Sarah Kells: Outside Reading Book Review #2

**EDITED**

http://contemporarylit.about.com/cs/currentreviews/fr/inkheart.htm
Inkheart book review

This book review by Scholastic brings up the question of whether or not the review is about Inkheart, or Cornelia Funke's previous book The Thief Lord.  It is not until the last paragraph of the five paragraph introduction that Inkheart is actually mentioned.  This makes the reader uninterested and distracted, but once they reach the sections about the book, it becomes informative and interesting.
The diction chosen in this piece is mature and intriguing, and there are some interesting phrases used to get the author's point across, such as "Inkheart is ever so slightly undercooked and over mixed."  Although the writing style tends to be rather advanced, there are several grammatical issues, and a few spelling and word choice errors (instead of 'equally,' 'equality' was written at one point).  These are few and far between though, so it does not detract very much from the actual article.
Another style decision chosen by the author was how the different sections of the review are distinguished.  All that Scholastic did was include different titles for each part, such as "Where the Story Goes," and "Where the Story Goes Wrong."  I found this style to be very distracting and it resulted in breaking up what could have been a very smooth and flowing article.
There were many points throughout this piece where it was clear the the formality of the piece was not constant, and it was difficult to identify whether it was written in a formal or informal tone.  Through the review there are sections that were written with advanced diction and very clear writing, but then there were parts where the author seemed to attempting to communicate with the reader.  This is seen when the author adds "(Get it ink heart—Inkheart. Just making sure you are still with me.)."  The changing tones confused me and made it difficult to concentrate on what was being written.
The biggest weakness in this piece was the lack of structure and consistency.  If the essay stayed on topic more and had one tone throughout the entire piece, it would be much easier to read and much more focused.  As it is, it if incredibly difficult to stay interested in the essay.
Strengths in this essay are the phrases used by the author and the points were the piece included very mature and intriguing diction.  These strengths are outweighed by the weaknesses though because the diction is not consistant enough and the phrases are not a large enough part to make up for the inconsistency and lack of focus.
The author uses the critical approach of feminism throughout this article by showing Maggie as a young girl who manages to save her father and the rest of the world from these criminals.  This is really the only critical approach used, however, which detracts from the overall tone and feel of the article.
Overall, the book review had some very strong diction at points, but it also was very weak in tone and grammar, and the style was very immature as it seemed to be merely following a guide.  I found the weaknesses to outway the strengths, and I would not chose to read or not to read the book based upon this article.