trick on him, the message is “if you play tricks on people, prepare to have tricks played on you”.  Chris Van Allsburg is an author that uses his author’s craft to always make his stories great.

The story Two Bad Ants is my favorite story by Mr. Van Allsburg. It tells a tale written from a narrator’s perspective in the world of ants.  In the beginning the queen ant tastes sugar crystals and decides they are delectable.  She orders a scouting party that goes on a journey to a human’s house and brings back one sugar crystal each for the queen.  But, two ants decide to stay behind in a  paradise of crystals. When they wake up, they have wacky misadventures.  Two Bad Ants is a story of teamwork and how not working as a team can get you in trouble.

Chris Van Allsburg’s Bad Day at Riverbend tells a story written in the world of a coloring book.  The page where Riverbend (the pages where the story is set ) is has not been colored yet, so when a horse comes in with greasy slime(crayon) on it everybody is frightened.  Sheriff Ned Hardy goes looking for the rider and finds that he is also covered in greasy slime and in a bad state.  Both these are products of a four year old’s imagination and artistic mind.  This book gives the reader a glimmer of what their crayon drawings would feel like if they were alive.

The books Two Bad Ants and Bad Day at Riverbend are two similar but very different books.  They are both written from a narrator’s perspective in worlds that the human cannot manage to see with the naked eye.  Two Bad Ants could have very well happened in real life (if you don’t keep your sugar covered you could get ants) but Bad Day at Riverbend is purely fictional (coloring book drawings aren’t alive!).  These books are very good, Mr. Van Allsburg didn’t disappoint.  

I think Chris Van Allsburg was an interesting author to study because his author’s craft and extraordinary illustrations make him an author hard not to like. The plot of his books, like Jumanji and Zathura,  have twists and turns around every corner and are fun to read.  For picture books, his stories  have lots of depth and meaning to them.  Overall, I’d rate Chris Van Allsburg an 8 out of 10 author.

The Birthday Party

   I'm in my house. Playing outside. Nothing seems out of the ordinary except...except...today's my eighth birthday party! Six of my friends were invited, five came. When my friends started filing in, I took them upstairs to play Madden 10 on my Wii. Unfortunately, there were only two controllers but the guests were good sports. While two of us were playing, the others took turns making their own unlimited topping, 11 inch pizzas from Pizza Studio.
  After we had fun with the Wii, we went to my backyard and played outside.We played the classic game Monkey in the Middle, but with our own twist. The two people who aren't monkeys have two decide who plays wide receiver and who plays quarterback. There are two monkeys chasing the quarterback, trying to strip the ball from him, and there is one monkey covering the wide receiver. The receiver ran routes like X-Clown, Double Seams, and Drag Outs.
  Then, the pizza came! Its heavenly scent wafted in the air. Everybody quickly came inside and devoured their delicious masterpieces. After that, we had cake. But it wasn't a regular cake, it was an ICE CREAM CAKE! We ravenously gobbled up that football cake(it was shaped and looked like a football) until not a single crumb remained. All the ants must have felt disappointed.
  I then opened presents. I got a Pokemon card set, Jenga Tetris, a $20 Barnes and Noble Gift Card, a $20 Amazon Gift Card, and a $20 Target Gift Card. Later, what better too happen than than my mom checked the mail and found a $50 Barnes and Noble Gift Card. To wrap up my birthday party, we played Mario Kart Wii until everybody left. That was the best birthday party ever!

The Nerve-Wracking Auditions

  The room was about 30 square feet. There were a lot of plaques on the walls. It was just me and a lady. I should have felt comfortable but I couldn't because she was watching me like a hawk. The "Welcome" mat at the front of the room didn't feel welcoming at all under the circumstances.
   I had worked seven whole months. Those seven months were brutal, and I was lectured tons of times on the values of "practicing" and "memorizing" and whatever by my very strict piano teacher, Mrs. Deering. I did practice half an hour a day! Usually an hour! But, all that lecturing and practicing was going to come down to this final span of 12 minutes.
  Let me just say that every minute of those auditions felt like an eternity. Playing " The Pink Panther" was the easiest because the tune of the tune of the song was easy to memorize. The first song I played was "United We Stand" and every time she looked down on that report card and made note of something I thought I was going to be sick. The passing grade was easy, even if you got 16 more Cs(negatives) than As(positives) you would still pass but I still felt like I was going to be sick to my stomach. While I was playing "Hogwarts Hymn" I could barely remember the notes of the song. On the last part, I thought I played a note wrong and I thought that mistake would cost me a good grade. After "Hogwarts Hymn" I played "Snake Charmer" in which I thought I had the tempo all wrong. After that eighth song, those twelve minutes were over. I felt like doing a hop-skip-jump dance. I braced myself for a bad grade but I got 11 As and 5 Cs. I had passed! My nerves relaxed. A ton of weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I got into the car and happily relaxed. Finally, those piano auditions were over.

The World Would be a Better Place if...

When it was summer time I visited my grandparents in Bangalore, India. My grandparents took me to an orphanage where many poor kids were living. My grandparents donate some food each month to help the orphans. I think the world be a better place if everybody has a home and family. Take those orphans, for example, and picture them living in a house with kind parents. They would also be healthy because they would get fresh food and clean water. Also they would be happy to have caring companions to stay with. I thought of ideas to help the orphans by sending them highly nutritious foods so they would be healthy. If everybody had parents and helped each other like my grandparents, the world would be a better place.

The Haunted House

After a chilly October day in school, me and my dog Midnight were walking home. It was a regular day in school, from playing handball with my friends to almost falling into a coma in Mr. Bore's science class. Little did I know about the adventure that was soon too come. Midnight loves too play fetch so I gave the ball a big toss; it rolled into a Haunted house where no one had lived since the 1700s. Midnight chased the ball inside the house and I uneasily followed him. " Midnight, Midnight, where are you." I called while pushing the door open with a loud CREAK! As soon as I opened the door I fell through a long trapdoor. When I got to the end of the trapdoor a war ghost blocked my path." I am hungry for blood." it moaned as it slowly drifted toward me. I quickly picked up a rusty,old sword that I found in a dark corner. It turned swords worked on war ghosts because when I jabbed at him he vaporized in a flash. I looked at my sword. It had transformed into a lightning bolt. Wow, I thought, why would I need a lightning bolt? Pretty soon, I found out. An army of zombie-chickens started attacking me. It turned out that when you zapped them they turned into chicken wings. After I electrified all the zombie-chickens I ate some chicken wings. Mmm, I thought, these chicken wings are really good. Then I remembered the purpose of why I was here. To get Midnight back, not eat chicken wings. Plus, I remembered that these were one-hundred percent pure zombie-chickens and suddenly they didn't seem so appetizing anymore. I raced down the cobwebbed stairs and  came to a gigantic room. I skidded to a halt and hid behind a dusty rock. Why a rock was there, I don't know. In front of me the most enormous mummy ever was about to cook Midnight for dinner. Conveniently, I knew a trick with mummies. I quietly tiptoed toward him and pulled one of his loose bandages. All of his bandages began to unravel, tripping him while I found a nearby sarcophagus and trapped him in there. Then I took Midnight up the ladder and tore like heck for home. That was some scary experience. It's a coincidence that today is Halloween. 

ALIENS

CRASH! I heard a thunderous noise in my backyard at 1:00 A.M. I rushed outside and what did I see? Aliens with high-tech laser guns and hydros( they shot water at about 100 miles per minute ). They had their names stuck to their T-Shirts. Alien 1 was called Sawk and was yellow with black spots. Alien 2 was called Throh and was green with black stripes. The one called Sawk said," We are on Earth to steal solar panels from people . After those words with a WHOOSH they were gone.I told my mom and dad. They didn't believe me. I called up some scientists. They didn't believe me either until I phoned up one who had his solar panels stolen and his house soaked with hydros. I told him to call up all the other scientists. They trusted him. After this the scientists started making some very powerful force fields. They were no match for the aliens though. They had teleporters! They quickly teleported out of the force fields which were meant to trap them. At last one very brilliant fellow named Mr. Jenkins made a force field that cripples any sort of teleporters. The Aliens tried to steal all the solar panels in the scientists labratories but they got trapped inside Mr. Jenkins force field. Their teleporters broken, the aliens laser gunned the force field and took cover under some debris in another room. Unluckily for them, that room was the newest invention of the scientists and all machines that somehow got in there were disabled. The walls were made of titanium so the only way to get out was if the scientists unlocked the door. The scientists unlocked the door, went in, and locked the door again. Throh and Sawk gave the scientists 10 million dollars( Ka-Ching), the hydros, laser guns, and teleporters so that they could keep the solar panels. Amazingly, once the scientists walked out of the room the machines started working again( even the teleporters )! It turned out that without the teleporters, Throh and Sawk were really slow so the scientists had to drive them in their cars to their irregular spaceship. It was the first time I saw the spaceship and it was definitely not normal. Instead of fuel it was powered by garbage and rocks. Throh said," We are from Mars. We power our spaceships by putting in rocks and garbage. Our great and wise leaders, Blastoise, Venasaur, and Charizard told us to go get the solar panels so that we can power our spaceships by the power of the sun so we won't run out of rocks and garbage on Mars. That really is a wise decision, that is." The scientists stuck some of the solar panels around the spaceship and put the rest inside the spaceship. The two aliens said," Thank you!" and with a WHOOSH they were gone.