Holes

Rating:
Summary: An exceptional book.
Review: This is, most likely, one of my favourite books of all time. It's the kind of book that you sit down to read... and you don't get up again until you're finished a few hours later, and your legs have fallen asleep and your eyes hurt but it really is worth it.
Holes is basically about Stanley Yelnats, who goes to Camp Greenlake, a juvenile correction facility (or whatever you call them) because he supposedly stole a pair of incredibly valuable sneakers. At Camp Greenlake, where there is no lake, they are made to dig holes, five feet wide and five feet deep, every day out where the lake used to be to "build character."
But after a while it becomes apparent that they're not just digging to build character, but because the Warden's looking for something...
But besides the main plot, there are so many sort of sub-plots that seem to be going on, and every single little detail that you kept thinking was so pointless really does matter, and all these details and plot threads tie in at the end in such a creative way that you just want to jump up and scream "Yes!" before reading the book again. And again. And again...
So overall, Holes is one of those books with something interesting going on in every sentence. It's the kind of book that is so exceptionally awesome you feel all tingly inside. If you've borrowed it to read, you go and buy a copy. It's that good. Now go read it. You'll be glad you did.

Rating:
Summary: What a great book (for everyone)!
Review: This may be a Newbury Award winner for children's literature, but I'm 23 and it kept me interested and in suspense the whole time. The interlacing of the two stories, the present centering around Stanly and the past centering around the "ancient" Green Lake its seedy past, are perfect and masterful. The characters are simply done, but they have a massive dynamic, taking on a whole new life after "building character." It's a great adventure, a riveting drama, a raucous comedy and has one of the most satisfying and redeming endings I've read in any novel, current or classic. This is great for every reader of every age. I give it my highest recommendation possible!

Rating:
Summary: A Book for All Ages
Review: This novel grabs the attention of the reader from the first page. The plot revolves around a boys' detention center. Stanley Yelnats, an overweight teenager, finds himself unjustly sentenced to Camp Green Lake. Stanley is convinced that his bad luck is caused by a curse put on one of his ancestors generations earlier in Latvia. The warden and her sadistic guards force the boys to dig holes in the desert day after day. Stanley comes to the conclusion that the warden is looking for something in the desert. Through a series of flashbacks spread throughout the book, the reader is told what the warden is so interested in finding. Eventually, the brutal life of the camp causes Stanley's friend, Zero, to run off into the desert. Stanley escapes from the camp and pursues his friend to save him from a certain death from exposure. Together they survive the hostile desert environment. Through Stanley's efforts the evil warden is brought to justice and Stanley is freed to be with his family. One of the charms of this story is in the quirky characters and rather odd plot twists that involve characters in the present and the past. The novel appeals to the reader on many levels. There is mystery, suspense, humor, flashbacks, and much more. The themes of friendship, loyalty, and perseverance are woven throughout the story. The reading level is low enough to make this book appealing to students of many grade and achievement levels. The interest level spans a wide range of age groups. This is a wonderful reading adventure for junior high and high school students and a "must have" for any library collection.

Rating:
Summary: To chronicle a broken world, must you be a broken person?
Review: This novel turns thematically on the words of a lullaby that a family passes down through four generations. Right at the start of that descent, somebody twists the words around from the way they were suppposed to be, and the meaning gets twisted right around, too. The lullaby originally extolled what you might call natural virtue: "fly high, my angel, my only." As debased, it extolled a sheepishly grinning fatalism: "'if only, if only,' while the wolves howl outside the door" (in my slight paraphrase). That contortion provides all the thematic emotional force the book contains. The original, undebased version of the lullaby appears on the last page of the book. You close the book with the contrast of the two versions ringing in your ears. The rest of the book vaguely foreshadows that eventual revelatory contrast by constantly pointing out people's fatalism and the evil it gives rise to: by first conniving at evil, then rationalizing evil, and eventually masterminding evil. The problem is that the two literary devices have no unifying principle: they coexist without cooperating. The poetic tension of the pair of lullabies hangs over the spectacle of the narrative like a great painting hung high on a wall in a gallery full of people who are all ignoring it in their gaucherie and philistinism. Given that my metaphorical painting condemns gaucherie and philistinism, this would not be a total artistic loss. However, unlike the gallery-goers, whom we may condemn for their claiming to be cultured, to be sighted, while they rhapsodize in their blindness, the reader of "Holes" as well as its characters have apparently come upon their crassitude through no fault of their own. I speak now of the life the reader shares with the characters in the course of the narrative. They and we have apparently been so beaten down by life so that their and our fatalism is as ordinary as spit. The notion that our fatalism is somehow our own work hangs over us uncomprehendingly, and we of it. That duality of theme, or discordancy between narrative and theme, betokens, I fear, another discordancy in the book: children read for action, adults read for meaning. This leads to a third: the author inhabits a world of meaning, the reader inhabits a world of literary gimmicks. Thence, the ultimate: the aristocrat acts upon the truth, the proletariat is acted upon by the truth. If literature is worth anything, is anything, it is the desire of people to see their lives and themselves in the round, as they go, so that they may judge the lives they live even while they live them. Literature is never anything more than a fable told by a cranky old person to children who may not want to hear. If the old person is unwilling to bend down and join in the narrative course of the children, as it were, in order to weave the fable's theme into the theme of the children's lives, the fable has no life in it. One published review called the book a shaggy dog story. I think perhaps that that technique only works with jokes. This book leaves me resentful that the author did not put himself down into the words, but only stuck himself on at the end, like a celebrity's cameo public service announcement stuck on to the end of a TV movie that deals with a social ill. I don't doubt that Mr. Sachar did his best. That's the way fatalism works. Here's my "word from our sponsor": the opposite of fatalism is not determination and exuberance,which Mr. Sachar seems to be full of. It is conscience, which I define as that sensibility for the tiniest loose end, the naryest hard pea under twenty nine feather mattresses, the response to which loose end and hard pea finally turns a bewildered old man into the tragic hero of Shakespeare's King Lear. In the case of "Holes", the author almost admits that he and his hero, Stanley Yelnats, may leave the book as bewildered as they began it . . . "if only, if only, the moon speaks no reply; reflecting the sun and all that's gone by. Be strong my weary wolf, turn around boldly. Fly high, my baby bird, my angel, my only." It is not enough to be a good wolf, and a good baby bird. One must be a good person, and that involves, what do they call it, a morbid sensitivity to nuance of expression and quality of theme.

Rating:
Summary: A little strange.....
Review: This novel was truly a little strange, but that is why I kept reading it. It was mysterious, and I had to find out what happened.

Rating:
Summary: The Holes of Camp Green Lake
Review: This one of the greatest and most mysterious books I've ever read. The main character, Stanley Yelnats, is accused of a crime (stealing a baseball player's shoe's) he didn't commit, and he is sent to a dried up lake called Camp Green Lake (it's a boy's detention center)as punishment. The boys that are at Camp Green Lake must wake up every morning and wake up at 4:30 a.m., and the boys have to dig a hole that is 5 feet deep and 5 feet wide, even on weekends and holidays! The Warden says that digging holes builds character, but Caveman (Stanley), Theodore (Armpit), Ricky (Zig Zag), X-Ray, Squid, and Hector Zeroni (Zero) aren't digging to build character, the Warden is looking for something. I liked the book because it was so emmotional, exciting, and adventurous. If you are in 4th grade or higher, you will enjoy this book.

Rating:
Summary: Chad from Indiana
Review: This story is a story that I would reccomend to people ages 9to 99, because it is funny and easy to understand. It is also a verypage turning book. A person that is 9 years old would like it as muchas a person that is 99 years old.I give this book a thumbs up.

Rating:
Summary: It's suspensful!
Review: This story is about a boy who is accused of steeling some expensive shoes that are donated to a charity by a famous basketball player to make money for the kids.His sentence is to go to this camp in which they are forced to dig a hole,6 feet wide and 6 feet deep, every day.When he befriends a boy named Zero, they soon discover that there's more to this camp than the flat desert around them;there's a strange secret underneath the soil and their gonna find out. This book is a good book because it is suspenseful and make's you seem like your in the book living every word of the book.

Rating:
Summary: The great story about holes
Review: This story is about a camp called "The Green Lake Camp". The Green Lake Camp is a Camp where juvenile Delinquent are sent. "Green Lake Camp use to be a great lake in Texas" but they drained it out and make it a Juvenile detention. Green lake camp became a dry, flat sunburned wasteland. A boy named Stanley Yelnats is framed of stealing a important pair of shoes. He was sent to Green Lake camp. When he was sent he expected to see a lake but all he saw was a hot and dry land. Stanley's family always had bad luck so they could not get him out. The Green Lake Camp made the kids there dig holes five feet deep by five feet wide, they even had to dig on weekends. They had to dig their hole all day under the sun. What Stanley and the rest of the boys don't know is that the warden isn't just building character, she's looking for the lost buried treasure of outlaw. I like this story because it is full of great characters with strong voices, exciting, funny scenes and enough twists and turns.

Rating:
Summary: HOLES BY BOBBY AND NATHAN
Review: THIS STORY IS ABOUT A KID WHOSE NAME IS STANLEY. HE IS CURSED, AND THEN HE GOES TO CAMP AND MEET'S A FRIEND NAMED ZERO. THEY BECOME FRIENDS, AND STANLEY TEACHES ZERO HOW TO READ. ZERO IS HOMELESS. THEN THEY RUN AWAY FROM CAMP! THEY ARE SEARCHING FOR A MOUNTAIN NAMED THE BIG THUMB THAT TIES IN WITH THEIR PAST. THEIR ANCESTOR BURIED TREASURE AT CAMPGREEN LAKE, CAUSING IT TO DRY UP.NOW THE WARRDEN AT CAMP GREEN LAKE IS MAKING THE KIDS DIG FOR IT. SHE TELLS THEM THEY ARE DIGGING FOR CHARACTER, BUT THEY ARE REALLY DIGGING FOR THE TREASURE.
WERE THE EVENTS IN THIS NOVEL BELIEVABLE? WAS GREEN LAKE A REAL PLACE? I BELIEVE IT COULD BE. GREEN LAKE IS A BOOT CAMP. IT IS A DRY PLACE. EVERY DAY THEY DIG HOLES FOR CHARACTER, BUT REALLY THE WARREN IS A REALITVE TO KISSING KATE BARLOW. SO THE KIDS ARN'T DIGING FOR CHARACTER, BUT THEY ARE DIGING FOR THE TREASURE. THESE EVENTS COULD HAVE REALLY HAPPENED.
I THINK THIS IS A GOOD BOOK BECAUSE IT WAS ADVENTURES. IF YOU LIKE THESE KINDS OF BOOKS, GIVE IT A TRY!