Catalyst

Rating:
Summary: Definitely gotta read this!!!
Review: Catalyst is a fiction book that deals with situations all teenagers and most people face as well as bad situations that no one should have to be face. It is about a girl who is a straight-A science and math geek, ranked third in the senior class. She is a cross-country runner, and a minister's daughter named Kate Malone. Her boyfriend Mitchell Pangborn III has already decided to go to Harvard. Kate was still waiting on her acceptance letter from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), which is the only college she applied to. Kate life is spinning faster and faster out of control. When her father shows up at her school one day and gives her a thin envelope from the MIT admissions office. Inside the letter says we regret to inform you...! When she is rejected from MIT its like her whole world as come to an end. Then on top of being rejected, her neighbors, the Litch's house gets burned down and Kate's father invites them to come stay at their house. But Teri Litch isn't exactly Kate's best friend. In fact, Teri stole a watch from Kate! Kate has to share a room with Teri. When they move in a secret that the Litch family has been hiding comes out in the open. What is the secret? What will happen? And can Kate handle all of this without going insane?

By Jessica B.

Rating:
Summary: A summer phenomenal " MUST READ"
Review: The book Catalyst was a very good book. I really enjoyed this book. If you have read the book Speak you will really enjoy this book. Although if you haven?t you will still enjoy Catalyst. This is probably my favorite book. The book is about how to deal with life, what life can bring you and that you always have your family and friends. Catalyst is about a girl named Kate Malone who is the main character. This is all about her life. She is a senior in high school. Her father is a minister, her mother passed away a few years ago. She has the reputation of being such a wonderful person because her father is a minister. She hates the reputation she hates having to always be perfect. Kate only applies to one college MIT. Although her father and her boy friend think that she has applied to many colleges. Her boyfriend is Michell Pangborn III. As she waits to hear back from the only college she applies to her neighbor?s house burns down and since her father is ?God man? they get to come and live with her. The neighbors are Teri Litch and her brother Mikey. The move in and Kate is stuck taking care of her brother and trying to put up with her worst enemy Teri. Teri is also a senior at her high school. With all this going on Kate runs at night to escape from all of her pain and life. On the same day that Teri moves in she receives a letter from MIT saying that she did not get in. Her life is falling apart and her boyfriend isn?t helping at all, they seem to be growing apart. Her father and the church are helping to rebuild Teri?s house, but it looks like Teri?s going to be they?re longer than expected. Do Teri and Kate have more in common they the seem to? Read this phenomenal book and find out. You will love it.

Rating:
Summary: Catalyst
Review: Catalyst
By: Laurie Halse Anderson
Reviewed by: K. Ueno
Period: 5

The book that I am reviewing is Catalyst. It is about a girl named Kate. Kate is the minister's daughter. She desprately wants to get into the university MIT. MIT is the only school that she applied to. Finally one day her acceptance letter comes. She was rejected! When she thought that things could not get any worse, they did. Her school bully's house has been burned down. It just so happens that the bully, who's name is Teri, is her neighbor. Since her father is the minister, he offers to let Teri and her little brother stay in their house until Teri's families house is repaired. Teri and her brother decide to stay. Teri and her little brother Mikey stay at the house for quite some time. When the house is being repaired by the church members and Teri, her little brother is missing. They all search for him throught the house. Then Teri finds him dead in his soon to be room. He was only two years old when he died. Mikey wasn't Teri's little brother, he was her son. It was an emotional time for everyone, even Kate because she had gotten "attached" to Mikey. Fairly soon they have a funeral for him. Out of pain and sadness Teri ruins what they have fixed in the house. When Teri calms down after a while everyone pitches in to help refix the house.

I thought this book was a pretty good book. I enjoyed reading the book because it was interesting to see how Kate would react to all of the situations she was put through. I also liked this book because Kate somewhat started to become friends with Teri. Teri started to teach Kate how to do certain things. Teri did this when Kate said "You promised that you would teach me how to hammer." At first they never did anything together, but then they began to. They wern't the best of friends, although they became fairly close.

I did not like this book because it had some sad times in it. I did not like it when Mikey died. I thought it ws really surprising and sad when Teri said "He's my son, my son, my baby, my boy." I thought that it wasn't fair for him to die. Although if he hadn't died, the book would have been less interesting to read because it wouldn't have had anything sruprising in it. This book was interesting, but it was sad to read toward the end.

My favorite part of the book was when Kate's friends tried to help her continuously. They always were there for her and they always were willing to help her. Sometimes Kate didn't want any help. She just wanted to be alone. Nevertheless they would be there for her like when they were going to try to kidnap her. Her friends were going totake her out to the movies without telling her. Their thought was nice, although their plan never happened because Kate and her friends saw each other at the grocery store. Kate told them she was fine and they told her what they were going to do to her. I thought this book was enjoyable to read and other people should read it.

Rating:
Summary: Good Kate vs. Bad Kate
Review: The book Catalyst is a very good book. It is about a teenager named Kate Malone. She is a straight-A science and math student, her father is a minister, she is an ace long-distance runner, and she is Mitchell Pangborn III new girlfriend. Kate applies to one college which is MIT. First, her dad comes to her school with the acceptance letter from MIT. When she read it, it said that she wasn't accepted. The same day she didn't get accepted to MIT, her father took in their neighbors, the Litch's because their house got burned down. Kate really doesn't get along with Teri very well because she stole her watch, which was really special to her. So now she has to live with Teri for a while and Kate's father wants to get people at the church to help and rebuild Teri's house. People are helping, but then something happens with Mikey (Teri's little brother) and that messes a lot of things up. There is also a secret that Teri has been keeping from Kate. Whats the secret? What happens to Mikey? Read this really good book to find out!

Rating:
Summary: Catalyst
Review: The preacher's daughter. Star Athlete. Straight A student. Upcoming Chemist. Kate Malone. Kate has dreamed of being the reincarnation of Marie Curie since she was in fourth grade. She has planned to follow her mother's footsteps and enroll into MIT for college and then become a famous chemist that will bubble her way into history books. Since she knew that she was going to be MIT, when sending out applications for college Kate neglected to apply to any safety schools. But things could not be better for her. She has a perfect boyfriend and will be going to the perfect school.
Life is not so perfect for Teri Litch, though. Balancing taking care of her little brother, Mikey a beautiful blond-haired, blue-eyed toddler, and her feeble mother, and keeping her house in one piece. School is not a priority for her. When she is at school she is constantly teased for her beefy appearance and lack of fashion sense. Teri can throw a mean punch and is constantly getting into fights with other students. Teri and her family live in a house behind of Kate's, on the other side of a hill.
Kate's perfect life was suddenly turned around when Teri's house was burned down and her father took responsibility, as the preacher, to take care of these dispossessed people. He invited them to live in his house until theirs was in better condition. The fire burnt down the barn and only affected the kitchen, roof, and attic on the house. But Kate's father decided that if the whole community could work together they would rebuild the whole house so not only would there house be in one piece again it would be ten times better than before. They tore down the whole house to the foundations and began to rebuild it.
All of a sudden the whole community was consumed in rebuilding a house for the Litch family. Since Kate was not to be trusted with a hammer. She was assigned to ferrying around Teri and Mickey. She took them shopping at the grocery store, she took them to school and daycare, and wherever else they required. Kate was fed up of putting miles on her precious car, Bert, and sharing her room with her snoring monster Teri, who she doesn't get along with to great.
The story of these two girls trying to get along is thoroughly enjoyable. Laurie Halse Anderson does an amazing job of creating very real quirky characters. This book has many layers. It will have you laughing uncontrollably and sobbing hysterically in the same chapter.
Anderson wrote another book before Catalyst entitled Speak. It was about a girl recuperating from the experience of being raped by an upper classman in her high school. Speak and Catalyst is very similar. They both have a dark plot with touches of sarcastic humor. They take place in the same town but are not sequels. I suggest both books. They are extremely rewarding and enjoyable. Laurie Halse Anderson is a talented writer that will entertain you and eyes. make you to see the world through another person's eyes.

Rating:
Summary: Catalyst
Review: Catalyst is a must read for any teenager wanting to go to a big name school. The story starts off with the main character Kate. Kate is a Honors Chemistry geek with a so called "nuclear family". Her boyfriend, Mitchell, is a shoe-in for Harvard. Kate's little secret is that she only applied for one school, MIT. The story thickens when the school bully/loner, Teri and her brother (Mickey) and her mother, move into Kate's house. Why? Because Teri's house burned down. Teri,. Kate has to adapt to Teri's presence and eventually learns to like her.
Then one-day Kate's dad comes to school with bad news. Kate received a thin envelope starting with the phrase " We regret to inform you that...". Kate soon becomes very depressed because of the news.
The story then gets worse when Mickey is killed. He was electrocuted when playing in his soon to be home. Teri is devastated and literally stops living. Kate is shocked and doesn't think things could get any worse.
Catalyst is again a great book for teenagers. I really loved it even though the ending was a little bland. I sure hope they come out with a sequal.

Rating:
Summary: AMAZING!!!
Review: I must say that the novel, Catalyst, was one of the most amazing I've ever read. I am an avid reader, but as soon as I picked up this book, I was unable to put it down. The text was amazing, the vocabulary-phenominal, and it was just all around a great book! The main character, Kate Malone, experiences ups and downs in life, just as we do as humans. This book was amazing because not only is it just a novel, but it relates to our lives as teenagers, so it was extremely interesting. Kate, like us, is capable of doing the good things life has to offer, but does she has what it takes to be accepted into her dream college, M.I.T? Once again, Kate, just like us, often faces rejection and disappointment, but manages to see herself through it. But there's one problem-Kate's ENEMY and younger brother, has to live in the household of her brother and father. AHH!!! Kate and "the enemy" face challenges with one another, but Kate realizes she must be the bigger person and see past it all. From this book, I've learned that life is TOO short to have a grudge against someone. I've also learned that although we know that we're capable of achieving life's goals, we should always prepare for the worst and expect the best.

Rating:
Summary: awesome
Review: i thought this book was great:) it becomes very sad and you feel bad for every character at least once. my heary actually hurt when i read this book. don't be afraid to read it jsut because it is sasd becasue you would be taking away so much by passing this book up! i loved it!!

Rating:
Summary: Catalyst
Review: Through "Catalyst" you get to experience the hardships Kate Malone goes through during this periosd in her life. She's a strait-A student hoping to get into her one and only college choice MIT. Not only is she responsible for keeping her rades up she's also responsible for keeping her family togethr. But when her father, the local misister, decides to give Kate the job of helping out their neighbors she's overwhelmed. She's forced to share her home with her known enemy, and dive into a world completely different from the one she knows. Everything is put into a different light, and you the reader get to experience all these changes she goes through with her. When things go from bad to worse, and she experiences heartbreak for the second time in her life ou're right there with her. All in all I really enjoyed this book. It was both realistic and entertaining, the perfect blend.

Rating:
Summary: Ehh...
Review: I didn't think this book was that good. Laurie Halse Anderson has written many better books than this one.

I found the main character, Kate Malone, was unrelatable. Okay, it seems she has the perfect life, but I just got really tired of reading about what she was thinking. For some reason, she really annoyed me. I mean, how stupid is it to apply to just one college. Then, she kept dwelling on this subject the entire book. It seemed like throughout the entire book, Kate was obsessed about herself.

I also found it annoying that she thought badly of her life. She had good grades, a great boyfriend, nice friends, and a great family. I just feel that throughout the whole book, Kate never realized much of what she had, and how she should be glad of what she has, compared to Tracy.

Also, I think the book was pretty unexciting. (...)