Reading Log - Tomorrow, When the War Began
Reading Log – Tomorrow, When the War Began
The award-winning book ‘Tomorrow, When the War Began’ by John Marsden is narrated by the main character, Ellie. She tells the story of how each teenager responds when war suddenly strikes in their country, Australia. It begins when Ellie and her best friend, Corrie, decide to go camping in a deep valley named Hell along with a five other friends. When they return home to their rural town of Wirrawee, they find their lives shattered. Their dogs are dead, the power is cut and their houses that have ‘no sign of life at all’. Australia has been invaded by foreigners and the group is given the choice to either fight, surrender, or hide. They chose to fight! From there, various dangerous situations arise and Ellie and her friends must find a way to survive. It also has a touch of romance on the action along with convincing teenage voices which help convey their emotions and thoughts.
I really liked how this book was written in first person narrated by Ellie because it was extremely effective. During the book, there were times that the group was split up so therefore Ellie could not retell what happened in another group’s team in detail since she wasn’t there. This meant that the details of what happened in the other group was left to my, the reader’s, imagination. An example of this is when Ellie finds “no sign of Lee and Robyn” and she wonders “what might have happened to Lee and Robyn”. Since Ellie did not go with them, she does not know what happened with them. This allowed me to feel the anxiousness that Ellie must have felt to not know what had happened to her friends. Also it allowed me to use my imagination and create scenarios in my mind of what could have happened to Lee and Robyn. Naturally, I imagined terrible scenes which I suspect were what Marsden wanted the reader to imagine, in order to create suspense. All of this made me more active with the book as I was thinking through what I read. Furthermore, as
The award-winning book ‘Tomorrow, When the War Began’ by John Marsden is narrated by the main character, Ellie. She tells the story of how each teenager responds when war suddenly strikes in their country, Australia. It begins when Ellie and her best friend, Corrie, decide to go camping in a deep valley named Hell along with a five other friends. When they return home to their rural town of Wirrawee, they find their lives shattered. Their dogs are dead, the power is cut and their houses that have ‘no sign of life at all’. Australia has been invaded by foreigners and the group is given the choice to either fight, surrender, or hide. They chose to fight! From there, various dangerous situations arise and Ellie and her friends must find a way to survive. It also has a touch of romance on the action along with convincing teenage voices which help convey their emotions and thoughts.
I really liked how this book was written in first person narrated by Ellie because it was extremely effective. During the book, there were times that the group was split up so therefore Ellie could not retell what happened in another group’s team in detail since she wasn’t there. This meant that the details of what happened in the other group was left to my, the reader’s, imagination. An example of this is when Ellie finds “no sign of Lee and Robyn” and she wonders “what might have happened to Lee and Robyn”. Since Ellie did not go with them, she does not know what happened with them. This allowed me to feel the anxiousness that Ellie must have felt to not know what had happened to her friends. Also it allowed me to use my imagination and create scenarios in my mind of what could have happened to Lee and Robyn. Naturally, I imagined terrible scenes which I suspect were what Marsden wanted the reader to imagine, in order to create suspense. All of this made me more active with the book as I was thinking through what I read. Furthermore, as