Romulus and Remus Comic Strip

Romulus and Remus by KChan | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

Author Memo

To: Kate Brian
From: Kara Chan
Date: March 7, 2010
Re: Private
Dear Kate,
I love this book because I think that every teenage girl is able to relate to it. Everyone has to go through the struggle to fit in and a struggle to reach our dreams. I made plenty of connections and I’m sure plenty of other people would be able to do the same too. Another thing I like about the story is that it is written in a way where there is so much mystery about the Billings girls. Since not much was said about them, it made me keep wondering if they would be nice or mean and what they were really like underneath all those rumors. I desperately had to find out more about them which made me keep reading.
Something I’d like to ask you is where you got the idea from. Is there really a private school where special people are selected to live in the same house? In some ways it seems kind of strange and a bit cruel to have only selected people living in the best house. Also, where did Thomas Pearson disappear to in the end? It was so unexpected because he told Reed he wouldn’t leave and that he would meet her the next morning. Why did he suddenly leave without a trace or notice?
One suggestion I have is not to make the ending so packed up. Plenty of important events happened within the last chapter, like Reed meeting Thomas’s parents, scrambling around wondering where Thomas disappeared to, and being invited into the Billings House, all in the last few pages. There were just too many unanswered questions and things going on that it all felt rushed and confusing.
However, overall I enjoyed the story and look forward to reading the next book in the series.

Pyramids of Egypt

Three interesting facts I learned were:

1. Pyramids were built so that each side faced exactly north, south, east and west which is called cardinal direction.

2. There were plenty of things inside pyramid chambers: hieroglyphs and hieroglyphic writing on walls (including hymns, magical spells, instructions on how to act in front of the gods and other useful knowledge known as Pyramid Texts), potter vases-some containing wine and expensive perfumes, furniture for pharaohs to use in the afterlife, stars on the ceiling to symbolize the heavens, and sometimes even one or more boats were buried near the pyramid, possibly for the king’s pleasure in the next world or to allow him to sail across the sky.

3. The Bent Pyramid was known as the first true pyramid with sloping sides but it's also unique because the structure bends halfway up. The reason why it bends has been argued and is still a mystery. Some theories are that it was a calculation error, it was part of a new design, or it started to collapse halfway up so it had to be finished at a different angle.

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