Title: Girl Coming in for a Landing Author: April Halprin Wayland
ISBN: 0440419034 Pages: 134
Publisher: Yearling, New York, 2004
ISBN: 0440419034 Pages: 134
Publisher: Yearling, New York, 2004
Readers Annotation:
An anonymous adolescent girl with a strong desire to write down her innermost feelings, decides to express herself with poetry. At the beginning of her high school career, season by season, she shares her most private thoughts and emotions.
Author Information:
April Halprin Wayland is an award winning poet in addition to an author for young readers. She grew up in both Santa Monica, California, and on a three hundred acre farm in Northern California. April went to college at University of California Davis and graduated with a degree in Human Development. She worked with the poet Myra Cohn Livingston for ten years, who suggested that she write a verse novel in a teen voice. This led to Girl Coming in for a Landing, which has won many awards including the Myra Cohn Livingston Award for Poetry, and the Lee Bennett Hopkins Honor Award for Children's Poetry. Another of her famous works is New Year at the Pier, which has won the 2010 Sydney Taylor Book Award.
Currently, Wayland lives with her family and her animals in Southern California. She teaches writing for University of California Los Angeles's extension program. Though always a writer, April has also tried her hand at fiddle playing, walnut farming, aqua farming, and managing a corporate marketing business.
www.goodreads.com
www.aprilwayland.com
Currently, Wayland lives with her family and her animals in Southern California. She teaches writing for University of California Los Angeles's extension program. Though always a writer, April has also tried her hand at fiddle playing, walnut farming, aqua farming, and managing a corporate marketing business.
www.goodreads.com
www.aprilwayland.com
Plot Summary:
Set in Los Angeles, California, a young teenage girl narrates one year of her high school existence through poetry. Her adventure begins in the fall, immediately prior to the beginning of the first semester. Her ramblings take her to wondering what love has in store for her in the coming year. She also discusses her relationships with the most important people in her life. She tells of the safe and somewhat distant relationship she has with her parents, the wonderful yet occasionally annoying relationship she has with her older sister, the close and tumultuous feelings for her best friend, the love and headaches she gets from her great-aunt, and the crushes she has on two boys in her class.
The poems she writes vary based on her moods and daily events. She depicts a typical life of a high school teenager, complete with loved and hated teachers, anxiety at drama tryouts and at parties, and love both gained and lost. She explains her need to write and her thoughts on being published. She writes her true emotions as a teenager, and the accompanying trials and triumphs.
Critical Evaluation:
This novel in poems presents an honest and simple year in the life of a ninth grade teenager. The book is cleverly divided into four chapters corresponding to the four seasons. Essentially, Girl Coming in for a Landing is an enchanting plot about a young girl who talks about her ordinary teen travails in about 160 short poems. She speaks directly to the audience through a first person narrative, giving the readers insight into her true feelings. The tone is raw and straightforward, bringing a sense of powerful reality to the book. Diverse black and white illustrations by Elaine Clayton enhance the background of many poems, making the novel both entertaining and charming.
This novel in poems presents an honest and simple year in the life of a ninth grade teenager. The book is cleverly divided into four chapters corresponding to the four seasons. Essentially, Girl Coming in for a Landing is an enchanting plot about a young girl who talks about her ordinary teen travails in about 160 short poems. She speaks directly to the audience through a first person narrative, giving the readers insight into her true feelings. The tone is raw and straightforward, bringing a sense of powerful reality to the book. Diverse black and white illustrations by Elaine Clayton enhance the background of many poems, making the novel both entertaining and charming.
Genre: Coming of Age, Verse Novel
Curriculum Ties: English - Poetry
Book-talking Ideas:
1. The adolescent girl writing the poems tells of her highs and lows in high school. How was your high school experience similar or different than the experience of the narrator of this book?
2. The teenage poet was told by her teacher that her poems were good enough to give into a publisher. Were you ever told that some of your own works could be published?
1. The adolescent girl writing the poems tells of her highs and lows in high school. How was your high school experience similar or different than the experience of the narrator of this book?
2. The teenage poet was told by her teacher that her poems were good enough to give into a publisher. Were you ever told that some of your own works could be published?
Reading Level/Interest Age: 12+
Challenge Issue: none
Why I chose this item: I found it fascinating that a novel could be written in poetry format, and felt that this would be a great poetry option for the more reluctant readers.
Girl Coming in for a Landing book trailer
Girl Coming in for a Landing book trailer
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