MMGM- The Frindle Files and Escape from Alcatraz

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Marvelous Middle Grade Monday
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Always in the Middle 

and #IMWAYR day 

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Unleashing Readers

Clements, Andrew. The Frindle Files

August 27, 2024 by Random House Books for Young Readers

E ARC provided by Netgalley.com

Josh Willet loves technology, prefers doing his schoolwork on the computer, and is a huge fan of The Zen of Python, a coding style manual similar to Strunk and White's Elements of Style. His teacher, Mr. N., does NOT like technology, and uses it rarely in his classroom. Instead, he has a chalkboard, requires students to bring a paper copy of Strunk and White with them every day, and makes them hand in handwritten assignments. When Nick's pen runs out of ink, he has to borrow one from his mother, and notices that it has "Frindle" written on it. She tells him that it was a big fad when she was in middle school, and when Josh does a search for the term, he comes across stories about Nicholas Allen, a boy whose dictionary loving teacher inspired him to make up a new word for pens. Not only that, but Nicholas Allen looks a lot like Mr. N. a.k.a. Allen Nicholas! Could his Hawaiian shirt wearing Luddite of a teacher be the news sensation from the 1990s? To test out his hypothesis, Josh leaves a pen with "Frindle" written on it on the teacher's desk and waits for a reaction. When the next writing assignment deals with whether or not someone should reveal another person's secret, Josh knows he has the right person. To further test, he has all of his classmates use the adjective "frindy", meaning "weird, tacky, strange, or odd" in their writing assignments. Mr. N. plays along, and before he knows it, Josh is pushing the envelope. He has several of his friends bring their laptops to class with copies of a free, online version of the Strunk and White manual. Mr. N. takes away their laptops for the day, which earns him a meeting with the principal. In the end, students are allowed to use the online version, but Mr. N. points out that there are a lot of errors in it. Josh is interested to find out that E.B. White, author of Charlotte's Web, is the "White" in "Strunk and White". Soon, the class is researching this problem, trying to find out who posted the illegal copy, and using the battle cry "For Wilbur!" Mr. N. assigns the class a letter to send to the poster, asking for the copy to be taken down. It's sent from Mr. N.'s e mail account, which causes the school server almost to crash after a famous writer heralds their cause and classmate Miguel's interview about it goes viral. When the local news covers the class's project, Mr. N.'s secret is revealed. Josh learns more about his teacher's past, and about the value of using technology responsibly as well as grammar and print books, than he ever hoped to find out. 

Strengths: I have to admit that I was leery of this title going in; the note reassuring me that Clements had been working on this book before his death was helpful. Since Frindle was published in 1996, this really worked perfectly. Technology has changed so much since then, so of course Josh prefers doing homework on a laptop. Nicholas Allen would be old enough to be a teacher. I adored the story of how he came to be a teacher, and admittedly cried when he shared information about Mrs. Grander and her impact on his life. This took several twists and turns, but was a masterful look at research, coding, and even good writing. I am not a good enough writer to do this final book of Clements' justice. It really is a fitting and excellent Trumpet of the Swan song of his career. 
Weaknesses: I wasn't able to go back and read Frindle, but I seem to recall that Nick wasn't as nice as Josh. Somehow, I wanted Josh, or perhaps Mr. N., to be a little snarkier or nastier, if only to see them become nicer during the course of the story. That said, it's much more on trend to have characters be nicer today, and that's much more pleasant to read. 
What I really think: This begs to be studied in classes, and I thought long and hard about which book would be best to read first. I think if I were using this as a class novel with 6th graders or upper elementary school students, I would start with The Frindle Files, and then go back and meet Nick in Frindle. This would also be a perfect book for any student-parent book clubs. This will be a hugely popular book, and it has several great messages. 

And yes, I could have been teaching Nick in 1996! Also, my middle school has banned cell phones during the day, and I think students will be much more engaged and actually talk to each other at lunch!

Marino, Andy. Escape from Alcatraz (Escape #4)

September 3, 2024 by Scholastic Inc.
E ARC provided by Netgalley

Chip Carter lives with his father, a senior prison guard, on Alcatraz Island. He finds it hard to make friends, and longs for the day when he can live in a bigger city, away from the somewhat stifling atmosphere of the close knit community on the island. He also fancies himself something of a private investigator, modeling himself on Jake Hall, of the Hall of Justice television show. Having already solved the mystery of a missing cat (a gateway mystery for many crime obsessed youths), he is approached by Maddie, who wants Chip to figure out where her and her brother's new raincoats have gone. She suspects local bully Albert, who shakes people down for their daily dime of lunch money, so he's a likely candidate. Chip's mother has passed away, and his father is struggling a bit, although his weekly poker game seems to cheer him somewhat. After Chip sees Maddie's father, Mr. Thompson, on the shore with the raincoats, he knows that something nefarious is up. He tells Maddie that he knows about her dad's involvement in the coats' disappearance, and she admits that she is worried that he's involved in something illegal. They skip school, and Chip (wearing a hat and glasses as a disguise) eavesdrops on the men at a diner. He finds out that Jimmy the Hat, aka Mr. Lanza, is involved, as is his own father, but he has also gleaned the information that Zipper, an "associate" of Mr. Lanza's is trying to run how own shakedown. Mr. Thompson and Mr. Carter both owe money to Mr. Lanza,  and are driven to helping him arrange a prison break when they also have to pay off Zipper. Mr. Lanza says he'll make things right as long as Chip helps with the prison break he has planned; he wants a fire set in the courtyard as a distraction. No one will be hurt, but the men on the inside will be able to escape. We see, in alternating chapters, how several men are working to dig out of the prison, construct a raft, and are planning on escaping that way. When Zipper shows up dead in a local park, Chip and Maddie know they have to keep their end of the bargain. Several men escape, and the guards are not blamed, and Mr. Lanza lets the kids know that their obligation, as well as their father's, is paid off. Chip and his father talk about how they can improve their lives, and connect more than they have in recent years. 

Strengths: I wasn't quite sure how Marino would pull this off, but he does a perfect job of realistically getting a tween embroiled in a real life situation. Tom Sullivan's Unsolved Case Files: Jailbreak at Alcatraz: Frank Morris the Anglin Brothers' Great Escape  is a great companion for this book, since it outlines all the details on how the escape was probably planned. I enjoyed the note from Marino, talking about how there were rumors that guards were involved, and he elaborated in an exciting way that made sense. I love Chip, who would have been a contemporary of Donald Sobol's Encyclopedia Brown, and envisions himself a hard boiled gumshoe, chewing on a toothpick. Like this author's Escape From Stalingrad, Escape from Chernobyl, and Escape From East Berlin, this book has plenty of adventures and successfully adds new characters  into a historical setting. The details of daily life in this are great, as are the details about life on Alcatraz and in San Francisco. More tweens would read historical fiction if the books had the elements that Marino's work has. 
Weaknesses: Chip's mother didn't have to be dead; it would have been more fun if she had been alive and found out about the father's involvement with Jimmy the Hat! Also, Maddie uses the phrase "bee's knees" to describe Nestle's Quik, which sounded more like the 1920s. Small quibble.
What I really think: Definitely purchasing this one, since there are an inordinate number of my students who listen to true crime podcasts and like to read about various criminal hijinks of the past. Chip's adventures were just particularly well done and oddly charming. 

Blather Update: I've been off my foot for a month, but the cast is removed on Thursday! Whew. I am hoping to return for my 27th year of teaching on 9/16. 

I've had a lot of time to read but having trouble focusing. Will try to do better for my final two weeks. Not moving doesn't work in my favor; usually, I probably spend two hours a day walking outside. Leo has been very patient with my replacement. I also miss taking breaks for cleaning, cooking, and laundry. Variety is a good thing. 

On the bright side, I've had plenty of time to Tweet like it's my job, and I found out that educators can get a premium Canva account for free!