| One
of the things that I loved when I was younger was that I loved to start
a fire. I kind of had a fascination with it. I don't know why. It was one
of those weird things. My parents gave me the job once a week to take out
the trash and burn it in a metal barrel back behind the fence. I took out
a match (SHOW MATCH AND DISPLAY STRIKING MOTION) just like this one and
lit a few pieces of paper on fire. It was always amazing to me how the
fire would spread from one piece of paper to another so quickly. Finally,
the whole barrel had flames leaping about three feet high from the top
and it seemed as if it was out of control.
One day
I kind of got carried away. I used a candle to help start the fire. (SHOW
CANDLE) Then I left it sitting against the fence. The next day when I looked
out my back window, I discovered that a big black hole had been burnt clear
through that fence. Oh no! I had forgotten that I had left that burning
candle leaning against the fence and I was in serious trouble with my parents!
In Burning
Up by Caroline Cooney a bigger fire than that is described in the story.
Macy decides to do a research paper on a barn that burned to the ground
back in 1959. The problem was that built into that barn was the apartment
of the first African American teacher who ever taught at their High School.
She wondered, "Who had started this fire and why was this building burned
down?" When Macy begins to question people about the fire she gets all
sorts of responses. Some say they don't know. Others said it would be better
if you picked another topic. But Macy continues her search for answers.
Let me
tell you what happened the night of the fire. (SHOW PICTURE OF HOUSE BURNING).
When it was dark, someone decided to set the apartment on fire with the
teacher, Mr. Sibley, still inside. Then a group a people start to gather
outside. They laugh about the fact that they have gotten rid of this teacher
and they decide to celebrate. Do you know what they did? (POINT TO PICTURE
OF BOOK COVER ON OVERHEAD). They pass out a bag of marshmallows and
they roast them over the flames that had now died down from the fire.
Well,
who is responsible? Macy finds out. It is somebody that she .....knows.
It is somebody.......in her own family! (Paul Christopherson, Young Adult
Librarian, Millard Branch Library paulc@omaha.lib.ne.us) |
