G55 E-Reading Book Review of Bruce and the Road to Courage by Gale Leach
Author: Gale Leach
ISBN: 9781937083007
Publisher: Two Cats Press
Part of a Series: Bruce trilogy
Type of book: 2000s, insect, evil, bats, travel, bullies, kids to young adults
Year it was published: 2011
Summary:
Bruce, a young caterpillar who is afraid of heights, doesn’t want to become a butterfly. Tired of being teased and bullied about this, he leaves home, unaware that he has embarked on a heroic journey that will test both his character and his courage.
Through a series of perilous adventures, Bruce discovers that standing up for yourself and doing what you know is right, even in the face of great odds, are the most courageous actions of all.
Characters:
Although the author attempted to create dimensional characters, they fell flat for me. I did enjoy reading about them, but a small complaint that I have is the villains are very one dimensional and there's nothing deeper to them. Why does the villain eat only insects? What is the reason he decided to do it? For some odd reason as well, I had a hard time buying the fact that Bruce gained courage. Besides the fact that the characters were insects, and a message of teamwork, there really is nothing special about the story, sorry to say.
Theme:
Teamwork is good.
Plot:
This is written in third person narrative, primarily from Bruce's point of view, but also a few other characters participated in giving their thoughts and opinions such as Stang and few others I forgot. This is a book good and interesting for children because it will encourage them to learn more about insects, but unfortunately for me it seemed a tad bit simplistic.
Author Information:
(from goodreas.com)
url
http://www.goodreads.com/galeleach
born
The United States
gender
female
website
http://www.galeleach.com
genre
Children's Books, Sports
member since
November 2010
About this author
Gale had a number of different careers—including teacher, gift shop buyer, craft wholesaler, and American Sign Language interpreter—before she started her own business doing technical writing and editing for biotechnology companies. She ran that company successfully for years, until her husband suggested she retire early. She didn’t think twice. She also never really retired.
After moving to Arizona, Gale fell in love with pickleball — a wonderful sport with a silly name. She wrote her first book, The Art of Pickleball, in 2005, and it went on to win the Arizona Book Award in its class. This book is now being released in its fourth edition.
In 2011, Gale finished her first novel, Bruce and the Road to Courage, a heroic fantasy for children. The second book in the series, Bruce and the Road to Honesty, was published in May 2012. Completing the trilogy, Bruce and the Road to Justice was published in September 2012.
All three books were nominated for the California Young Reader's Medal and they also won Silver Awards from Mom's Choice.
Gale lives in Arizona with her husband, two dogs, and three cats.
Opinion:
This an enjoyable story, although the insect characters were anthropomorphic and didn't really strike me as true. What I did like was the world the author created and how insects reacted to one another. This is an interesting but very obvious story for children. I also had a problem with the way the insect bats were portrayed because its bad enough the bats have reputation of being vampires and creepy and spooky, but now they have to be villains once more?
Quick notes: I would like to thank the author for the opportunity to read and review the book.
3 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)
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