8YO: “Oh, I know this one.”
When the topic of containing things came up she found the description hilarious. Again I love it when they get the humor in books.
8YO: “Containing a Smedry? Containing an incident? 😂”
8YO: “Neutralizing?”
Me: “Putting out of commission.”
8YO: “They’re all single lenses.”
8YO (excited squeal): “The Sands of Rashid!!”
When Alcatraz’s Firebringer’s lens was stolen the eight year old had thoughts.
8YO: “I knew this would happen. I knew he would take it! It’s easier for them to have it than him.”
When Sing shot at Blackburn she thought it wasn’t fair.
8YO: “No cheating!”
After a lens was reversed she made a logical connection.
8YO: “So you need to use it backwards!”
8YO: “He’s the one that is late!”
Then later in the rescue Grandpa Smedry said that they were going to be late.
8YO: He’s always late! That’s his talent! … Why did no blood come [when he was stabbed]?”
Me: “Because he arrived late to the wound.”
8YO: “Gramma Smedry was probably too late for each shot. I hope he’s always too late.”
Once Alcatraz mentioned freeing dinosaurs the kids thought it was a hilarious idea.
8YO: “Free those guys! I know what the distraction is. 😂😂😂 It’s going to be a surprising one! The dinosaurs are escaping.”
It didn't quite turn out like she hoped, but you'll have to read the book to find out more.
8YO: “What’s a bazooka?”
I had to briefly explain that it was a weapon that made large explosions as the simplest way to let them know more.
8YO: “What’s so special about a cantaloupe lamp?”
When Bastille pulled her sword from her handbag the kids could immediately relate.
7YO: “That’s magic it couldn’t have fit in her purse. Purses are too tiny.”
8YO: “That must have been a magic sword or a magic purse. Like Mary Poppins!”
At one point the narrator made reference to a bad literary technique of interrupting an action scene with unnecessary explanations, just like he’d done in chapter fourteen.
8YO: “I don’t remember that.”
Me: “What chapter are we reading?”
8YO: “Fourteen! 😂😂😂 That’s funny!”
7YO (deadpan): “That’s hilarious.”
8YO: “There’s one Smedry we haven’t heard about [in prison].”
7YO: “Dad, is there one more Smedry? That was introduced with Sing.”
8YO: “There’s still one Smedry on the loose. At least there’s one Smedry that I think is still on the loose. Dad, have you noticed there is one Smedry they haven’t mentioned yet?”
When the characters managed to escape by getting the guard angry by throwing things at him and then disarming him when he got close to the cell the oldest kid had her own hypothesis to propose.
8YO: “Can I tell you what I thought they were doing? I thought they were trying to throw something at him to knock him out. I’ve heard that in stories, hitting someone on the head to make them unconscious.”
At the end of the chapter all of them wanted me to keep going!
8YO: “Read another!”
7YO (chants): “Nother, nother, nother!”
Me: “No.”
7YO: “Why doesn’t it work with this book?”
7YO: “What are facilities?”
Me: “What do you think could be replaced by a bucket?”
7YO: “Ewwww, a toilet!”
8YO: “What do librarians call themselves?”
Me: “I don’t know.”
8YO: “They’re not ancient. They’re new weapons. Swords are ancient.”
7YO: “They probably think they are ancient!”
4YO: “[7YO] you look like you are a weapon!”
When Alcatraz realized one set of footprints hadn’t faded and thus was likely someone he knew the eight year old guessed which character it was.
8YO: “Maybe its Ms. Fletcher. He has seen her for a long time.”
7YO: “Probably Ms. Fletcher is trying to get Alcatraz further and further away from the Sands of Rashid.”
Then the eight year old wondered about Alcatraz’s own unfading footprints.
8YO: “Why are his staying a long time?”
Me: “Do you know yourself?”
8YO: “Yeah. Oh right. He’s known himself a long time.”
7YO: “Ahhh, he’s scary!! I hope Sing doesn’t trip on Blackburn’s head.”
4YO: “He really is scary!”
At the end of the chapter the eight year old was frustrated by another cliffhanger. She really wanted to keep reading.
8YO: “Are they good or bad dinosaurs?”
Me: “Why do you think everyone can be classified as just good or bad?”
8YO: “This is like Redwall a good side and a bad side.”
8YO: “Oh I love this, he is talking to dinosaurs!”
8YO: “They should set them free!”
4YO: “No.”
7YO: 😱 “Are they from the Free Kingdoms?”
7YO: “Because of the footprints? 😱😱 Are they the Dark Oculators?”
8YO: “It would have been four before they lost Australia.” (It was revealed last chapter that Australia is a recent Librarian conquest that has been added to the Hushlands not that long ago.)
I actually spoiled this surprise a bit as I showed the kids the map included with the book back when I first started reading the book. This gorgeous piece is actually printed on the inside of the dust jacket. I love that it is here since you don't lose any detail to the spine of the book as you would if it were printed on a spread inside of the book. I also really like it as it was only first available with this edition of the book--not the original Scholastic editions that I first read, and I presume while it may be included in the new paperbacks it obviously can't be as nice as those books lack a dust jacket.
Somehow while infiltrating a library Alcatraz broke a carpet.
8YO: “What? He broke the… 😂😂😂”
4YO: “He’s a breaker. He’s a breaker [6YO].”
6YO: “[4YO] might secretly be a Smedry and his power is being annoying.”
4YO: “I don’t have power!”
At the very end of the chapter (these books delight in cliffhanger endings to chapters) Alcatraz opens a door to discover living dinosaurs inside.
8YO: “YES! Talking dinosaurs? I hope they are.”
4YO: “Dinosaurs eat people.”
Once again Alcatraz rhetorically asked if he had mentioned that he not a good person.
“Yes,” the eight year old replied proving she had definitely been paying attention to the narrator’s prior gloomy pronouncements.
The book mentioned Bastille’s platform sandals and the kids were curious.
8YO: “What does it mean platform sandals? The sandals have a platform?”
Me: “What do you think that means? What is a platform?
8YO: “Something that you stand on. So she’s standing on her sandals.”
Me: “A platform is higher than the ground. So platform sandals are higher than flat sandals.”
6YO: “You mean like this?” Places foot with toes flat and heel raised.
8YO: “No that’s heels.”
Me: “Tomorrow is chapter eight.”
4YO: “Will there be pictures in chapter eight?”
Me: “Yes.”
4YO: “Yay, there will be pictures in chapter eight [6YO]!”
6YO: “Bu…bu…bu…bones? What does that mean?”
4YO: “Skeleton!”
6YO: “Eek!”
(Note The Scrivener’s Bones is actually the name of the next book in the series)
One of the kids asked about the name of one of the characters, thinking Sing-Sing was a strange name. I explained that not only did Alcatraz share a name with a prison but so did other characters: Leavenworth, (San) Quentin, Attica, Bastille.
At one point Alcatraz mentioned that he didn’t have control of his Talent for breaking things, and that got the kids thinking about a hypothesis.
8YO: “When he wanted it to break it didn’t. So it’s doing the exact opposite of what he wants!”
6YO: “If someone throws a brick at him he can think “please, please don’t break!”
While I was reading the four year old drew a picture that he said was Grandpa Smedry.
6YO: “Dad, can Alcatraz break hats?”
Then Grandpa Smedry gave some more information about the separation of the world into the Free Kingdoms and the Hushlands, stating that Australia had only been recently lost to the Librarians along with some of the islands of Mokia. I then showed them the islands of Mokia, including just southeast of Hawaii the Bigger Island and Biggest Island.
4YO: “It has the Misty Mountains!”
*camping in the rain*
8YO: “What about Rivendell?”
Dwarves: “Trolls!”
8YO: “Oops.”
When Elrond looked at Orchrist and Glamdring I asked if they remembered where they were made.
8YO: “Yes. Where Ungoliant was…”
Me: “The hidden city of…”
6YO: “Gondolin!!”
When the goblins called Orchrist and Glamdring by their elven names there was an objection!
8YO: “No, they didn’t call them the real names, they called them their names!”
Me: “Do you remember their names for the swords?”
8YO: “Beater and Biter are what the goblins called them.”
6YO: “Goblins are scary!”
Bilbo: “What’s this?”
Me: “What is that?”
8YO: “A ring. THE ring.”
As the riddle contest is about to start I heard, “Daddy, [it is] Gollum!” from the four year old.
Before Gollum finished asking one riddle the eight year old piped up with the solution, “that one’s time!”
My wife came to join us and the four year old told her “Gollum has precious.”
As Gollum paddles off at the end of the contest.
8YO: “Doesn’t he guess it (three guesses first)?”
Gollum: “It knows the way in, it must know the way out.”
8YO: “I love this, he actually leads his way to it.”
When Bilbo was telling Gandalf and the dwarves of his escape the four year old had to point out his favorite character: “Mommy, that’s Gandalf! There’s Gandalf in dis!”
*eagles set down party down at the edge of Mirkwood*
8YO: “Didn’t they drop them at the Carrock?”
Me: “Yep.”
8YO: “What about Beorn? What about Beorn? Did they skip Beorn?”
*dwarves walk through Mirkwood*
4YO: “I think dem are tired.”
My wife: “Would you be tired?”
4YO: “Yeah.”
*Bilbo climbs above the Mirkwood canopy*
4YO: “Sixty-hundred butterflies! Sixty-hundred. See there is! Sixty-hundred!”
After Bilbo woke up with a spider attacking him one noticed an issue.
8YO: “They skipped the lights where they saw the feast!”
*watching invisible Bilbo walk around*
6YO: “I think why you see him faintly so you can see where he goes.”
Bilbo (barrel rider): “Oh stop complaining, I never promised you first class accommodations.”
8YO: “Is he talking to himself?”
Me: “Who’s in the barrel?”
8YO: “Wasn’t the barrel he was on empty in the book?”
Bilbo: “Smaug…” (pronounced like smog”
8YO: “It’s Smaug!” (Pronouncing ‘ow’ as in ‘now.’)
Smaug (to Bilbo): “You have nice manners for a thief and a liar.”
8YO (indignant): “He’s the big thief!”
*Smaug throws temper tantrum atop hoard*
8YO: “Does it show the big bare spot he has?”
*view of Lake-town just before Smaug attacks*
8YO: “I thought you couldn’t see the end of the Long Lake.”
8YO: “How long do dragons live?”
Me: “A very long time.”
8YO: “As long as dwarves?”
Me: “Longer.”
Once Smaug died I joked “That’s it, the end.”
8YO: “No it isn’t. There’s still the Battle of Five Armies!”
*Bilbo leads dwarves to the entrance of the Lonely Mountain*
8YO: “What about his armor thing?”
Me: “His Mithril coat?”
8YO: “Yes, his Mithril coat.”
*Bard and Thranduil walk off*
8YO: “Where is the Arkenstone? When does he give up the Arkenstone?”
Bilbo: “A battle of three armies?”
6YO: “The orcs arrive and then the eagles!”
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8YO: “That’s not how I draw elves. I draw elves as people with tall ears.”
8YO: “What about his Mithril coat?”
Bard: “The eagles.”
8YO: “Yes the eagles. The battles of five armies. Everybody hates goblins. All the good guys hate goblins. I hope more goblins died than the rest of the people.”
After the battle Gandalf said that only seven of thirteen lived and soon it would be six.
8YO: “I thought it was ten…. What about the Arkenstone? I thought it was ten that survived. What about the Arkenstone? When are we going to see that?”
Gandalf: “Smaug is gone…”
8YO: “It’s Smaug!”
*closeup on Bag End*
8YO: “When’s the auction?”
*ring gleams on Bilbo’s mantle*
8YO: “It’s the One!”
8YO: “It’s not as good as Lord of the Rings. It had lots of mistakes. It was missing stuff.”
