Dad: For our bedtime story, we recently spent a few nights reading "Holes" by Louis Sachar...
Gracie (age 8): It's about digging holes.
Isaac (age 10): It was exciting. There were lots of parts where, at first you don't understand what's happening, but later in the book it tells you more about it.
Gracie: Like Stanley's dirty rotten, pig stealing, great-great-grandfather!
Dad: So that's an example where, at first you don't understand who he was...
Isaac: Yeah - but now we know why they called him that.
Gracie: Dirty rotten, pig stealing, great-great-grandfather!
Dad: I like how there were a whole bunch of things that seemed separate from each other, but as the book goes on...
Isaac: ...all the stories start combining into one.
Dad: So what happens?
Isaac: Zero ran away from the camp because he was mad, and Stanley chased after him...
Gracie: Camp Green Lake -- it's a terrible camp. You would rather go to jail than that camp.
Isaac: He was gone for eight or nine days, and there was no water or anything. But he brought his shovel with him, and he dug a hole under a boat that said "Mary Lou," and they found some old spiced peaches...
Gracie: Sam the Onion Man had a donkey named Mary Lou. But Zero and Stanley thought the boat was named after a person, not a donkey. They said, "Man, she must have been important if someone named a boat after her. I bet she looked great in a bathing suit next to her boyfriend." That was SO FUNNY! I'm imagining Mary Lou in a bathing suit right now, and it is HILARIOUS! Do you hear me people? HILARIOUS!
Isaac: I can tell you why the kids dig holes...
Gracie: No! We don't want to spoil the mystery for the listeners...
Isaac: WHAT???
Gracie: Shame on you!
Isaac: People are not just going to go read the book after they read this!
Dad: Well, they might-- that's why we're doing this! A book review is supposed to make it exciting for people so they'll want to go out and read it themselves...
Gracie: Yah!
Dad: So, Lily, what did you think was exciting?
Lily (age 5): The lizards in the book had yellow spots and glowing red eyes and very sharp black teeth and a loooong white tongue. They like to live in holes. And no matter what, if the lizards bite you... you will have to die.
Dad: Oh no!
Lily: But they don't bite you if you have onion blood, because they do not eat onion blood.
Isaac: The ending was one of the best parts.
Dad: Gracie was so excited, she couldn't sit still!
Isaac: They were surrounded by yellow spotted lizards in a hole... It made me feel worried...
Gracie: I was freaked out. And when I'm freaked out, I jump around and get scared.
Lily: I remember when it was happening, I didn't move at all. I thought there was a lizard... crawling... up... my... face...
Dad: Any last comments?
Isaac: It's a good book. You really should read it. I wish I could tell you more about it... but I can't. They won't let me.
spitting into the hole, by Lily
Mary Lou in a bathing suit, by Gracie
yellow spotted lizard, by Isaac
