Levi's Blog

The trial of the book got finished up and it did not turn out the way I expected at all! I think that the authors purpose in this was to create the theme of change taking place indirectly. This is because, Ben’s hope was for the trial to turn out in his favor and the racism would be resolved that way. But instead it took a longer time for the events to unfold and it created a greater change.

The author James Patterson was very strategic in how he wrote this book and I think that it made all the difference in the end. I’d say it went from a 6/10 to 8.5/10 from this change and added suspense.

This was me towards the end of the book.

This is the African Americans being very patient for the right opportunity.

It was quite surprising to me that such a small town could turn out to be so evil. At first, everyone seemed so nice and were very welcoming of Ben and loved to seem him. By the end of the book, this fully changed for the worse and people were trying to kill him. This developed the idea that even the things that seem ordinary, may be much more complex. This was shown through all of Ben’s relationships and how they crumbled as his time in the town of Eudora progressed.

-This is just like James Patterson

Overall this was a solid book and it developed well. I would suggest it to anyone who likes books that have a plot twist and also people who like books with aspects of history incorporated in them.

I think that the story really needs to move on from talking about the trial and get to the good part. It is pretty interesting what is happening in Alex Cross’s Trial, but for this whole section it’s all the book has talked about.

A big theme in this section of the story is that evil is hard to beat with the truth. This is seen in the trail the whole time where Ben is trying to convince the court that there has been wrong done in the town, but the biased judge is having a hard time believing him as he is on the defendants side.

I think that it is very unrealistic that the judge, police officers, and many people of the jury are biased on the side of the defendant. This is making the trial nearly impossible to win. I wonder why the president doesn’t just intervene in the trial even though he has been keeping tabs with Ben the whole time.

This is the president as the trial that affects all of America is going on.

Something else that I find strange is that every night when Ben and his crew of accusers in the trial go home, there is a mob of KKK members that stand outside and throw rocks through the window. It just seems like there is no justice in the town and it seems as the court case will be nearly impossible to win.

All of the members of the trial had to take an oath to tell nothing but the truth. But, there were some of the defendants (bad guys) that constantly lied and it seemed obvious even thought the judge didn’t care. It was quite interesting that near the end, when all hope seemed lost, a women named Moody, joined into the trial and made a statement that went along with the lies of the defendants. This ended up helping Ben and they now had the defendants flustered.

This is how Moody had the defendants looking after they had been so confident.

That is where the book left off and I hope that in the next section there is more interesting things that happen, not just the trial. Or, hopefully the trial becomes increasingly more intense.

One theme of this section is individual vs society. Ben continues his fight against the racism that is taking place in his town. However, the problem gets increasingly more complex when Ben is brought by the KKK to a lynching sight where they lynch a white man in front of him. There justification of this is that the man was bad and that their job is to get rid of bad.

This is a visual representation of how everyone in the town views Ben. As well as how he is trying to persuade a large crowd.

At this point, I predicted that they were going to kill Ben, but just after that, they let him go with a big warning to not interfere with them. This part goes to show just how challenging his mission was as he is going against such a large and strong crowd of people.

Another theme that is shown in this section is friendship over safety. Ben’s old friend, Moody, comes to Ben for help as she feels that she is being targeted and feels that her life is in danger. Ben knows that if he helps, his life is in danger, but he doesn’t hesitate in telling her that he will protect her. I think this was a bold move by Ben that isn’t a good choice because he already has upset many others and this won’t make it any better.

Ben heads to Moody’s house and him and some others set up their stations to protect her. On the second day of keeping lookout, a bunch of KKK members show up and they fight as many people are killed. Even though they were outnumbered, they still beat the members. They then captured a few and had them arrested. This event was so significant as now, for the first time, there would be a trial against the KKK members.

This brings the story to it’s next theme of beating the odds. This is seen multiple times in the story so far. Now they will have a court case and there are thousands of people lining up to the court house as this event effects all of America. I predict that because of all the characters beating the odds in the book so far, they will end up winning the case even though the other side has the best lawyer in the country.

Here’s Ben when he is basically fighting in a war

Right now Ben has a huge set of challenges in front of him and it is going to be difficult for him to overcome them, even though I think he will find a way.

This was by far the craziest section of the story so far!
Ben was very anxious to get a letter back from his wife after they were discussing their divorce and he was waiting for a letter back from the President as well. I think that it is very strange for him to continue on with his mission as all this is happening to him. It would probably be best if he would just go see his wife and get the figured out. But guess this just further adds to Bens character and shows how much he is sacrificing for his country.

Then, on top of all this stress, the story doesn’t slow down, but now goes into how he witnessed two black boys being drowned and he went up to save them and in doing so, three white men fought him and Ben ended up winning for now. The bad part about this is that he was then found by others and he was beat nearly to death and they tried to lynch him.

This is Ben Before he got beat up

This is Ben After he got beat up

This is all just crazy and hard to keep up with.

I wonder why Ben continues to put himself through this kind of pain in order to help others that will never repay him? It seems so impossible to accomplish what he is trying to do with stopping this racist treatment and yet he doesn’t give up. On top of that, he isn’t even affected by this treatment so that would make it easier for him to just not help.

Now Ben has to heal for weeks before he is able to continue working. I think that it is very interesting that the story rushes along this part of the book as he heals and not very many things happen, but at certain parts of the book where many things are going on, it takes much longer for the story to go through a short amount of time. This kind of shows just how much plot and events the story includes as there is no time to waste on non-significant events.

When Ben finally heals up, he goes to an old friends who takes him in. when he does this, he ends up being surprised as they take him to a KKK meeting where he has to where white sheets and blend in as one of the members. Where this went really wrong is when his buddy grabbed his sheet off of his head and everyone was looking at Ben. At this point, I was curious as to why he would just go ahead and trust his friend after he has not seen him in so long. This is what I thought would happen.

To my surprise, everyone said to Ben that they were his friends and that they were going to show him something. This is where this section of the book ended off and I am very curious to find out what they are going to show him. I personally think that he should just run away, before someone tries to kill him again. But he probably won’t.

This book just keeps getting riskier and riskier for Ben as he continues on with his mission.

He has now been found out of his intentions of being in his home town again. He got a note that was anonymous and it scared Ben very much. However, Ben is sticking to his mission and it speaks to his developing character.

On top of all the danger that Ben is avoiding, his wife has now sent a note to him telling him that she wants to divorce because she can’t take being a single mother any longer. This makes me question if Ben should just leave or if he should continue on.

Here is Ben (a business man), the is constantly being faced with hardships that he has to overcome.

While this is going on, he now reconnects with his old girlfriend. I think that because Ben and his wife aren’t working out that there is some foreshadowing going on as his previous girl friend is really into him. They will most likely date each other at the end of the book.

Throughout the story so far, Ben keeps meeting up with older men that know the town well and shown him the various injustices that are regularly had. They almost always bring him to a different lynching site for him to study and learn about. Ben noticed that at these new lynching sites, there are places for people to sit and there are even lemonade stands that have been put up. I think that this is really messed up. The way that it seems in the book is that people enjoy coming to a lynching and watching it with their families. I think this is very horrible and wonder how there was a time that similar things actually happened.

Overall, it just seems like Ben is being over-stimulated with new information and new events. This is making it really hard for him to focus and it seems like he is at a stale-mate with his mission.

This section of the story took a turn for the better. Ben now revisits his home town where he begins to see all of his childhood friends. This seems like a very meaningful time to him as he forgets of his mission for a time and enjoys the moment.

There are a number of new characters that are introduced but they all play a very small part in the story so far. I think that this just focuses the story more on Ben which conveys the idea that his decision are very important and that his decision have a huge impact over many people.

Although this reunion time with his friends is nice, he begins to forget what he was him mission is and needs to regain focus. This shows how Ben may not be the best canadine for this mission and if he wants to succeed he must focus in. Here details of his personality are shown as he is a “go with the flow” kind of person and his personality isn’t shown in much depth in the story yet.

There is a part where Ben has to walk down a street in a black community where he is receiving funny looks from everyone as he is the only white person that ever visits this place. This frightens Ben which I find ironic because during this time period the African Americans became very worried when they were around white people. The reason for this is the extreme forms of racism that were shown by whites where there was severe beating and even lynching’s if African American’s. So for Ben to be worried is funny as he is most likely scarring everyone else.

This image is a representation of how awkward it was for Ben to be stared at while he walked down the street.

The whole reason that Ben is there in the first place and it is for him to inform the president of the problems that are taking place in this town so that he knows what he needs to do in order to eradicate these racist treatments.

In my opinion, Ben is being way to bold and making too big of a scene as he comes back to town where he was supposed to lie low in order to not seem suspicious to anyone.

I don’t love this book so far, but it isn’t too bad either. I like that the plot is easy to follow and I think it is quite interesting that this is a fictional story while it seems very much like it could be real. I don’t love that the plot of this book sounds like it is going to be such a predictable story with so few challenges. I hope that things get more exciting which I think that they will as it is still early in the book.

As the book started the main character, Ben Corbett was introduced. Since Mr. Corbett is a white lawyer in the year 1906, he should be looked as a a highly esteemed man. Instead, because of the cases he takes on defending African Americans, he is hated by many people in the town. This seems like a classic under-dog story and shows foreshadowing towards events that will soon change Ben’s life forever.

This story is historical fiction and tells of many of the hardships that African Americans were really facing even as late as the 1900’s.

As the story starts off, Gracie Johnson is introduced as they are in court and she is being trialed for murder. Mr. Corbett is the lawyer that tries to defend Gracie from being prosecuted. This effort ends up failing and Gracie reveals to Mr. Corbett that she did actually commit the murder. This shocked Mr. Corbett and made his reconsider if what he was doing was actually a good thing or if he was doing more harm than good.

This was just a flash of something going on in Ben’s life. Now the context of what Mr. Corbett does for a living is shown which sets up the rest of the story.

The story then flashes back in time in order to show a past time in which Ben Corbett’s mother had a seizure and couldn’t take care of herself. This contributes to showing how strong Ben in the present day in that as a young boy, he had to take care of his mother.

This story is moving very quick near the begging which adds to the fast pace and intense life that Ben lives. Next, Ben is wanted by the president, Teddy Roosevelt, to go find out how African Americans are being treated with some extreme levels of racism. What is confusing to me is that out of lawyer in America, why would the president select someone who hasn’t won many of his cases and isn’t liked by others?

Mr. Corbett has many more flashbacks throughout the beginning of the book. What these do is show the reader how difficult his beginnings were as he had a bad childhood. This plays into the rest of the story because it speaks to the strength Ben has and how he is a strong part of helping others.

At this point in the book, it is very exciting and I want to see what happens next!

My book is Alex Crosses Trial by James Patterson. I selected this book because I heard that James Patterson is a very good author and on top of that, this book tells of challenges that individuals overcome and it sounds interesting. I am reading this book by myself. I look forward to becoming a better reading in that I am challenging myself with a higher level book. Though I am looking forward to some things, I am apprehensive about myself being able to keep up with the amounts of reading I have to do, while maintaining a clear understanding of the story. I am going to make sure that I read at least a little everyday and don’t take days off. I will also make sure to reread certain parts of the story when I zone out so that I can keep up with what is going on in the book and be able to complete the project on this book well.

This image is a good representation of the book because Alex Cross has been told the story of his great uncle Abraham’s struggle through the K.K.K. Now Alex tells his kids about this event in order to protect them from similar struggles.

Do you think any of these (de las Casas’, Columbus’, Red Cloud’s) accounts changed the audience? How? Why yes or no? If no, what could they have done to more affect their audience?
Aim for around a paragraph, making sure to answer all of the questions and connecting them to each author. This answer doesn’t have to have direct textual evidence, but paraphrasing could help you identify specific points where you think it was strong/could be stronger.

The text’s de las Casas’, Columbus’, and Red Cloud have very strongly conveyed to the reader the reality of the hardships faced by Native Americans and the irreversible effects that white men have inflicted onto these Natives. In Columbus’s writing it tells of the vivid ways that the white men treated Natives through their cunning ways of trading and forcefully moving them out of their lands. This is something the audience may not have realized and it goes to further show the reality of life for a native at this time. Furthermore, Red Cloud describes how the whites lied to the natives only to gain more. This happens when he talks about the treaty they had and how the whites didn’t keep up their end of the deal. This may not seem like a big deal but it was. They natives weren’t being sent the food they needed and they were pushed onto smaller chunks of land. Once again the audience may not have realized this, but now that they know, it causes them to further understand the side of the natives life. What the author could have done better is further explain the life the these affects caused from a Native Americans point of view which would allow the audience to deeply connect with the natives.

Bartolome de las Casas was an explorer who sailed under the rule of Spain. When Bartolome discovered the different islands in the Caribbean Sea, there was a variety of natives the occupied the land. Soon after, he decided to capture the natives and use them for his own good. He decided that they would make for great slaves, so he captured and sold them for a profit. But this idea of using something of value for ones self gain is no new idea to society. Whether it is a group of people or a recourse, it is a natural instinct as humans to get greedy and try to manipulate the discovery for self gain. In this writing it is no different, shortly after the discovery of these natives “more that two million souls taken captive, and have sent them to do hard labor in the mines”(90). Here it shows the devastating impact that Bartolome had on this population of people. He could have decided to make a friendship with these natives but that wasn’t an option for him as the text states “for a Christian eats and consumes in one day an amount of food that would suffice to feed three houses inhabited by ten Indians for one month”(89). The meaning is that the explorers have a natural greed that is way more than the Natives who are humble and aren’t trying to take advantage of others. All in all, when humans are faced with a frontier, there instinct is to take advantage of it for their own gain.