Number Twelve: The Odyssey

Obviously The Odyssey by Homer is one of the oldest and best known books in all of history.  It was even one of the foundational books for the ancient Greek religion. I had all of this in mind when I started reading this book, and I really wasn't disappointed.  This book was very captivating and it had a much more complicated plot than I had ever heard.  I would not, obviously, have chosen to read this book before the Iliad, but one of my classes in college required me to read the Odyssey.  This is the story of a man, named Odysseus, trying to get home from the Trajan war and his son back home attempting to become a man without him.  Odysseus takes many years to get home because the gods are preventing his return and in that time, he is believed to be dead.  Half of this story is his son's attempts to grow up and take care of his family without Odysseus, and the other half is about Odysseus's adventures as he tries to come home.
The two major themes I see through this book are courage in the face of adversity and the importance of growing up and taking responsibility for the things going on around you.  Odysseus faces dozens of challenges across this book, but his courage nearly always holds as he dreams of returning home.  This is a great (although, not altogether uncommon in many of these books) image of courage.  The other theme is shown through Telemachus (Odysseus's son) as he takes possession of his home and his life.  For years, he allowed other people to run his life, but just before his father returned, he began to grow up.  We can all learn a lot from Telemachus's example and begin to take responsibility for our own lives.
Now the important question is what exactly to say about this fascination book.  As I said, it was extremely interesting and I quite enjoyed reading it, but that does not necessarily mean that it is okay for everyone to read.  First of all, it is a relatively hard book to get through and some of the language is pretty hard (depending on which translation you choose to read).  I would definitely not recommend this book for someone will a low reading level.  The other issue that I see in this book is that of its religion.  I would caution anyone in carelessly reading a book about anything that was believed for centuries.  People really did believe that these gods were real and that seems to give them slightly more power than characters in other books.  I would just suggest some caution when reading this book and definitely wouldn't recommend it for younger teens who don't have their faith well founded yet.

Number Eleven: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) is undoubtedly one of the most classic children's books of all time and not without good reason.  The big question when reading a children's book is whether or not there is anything of value to an adult, but in this case that question has a very simple answer: YES!  This book is an exceptionally well written adventure which, although written using language a child can understand, contains ideals which can have application for everyone.  In this book, Twain manages to pull together an incredibly fun story which teaches children and adults alike the importance of maturing (both mentally and physically) and helping others to mature.
The obvious theme of this book was the idea of maturation.  At the start of this book, the characters in this book were as immature as possible.  Tom played jokes on everyone who cared about him and switched girls every other day (while claiming to love each of them).  By the end of the book, everything was different.  Tom had become a young man who took responsibility for his actions.  He cared enough for his girl at the end that he was quite willing to sit in a cave and die with her.  When he and Huck discovered where the secret treasure was, Tom used it to try to help Huck grow up in a good home and learn how to be a gentleman himself.  Truly, across this book, Tom grew up.
Now the question which is undoubtedly being asked right now is how exactly this theme is helpful to adults.  Well the truth is that everyone, young and old, has areas which they need to grow up in.  Also, the world today has taught people to NEVER grow up.  People now do not learn how to be adults and take responsibilities for their actions until they are extremely old.  This trend in society is extremely troubling and people could learn a valuable lesson from this book.
This book really was an extremely good book both for pleasure and for purpose.  I would recommend this book to just about anyone.  It is easy to read and has very few problems.  The only issue that I found in this book is a slight racist tendency indicative of the time in which it was written, but this tendency is not severe and can be relatively easily ignored.  I would recommend to parents of younger children reading this book that they remind their kids that attitudes like this are wrong, but that's my only caution.
Once again, hoping you are all out there reading these,
Jodath