Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

Parks/Brannon/Prose

These selections had some very interesting ideas that I have never thought about before
one of the biggest ideas I got is the one where you have to dive deeper into a writing. This is
stated in all the readings Parks talks about how you have to not only appreciate the piece of
writing for what it is but you also have to be able to pick out and notice inconsistencies within
the writing whether it be translation errors or parts that just do not make sense.
The idea of a daybook has never occurred to me either. I never considered using a
daybook to jot down notes or writings to help me along my process of writing. Applying some of
these ideas will be difficult for me though. The main problem is I suffer from what Parks talks
about. I get too engrossed in the way the writes and I fail to notice the things that are off or the
wordings that dont make sense. I also hate marking in books because I feel it is wrong. I do not
want a book filled with my own handwriting or riddled with dog-ears.
These concepts are definitely new to me. I am going to seriously have to get use to
reading and writing with pen in hand. I will also have to learn to read text more analytically
instead of just rushing through out of pleasures sake. These ideas I will hopefully get to use as
we go throughout this class and I continue my writings.

Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

Reflective Writing
Looking back on my writing u have learned some useful things that I will continue to use
in my writings. One is that I do not necessarily have to conform to the traditional way of writing
academically like in high school. Second, is the way that I have learned to look at peer review
and use it to clear up spots in my writing that might have been confusing for readers to
understand. The third thing I learned is a way to write using various different ways to express
myself such as using different methods of writing and portraying the writing. Some things I am
trying to discard are my bad procrastination habits. These habits cause me to usually wait until
the day before papers are due to work on them. Another habit I am trying to get rid of us the
habit of getting distracted while writing. These are a few things I have learned and a few that I
want to discard as I improve and pick up more skills for writing.

Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

Book Thief Entries

1.
The book started out in an interesting way. The narrator being Death made the scenarios that he
spoke of a little unusual from my perspective, but it was not bad. Whats happening in the story
is that Death is watching a girl that he has dubbed as the book thief. Death kind of rambles on a
bit about his encounters with her. He talks about the time he went to pick up her brothers soul
Then during her brothers funeral service he catches her taking the gravedigger
apprentices book. Later he talks about how she is to live with the Hubermanns. He describes the
wife as a short mean lady and the husband as a kinder old man. Then Death goes on to talk about
how Liesel, the book thief, goes on to start learning how to read and write from Mr. Hubermann.
Death also talks a bit about Liesel and her friend Rudy and some of the little adventures
they go through. My first reaction to this story was that it was going to be just sub-par or maybe
even below average. This is because I have a natural dislike for books about past wars and such.
Especially WWII because I feel it has been overdone. I find them to be a bit boring and I tend to
drift away from them. This book though is a little different. It is not very engrossed into WWII as
of yet. I do not know about the rest of the book. I like the book so far. The fact that it has a
gloomy beginning bums me out a bit though. I think this book will be a good read and I
anticipate reading it from cover to cover. I just associate this novel with my writing class. I cant
really relate to much of the story. The book does raise questions of how can anyone live without
being able to read or being in poverty.
The stories I have heard as a child has influences me to be a better person its because the
stories I used to hear were always stories of how great my grandfather was and how he was good
man and a good leader. The stories influence me to be a great person and uphold that legacy.
These are just my initial thoughts after reading and thinking about the book and the questions.

2.
In this part of the story Liesel has adapted pretty well to living with the Hubermanns. She
is slowly but surely learning how to read letters due to all the help that Hans has given her. One
of the more depressing parts of the story is the part where Liesel keeps writing letters to her
mother and never getting a reply back. It is a bit saddening to read about how the letters just keep
piling up without her ever getting a reply. Here they also introduced the Hubermanns children. It
shows how Hans Junior shows some hatred towards Hans Senior for not being a part of the Nazi
Party. This goes to show how deep the core values of Nazism is embedded into a lot of the
German people at the time. It was deep enough to turn a son against a father just because of
beliefs and teachings.
Also in here is the event where the people celebrated Hitlers birthday. There was an
assortment of fun from speeches, to marching, to huge bonfires powered by Jewish related
literature and goods and basically anything that was not to the Nazis liking. Here Liesel steals

Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

another book. There are also a few parts about Liesel and Rudys misadventures as they steal
food to fill their stomachs. Last but not least is the introduction of Max Vandenberg to the
Hubermann household. He comes in search of Hans Senior to help hide him. I can only imagine
how hard it must have been to always be on the run or looking over your backs just because
people discriminated against you or your people. I do not really have an association to most of
the things in the novel because I have lived a mediocre life that wasnt too hard or unbearable.
My family was always doing well enough to not fall into deep poverty and I never had to
struggle to secure literature to read or anything like that. A question the book raises for me is
how did the struggles of the hard pressed people at that time help them to overcome their
opposition? A few stories that also influence myself as a person are stories with morals. They
taught me about the right and wrong ways of things and how to treat others. Some Hmong
superstition stories also help to keep me out of trouble most of the time.
3.
In this part a few things of note were happening. Max had grown to be a part of the
Hubermann household in his own way. Liesel and Max got along fairly well. The mayors wife
who Liesel had also gotten chummy with also had to cancel Liesels mothers laundry services
and that stopped Liesel from being able to come over to the mayors house and reading books.
Afterwards Liesel resorted to stealing from the mayors house although she only stole one book
at a time. There was also a German search party that came in to the Hubermanns to search and
see if they were hiding Jews. After that there were German raids with bombings that left some
places destroyed. Last, part of this section was that the Gestapo came to take Rudy away.
This part of the story was a little more relatable to my people the Hmong. I have heard
many stories of persecution against my people by the Vietnamese and others around the time of
the Vietnam War. I relate what is happening to the people in the The Book Thief to what has
happened to my people during war. My people was also prosecuted for siding with the U.S. and
chased and killed even though we didnt even have a country to call home. Some questions that
the book raises for me are how are all the persecutions of people alike throughout history? How
are they different? These questions pop up every time I read books that deal with discrimination,
persecution and others things of the sort.
4.
In this part of the book things getting pretty serious as they reach the end of the story.
Max has been gone for a bit now and Liesel is left mainly with the Hubermanns and Rudy for
company but that eventually changes too. Later Hans is told that he would be drafted into the
German army. Hans would later be sent to a place called Essen. Around this time Liesel was also
given the sketchbook from the basement and it contained many stories that Liesel would read
through. Liesel also in a way made up with the mayors wife Ilsa. I guess she didnt mind Liesel
stealing and was just happy to know another person that loves books. After many things happen
Hans came back. Later though unfortunately there was a bombing in Himmel Street and all of
Liesels close family members died. Eventually the war came to a close but all that was left was
Liesel. Max came back and found her at the end but it was only those two left at the end of the
story.
The ending was a bit too depressing for me. Having many of the main characters die off
like that is a bit saddening as a reader, and as reader who likes to really enjoy the stories being

Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

told I tear up easily at tragic parts like those. It made me want to put the book down and just stop
although I was basically done by that point. The author did a good job of keeping me and the
engaged in the story with the ups and downs of Liesels life. I also like how he ended it with
Death having the last word and telling us, the reader, of how he is haunted by humans. I think
that was a nice touch the end the book off.
A question that I thought up after reading this last part was how does tragedy make
people stronger? I feel like with The Book Thief every time a bad thing happened it made Liesel
able to become a person that was more strong minded in a sense and able to enjoy the little
things such as like having a snow day or just playing with Rudy. This story overall was a very
well written and well told story. I enjoyed it, but I dont see myself picking up another tragedy
anytime soon less my sinuses act up and I get tears again.

Andrew Vang

Day Book Entries

3/24/15

Free Choice
My choice daybook entry is the few notes I took on Markus Zusaks writing and his
development of character.

He had a bunch of sentence fragments

Uses bullets and ellipses
I think he uses this style of writing with all the inserts to give readers a feel for Death as a
character of the novel.
Also seems that he is using these points to give readers more information

Short summary from video in class about the storytelling from those students
I like the retellings of the stories. I think it was good that they can share some stories of the
tragedies that happened during that time. I also think they did a good job putting the video
together. It was well done.