Alicia

 10 Things To Do Before I Die. By: Daniel Ehrenhaft

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“This is the story of my death.”

“You will never have much of a future if you look for it in a cookie at a Chinese Restaurant.”

"One should never look for one's destiny in a dessert item. One should look for it in experience."

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//Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.// **
 * There are several great scenarios here, but the stitches needed to gather them into one story don't bear up to even casual scrutiny.//–Francisca Goldsmith, Berkeley Public Library, CA//

// Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved. // ** 
 * The novel, which is broken into cleverly titled snippets, takes a while to gather speed, but the premise is fun, and Ehrenhaft employs many different literary devices, including lists, screenplays, and delightfully bad puns. Urban teens will enjoy the lighthearted romance and its unlikely hero. -//Debbie Carton//


 * From the title you assume the character is going to die. It took me reading practically midway to realize perhaps he is not going to die. Ted eventually begins having a list that his friend Mark put together of things Ted should do before he dies. In conclusion as said before I started reading it thinking it was going to be sad because of the character death only to find out it’s a tongue in cheek book about death. In the end I did not really enjoy this book. I felt the author was making a joke about death which I do not see as funny.** **//- Annmmar “ASMB” (Bronx, BY USA)//**



 My first memorable quote: "This is the story of my death.", is an important quote in this book because this entire book is based on the ten things Ted wants to do before he dies. He says, “This is the story of my death”, because he actually finds out he is going to die in 24 hours. Also, he says it to inform the people that he is going to die and he is going to tell you how. Throughout the book he tells many fascinating stories about his life and how he grew up. Some are funny and some are sad. One of the stories is how he found out he is going to die. He explains it a lot and tells exactly what happened that day. After that he tells about the things he’s going to accomplish before he dies.

My second memorable quote: "You will never have much of a future if you look for it in a cookie at a Chinese Restaurant.", is important because it explains parts of the reason for this book. It explains how you can't have a future if you just sit around and depend on fortune cookies to tell you what will happen with your life. Ted found out he is not going to have a future because he has been poisoned. This quote from a fortune cookie states he won’t have a future if he searches for it there. Soon after that he finds out he really won’t have a future. It was for his birthday. He went to a Chinese Restaurant and that was his fortune. He never really thought anything of it until he found out he only had 24 hours to live. Now he’s trying to do anything he can before he dies.

My third memorable quote: "One should never look for one's destiny in a dessert item. One should look for it in experience.", is important to the story because it taught Ted something. The thing it taught Ted was to not look for your destiny in other things, look for it in yourself. At the Chinese Restaurant Ted asked the waiter about his fortune because he thought it didn't make sense. He also thought it was a rip-off The waiter's response was, “One should never look for one’s destiny in a dessert item. One should look for it in experience.” He said this to tell Ted that even though they can say knowledgeable things, they can always be wrong. It is very important to the story because Ted ends up looking for his destiny. He decides to do ten things before he dies. Doing those ten things will make him gain experience. Therefore, he can find his destiny.


 * Video 1: My book, 10 Things to do Before I Die, is about a boy named Ted Burger. He thinks he gets poisoned and is going to die. He and his friends Mark and Nikki make a list of ten things Ted has to do before he dies from the poison. Throughout the book Ted is trying to accomplish all of these tasks within a short amount of time. He realizes he isn't going to die, he was just sick. This trailer of The Buried Life relates to my book becuase in this show, the men made a list of things they want to do before they die. They travel the workd trying to accomplish each task on their list. Everytime they accomplish one of their wants, they help out someone else. Ted Burger was like them becuase he wanted to accomplish a lot before he died. He started to realize that in order to do something you want to you have to take risks and help out someone else that needs it more.

Picture 1: I chose the picture of a cheeseburger, french fries, and a pickle because it is a big part of the story. The book is about a list Ted makes because he thinks he is going to die. Everytime him and his friends went to the Circle Eat Diner they got the meal of a cheeseburger, fries, and a pickle. Nikki ate the pickle, Ted ate the fries, and Mark ate the cheeseburger. One day after they ate Ted didn't fell good. The old fry cook came in and said he poisoned the fries. This picture is very important because it shows how Ted thought he was going to die. Also, it leads up to him making the list and accomplishing everything throughout the book.

Picture 2: I chose this picture of someone making a list of things they want to do before they die because that is the main part of the story. Mark, Nikki, and Ted make a list of things for Ted to accomplish in his lifetime. The reason they do this is because he has been poisoned and doens't have a very long time to live. In the book, Ted is trying to accomplishing mostly all of the tasks on the list. There are ten things he is suppose to do. This picture best suits it because the person making the list wants to accomplish all of those things before he/she dies just like Ted wants to do.**