The Accidental Prime Minister is a hilarious book written by Tom McLaughlin. It is about a 12 year old boy called Joe who leads an ordinary life. Joe is a fun loving, buoyant and determined boy. One day two events happen to coincide that change his life forever. He gathers that the park in which he played in was closing because the politicians wanted to construct a big tower on it and that Percival T. Duckholm, the British Prime Minister was visiting his school. In school amidst all the children, teachers and news reporters staring in awe, the usually shy Joe gives the surprised PM a good piece of his mind. After this incident Joe goes viral on all the news channels and for once Joe is the centre of attraction. In the end the there is to much pressure on the PM, he gets annoyed and calls Joe for a meeting. With the world wondering why Joe has been called the PM makes Joe unknowingly sign the papers to becoming the Prime Minister. From a normal school going kid, Joe is catapulted to success and to one of the most famed people on earth. Joe takes advantage of his leading position and vows to make the country an enjoyable place. Joe faces many challenges along the way, almost loses his job but in the end Joe fulfills his ambition and emerges successful. I read his book because I want pursue a career in politics myself and because the title managed to attract me. Throughout the book the author ridicules the politicians by employing sarcasm, wit and humour. “Duckholm liked to shout, he was one of the rudest men you are ever going to meet and he would sell his own grandmother for money.” He embodies the kind of ministers who are detested because they are lazy, don’t do anything for the country and are churlish. “Violletta, is a chilling woman, has a steely look on her face that makes everyone feel puny and unimportant.” She represents the kind of politicians who are greedy for money and power, are callous and want to further their own personal interests and ambitions giving it priority over the nation’s. In the book Tom McLaughlin is trying to convey that we need to treasure happiness and compassion just as much as materialistic things like money and factories. There are plenty of examples of disconcerting things splashing in the newspapers and making headlines every day. Examples of politicians making fools of themselves, getting embroiled in controversies, bickering over small issues, ceaselessly accusing each other and manifestos being just mere words plastered on walls during the elections are not uncommon. The crux of the matter is that people expect politicians to give them a happy and well managed country. All politicians do have the potential to grant everybody what they want, happiness and a well managed space. It’s just that some of them don’t.What stops them is their greed and hunger for power. There is a dearth of politicians to look up to and admire these days. This book is funny throughout, entertaining and extremely topical. The Accidental Prime Minister by Tom McLaughlin. Oxford University Press, 2015. Buy the book here and support Stone Soup in the process! Have you read this book? Or do you plan on reading it? Let us know in the comments below!
Stone Soup Magazine for young readers, writers, and artists
Saturday Newsletter: January 12, 2019
Colored pencil ‘Tick Tock’ by Marco Lu, 12, published in Stone Soup, January 2019. To our adult readers: A call for web designers! Before getting into the meat of this week’s newsletter, I’d like to put out a call to those of you who are web designers or work for a web-design firm. Our first priority this year is improving our website’s functionality and its design. Our print publications were redesigned in 2018. It is the website’s turn in 2019. A more beautiful and more functional website is key to our many projects—the magazine, the blogs, the book reviews, a new project space for child-refugee art and writing, a space for child composers, and more. How do we improve our navigation and make what we have clearer and more engaging? How do we add new kinds of content and retain clarity and engagement? If you can help us with this, please reply to the newsletter. This is a WordPress site. Thank you. A note from William Rubel The January Issue! It’s great! I know. I am always saying that. But it is always true. You, our Stone Soup writers and artists, are consistently sending us fabulous material. Before saying something more about the issue, I’d like to let you read editor Emma Wood’s introduction. In January, the days are already getting longer but it doesn’t feel that way! This issue has some short short fiction—the winners of our 2018 contest—to match the season’s short short days, as well as wintry, dark landscapes in both art and poetry. It also has three longer stories that matched the seasonal mood in a different way; their “darkness” is more metaphorical, but each one still leaves you with a feeling of hope and the presentiment of longer, lighter days ahead. Here’s to some fireside reading! As always, no matter how old you are, you will find inspiring language in this issue. Read the poems aloud and read at least one or two of the stories aloud as well. This way, you go slowly and are more able to savor the language. And, regardless of your age, the photography Emma chose will speak to you. I’d like to highlight “Cuts of the Blade” and “The Lonely Tree.”As you read in Emma’s letter, the issue includes the winners of our short short story contest. On behalf of all of the Stone Soup staff—Emma, Sarah, Jane, and myself—I’d like to thank all of you who sent in your flash fiction to the contest. Whether you placed in our contest or not, I hope that you have found the format of short short fiction useful to you. William’s weekend projects Writing Below, you will find the first-place winner the Flash Fiction Contest, “The Pendulum,” by Sabrina Guo. For the writing project today, write an observation of something around your house, yard, or neighborhood. Make it short, no more than 300 words, which was the constraint that Sabrina was working under. You can describe a pet doing something, as Sabrina did, a place, a feeling, a meal, your room, anything. Unlike a longer story, you may find that there is no beginning, middle, or end as we normally think of them. You may just evoke a place, describing its look and feel but without there necessarily being any action, without there being a plot–something we’d call a vignette. But 300 words is plenty for a short scene that includes characters and even dialogue. As always, if you feel you have succeeded, then submit it to Stone Soup via the ‘submit’ button so Emma can read it. Art The drawing by Marco Lu that you see above, “Tick Tock,” combines the precision of scientific illustration with the imagination of a creative thinker. When I first looked at the drawing I saw a flea in a nautilus’s body. Next, it looked to me like a mechanical creature eating a bug. Now, I understand the image to be that of a single robotic creature. There is so much to look at in Marco’s masterful drawing, so many ideas in it, that I’d like to use it as the inspiration for today’s art project. What strikes me most about the drawing is the flea clock feels so present, so real—so weirdly, naturally alive. At least, that is how it strikes me. I think the real “how” of this drawing is not its accomplished technique. The “how” is in the ideas that Marco brings to life with his pencils. We all have different levels of drawing skill. What is is important to succeed at this project is not that your work is as precise as Marco’s but that your idea is equally well developed. It is the idea of this mechanical flea-like creature with a clock stuck to its side that that gives the work its power. We look forward too seeing what you come up with. Until next week, Highlights from the past week online Don’t miss the latest content from our Book Reviewers and Young Bloggers–keep checking our website to keep up with what’s new! This week, we have another nature video from blogger Sierra Glassman, this one of the wildlife she encountered on a trip to Pantanal, Brazil. Plus, a new book review from Kaiya and Silas, of They Poured Fire on us From the Sky by Benjamin Ajak, Benson Deng, Alephonsion Deng, and Judy A. Bernstein. From Stone Soup, January 2019, & winner of our 2018 Short Short Fiction Contest The Pendulum By Sabrina Guo, 12 Art: “Tick Tock” by Marco Lu, 12 Most nights, my cat stares at the grandfather clock in the living room. She is a grey tabby with splotches of black and white. Her eyes are golden and edged in greenish blue, like a miniature painting of the sun over a forest, or a mood ring, because you never know when the colors will change. When she is calm, you see more of the gold, flickering. But when she is scared, her pupils are large and black, and you notice more of the green, which is the way she looks before the clock at night—her back arched, her fur raised like small tufts of grass. She stares at the oval shape of the
They Poured Fire On Us From the Sky, Reviewed by Silas and Kaiya
They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky is about a civil war in the continent of Africa. Thousands of children are sent on a nauseating journey through horrible hardships, where survival is the only thing on their minds. As the book progresses, you can feel yourself going on this journey alongside them, facing their troubles and their grievings. Three boys who go by the names of, Benson, Alephonsion, and Benjamin are forced to go on this journey. They watch as their friends and family die. Worst part is, this is a true story. It all happened on a peaceful day, rumors about bombs destroying whole villages had been spreading around. These three boys had been going about their daily duties when suddenly, “…fire was poured on them from the sky.” Benson and Benjamin darted in different directions, unaware of each other’s safety. Alepho, however, managed to remain safe alongside his mother. Soon though, Alepho is forced to flee from his village, hiding underneath bushes until he manages to find a group of other boys like him. They all travel to different places in seek of shelter, food, and whereabouts of their family. This remains to be the main issue for most of the book, if you ignore all the deaths and casualties around them. This war lasted twenty-two years! That’s crazy! Going through starvation, dehydration, and illness while not knowing about their family’s safety. Terrible, I know. Anyhow, that’s enough of a summary. Let’s go over reviews. Silas will be making the first review, Kaiya the second. Silas’s Review: This book is written well but the story is just murder and torture walking to different villages trying to find a home. If you love history and pain this is the book for you. If you are looking for depth and emotional value then go grab a copy of To Kill A Mockingbird and read that. The writer seems to not know the extent of how many horrible chapters the reader can take before having an existential crisis, wondering how people can be so terrible. They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky is not a pleasure read, if you ever dare to turn the pages be ready. This book is for those who have a iron stomach and those who have very low expectations of humans. To top it of, the ending of this book feels very rushed. All of the book you are made to think nowhere is safe but suddenly they reach this camp and everything is ok! The writer seemed to fast forward years in the amount of three pages, then there are twenty about one long walk. This proves the author focuses on torture. Kaiya’s Review: This book was a trip! So much was happening at once, and at times, it was difficult to keep up! I can’t say that I enjoyed it, since there was so much gore and death, but I will say that it was well written. It put you in the boy’s perspectives. It’s not meant to be fun, sentimental, or enjoyable. It’s meant to show how much pain these boys went through. This is a real thing that has happened. Sure, maybe Benson, Benjamin, and Alephonsion is safe, but how about everyone else who died? Those who fell down and never came back up? You don’t finish this book satisfied, you finish it with grief, and disappointment. How could people kill over something so unimportant? Was it really so much of a big deal that thousands had to die? The ending may be short, and unsatisfying, but maybe that’s on purpose. Maybe it’s a lesson the author is trying to tell you, maybe it’s on purpose because they ran out of time. Nobody knows. Well, that’s my opinion. If you wish to read this, go ahead. Just be prepared for a long journey, and heartache. I wouldn’t recommend it, but it’s still about a terrible experience that many people had to go through. A true story, in fact. If you were to read it, instead of thinking that people are terrible, think of how you can better yourself. I mean, you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but it’d be nice if you did. Thanks for listening to me ramble! Well, that’s it! That’s our opinions on They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky. I hope this helps you decide on reading it or not! Remember, keep on reading! They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky by Benjamin Ajak, Benson Deng, Alephonsion Deng, and Judy A. Bernstein. PublicAffairs Publishing, 2005. Buy the book here and support Stone Soup in the process! Have you read this book? Or do you plan on reading it? Let us know in the comments below!
