Review by stalliongirlke -- Will of The Hill
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stalliongirlke
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Review by stalliongirlke -- Will of The Hill
[Following is a volunteer review of "Will of The Hill" by Marshall Cobb.]
4 out of 4 stars
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I have always had a natural liking for books meant for children. This is the obvious reason I felt inclined to read Will of the hill by Marshall Cobb. The story is about a ten-year-old boy named Will. The school he goes to has a rule prohibiting students from bringing comic books to school. The rule has proved hard to observe for Will and his friend Dillon because they both love comic books. To navigate their way around this rule and being the cheeky boys they are, they have devised a way to sneak the books to school. Unfortunately for them, one day Will gets caught by Gertrude, a girl who has made it her business to tell on the students to the teachers whenever they were on the wrong. Interestingly, Gertrude has a party she has organized and for which she decides to use as leverage against Will to get him to attend her party in exchange for her not reporting him. What is obvious is that Will doesn’t like Gertrude, and he dreads the idea of attending her party. What does this ten-year-old boy have up his sleeve? Will he agree to Gertrude’s proposal?
While growing up, I had an elder brother who liked comic books just like Will and Dillon did. Because of that, their character was something I could relate to. Besides the two boy’s love for comic books, I immediately developed a liking for their character as soon as I began reading the first chapter. The boys were just being boys, nothing about them was hypocritical. To begin with, Will was this ten-year-old boy who liked softball, whose favorite food was sushi and hated having to wake up early to go to school. I found this to be quite a natural character for a boy of his age. In fact, the writer also pointed out to Will and Dillon’s dislike for girls. At their age it was understandable to me that they felt that way about girls. Usually that is a stage when both boys and girls have conflicted feelings whether they should like each other or not (if you know what I mean). I went through the same thing Will and Dillon went through at that stage in their lives so I found it to be something natural and funny at the same time.
If there is something I admire about friendship between children is the ease at which it begins. Children as young as two year olds could be in a park playing individually with their toys but as soon as they encounter each other, they immediately establish a friendship. In fact most of the adult friendships I know of have either began because their children first became friends. The friendship between Will and Dillon was a friendship I admired throughout the story. These two boys first met as two-year olds in a sand pit in their town’s only park. According to Will’s mother, the two boys began their lifelong friendship by foraging together through the sand for the poop deposited there by the neighborhood’s cat community. However over the years, the friendship had developed into a love for comic books. Throughout the story, Will and Dillon (whose name I found cute) expressed a natural bond between children in a manner I could relate to.
The story was not without the right dose of humor. I found it funny that the students nicknamed Gertrude based on her intrusive habit. She earned the name ‘Intrude’ because she was always in someone else’s business. In addition to her intrusiveness, everything about her was pointy; her nose, her cheeks and her elbows. The writer referred to her as a walking invasion of both privacy and space. Other than that, there were other humorous scenes in the story for which I would prefer if other readers found out for themselves. Cobb’s choice of language was simplistic enough to be understood by children especially because the writer’s target audience is children who would ordinarily at their age, have already developed reading skills to enable them navigate through the book without requiring supervision.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this book. There are many lessons a child can learn from this story plus all the eleven chapters of the story are well developed to suit a child’s enjoyment. I recommend the book to children between the ages of ten to twelve because almost all the characters in the book are in that age group and what they go through is not different from the experience of children in a similar stage of life. I rate the book 4 out of 4 stars.
******
Will of The Hill
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
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4 out of 4 stars
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I have always had a natural liking for books meant for children. This is the obvious reason I felt inclined to read Will of the hill by Marshall Cobb. The story is about a ten-year-old boy named Will. The school he goes to has a rule prohibiting students from bringing comic books to school. The rule has proved hard to observe for Will and his friend Dillon because they both love comic books. To navigate their way around this rule and being the cheeky boys they are, they have devised a way to sneak the books to school. Unfortunately for them, one day Will gets caught by Gertrude, a girl who has made it her business to tell on the students to the teachers whenever they were on the wrong. Interestingly, Gertrude has a party she has organized and for which she decides to use as leverage against Will to get him to attend her party in exchange for her not reporting him. What is obvious is that Will doesn’t like Gertrude, and he dreads the idea of attending her party. What does this ten-year-old boy have up his sleeve? Will he agree to Gertrude’s proposal?
While growing up, I had an elder brother who liked comic books just like Will and Dillon did. Because of that, their character was something I could relate to. Besides the two boy’s love for comic books, I immediately developed a liking for their character as soon as I began reading the first chapter. The boys were just being boys, nothing about them was hypocritical. To begin with, Will was this ten-year-old boy who liked softball, whose favorite food was sushi and hated having to wake up early to go to school. I found this to be quite a natural character for a boy of his age. In fact, the writer also pointed out to Will and Dillon’s dislike for girls. At their age it was understandable to me that they felt that way about girls. Usually that is a stage when both boys and girls have conflicted feelings whether they should like each other or not (if you know what I mean). I went through the same thing Will and Dillon went through at that stage in their lives so I found it to be something natural and funny at the same time.
If there is something I admire about friendship between children is the ease at which it begins. Children as young as two year olds could be in a park playing individually with their toys but as soon as they encounter each other, they immediately establish a friendship. In fact most of the adult friendships I know of have either began because their children first became friends. The friendship between Will and Dillon was a friendship I admired throughout the story. These two boys first met as two-year olds in a sand pit in their town’s only park. According to Will’s mother, the two boys began their lifelong friendship by foraging together through the sand for the poop deposited there by the neighborhood’s cat community. However over the years, the friendship had developed into a love for comic books. Throughout the story, Will and Dillon (whose name I found cute) expressed a natural bond between children in a manner I could relate to.
The story was not without the right dose of humor. I found it funny that the students nicknamed Gertrude based on her intrusive habit. She earned the name ‘Intrude’ because she was always in someone else’s business. In addition to her intrusiveness, everything about her was pointy; her nose, her cheeks and her elbows. The writer referred to her as a walking invasion of both privacy and space. Other than that, there were other humorous scenes in the story for which I would prefer if other readers found out for themselves. Cobb’s choice of language was simplistic enough to be understood by children especially because the writer’s target audience is children who would ordinarily at their age, have already developed reading skills to enable them navigate through the book without requiring supervision.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this book. There are many lessons a child can learn from this story plus all the eleven chapters of the story are well developed to suit a child’s enjoyment. I recommend the book to children between the ages of ten to twelve because almost all the characters in the book are in that age group and what they go through is not different from the experience of children in a similar stage of life. I rate the book 4 out of 4 stars.
******
Will of The Hill
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
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Latest Review: Learn to Play Guitar by Gareth Evans
