Writing a Good Hook

Authors Note: This is my hookk that I wrote. You had to include an 80 year old man named Leroy wearing a speedo with the setting of the kitchen sink. The conflict had to be someone falling out of a wagon.
 

"Hahahaha, Grandpa Leroy! Grandpa Leroy! Watch me in my wagon!"

"Hold on sonny I'm givin' myself a bath in the kitchen sink! I'm comin'!" I swear that little kid is growin' faster than a bean sprout! I'm so glad I bought 'em that little red wagon; he's been playin' in it since the minute I gave it to him. 

"Ahhhh! Owch!"

"What is it sonny?"I see  little sonny sittin' on the ground crying his eyes out. Must've fallen and gotten a boo boo.

"Ima' comin'!" Little sonny is still balling his eyes out-he must've really hurt himself. So I start to run faster than a Nascar Racecar in the Daytona Five Hundred! Suddenly, I hear the neighbor kids pointin' and laughing at little sonny. When I get to his side  I see that the neighbors are laughin' at me 'cuz I'm wearin' my speedo!

Authors Note: This is my short story about a girl who see's a strange man looking at her. All you need to know is that the setting is in a mall food court.

Secret Identity

A strange elderly man approaches me. I’ve never seen him before, but he looks at me like we’ve met. He smells of gas station coffee and grins with his missing front two teeth as I wince because of the awful smell. Since I’m surrounded by people in the food court, I don’t expect what happens next. The man takes his hands out of his pockets and pulls out a gun.

Instantly I start running. I don’t understand what’s going on but there must be some misunderstanding! Soon enough I’m half way across the food court-headed towards the ‘bathroom center’. It’s partially closed off from the rest of the food court with bubblers and two separate bathrooms-girls and boys. Hopefully I’ll be able to hide in there and call the cops or something. When I turn around, I see that the old man has hidden the gun in his jacket. Obviously he doesn’t want to make a big scene; but wouldn’t seeing a girl being chased by an old man seem alarming to you?!  Apparently not because no one has tried to stop him! Just as I’m about to enter the bathroom I see something out of the corner of my eye-no it’s someone. She looks a lot like me, a little too much like me.  Almost as if she could be my twin…

I stop for a second, not believing what has just happened in the last sixty seconds. I turn to the girl and she looks at me and puts her finger up to her lips telling me to stay quiet. She’s hiding beside the bubblers trying not to be seen. Luckily I’m ten times faster than the old man which has allowed me enough time to examine the girl a little bit. Every single feature I have, she has. Her hair color, eyes, everything about her reminds me of myself. Is it possible to have a secret twin I’ve never known about? I’ve taken too much time thinking though, because gramps is only 20 feet away from me. And he’s not stopping.

What do I do? I can’t just hide in the bathroom with the door locked! He’ll find the girl hiding behind the bubbler ad she told me to stay quiet. And I can’t just stand here, a man wants to kill me and he’s going to if I don’t do something quick!

Finally the man slows down to a walk and starts laughing in an evil way. A janitor-or at least someone who looks like one pulls his cart into the entrance of the ‘bathroom center’ blocking the view from the outside world. He must be working with the old guy because he turns around to face us and crosses his arms. It’s almost like he’s his body guard. Thankfully, the girl makes the next step for me and jumps out in front of the bubblers.

 “Oh, there’s two of you ‘a? He he he, I guess I’ll have to kill you both!” the man concludes. He has some sort of Russian accent it sounds like. The man pulls out the gun and directs it towards us both. I look at the girl and she looks completely focused. Unlike me, I about to pee my pants! What is happening?! He loads the gun with one bullet and rotates the revolver.

“You want to play?” the man looks at me, then the girl, then the body guard, “Maybe later.” It’s very clear that this man has issues. He sounds like some Russian warrior coming out of a scary movie. “Not so fast!” a man coming out of the boy’s bathroom says while exploding out with a gun in his hand. He shoots his gun which has a silencer on it and hits the body guard just before the girl takes out the old man with her ‘spy moves’. I just stand and watch in complete shock. In a matter of minutes I have been chased, found out that I have a twin (at least I think I do), and watched two people get attacked right before my very eyes.

“Nice job sis,” The girl says.

“You mean agent double-seven?” the man from the boy’s bathroom questions. Now that I’ve got a closer look at him, I see that he is a very fit man. He’s twice the size and half the age of the old man. 

“Are you talking to me? And are you…are you my…twin?”

“Yes and yes. I know this is all very confusing for you but you have to understand. We were separated at birth. Our real parents were spies but they were killed. You were adopted but I went to a military camp and trained to become a secret agent. And thanks to you, you brought our next target right towards us so we could kill him. So nice job sis.”

“It’s not safe for you to be with your old family so you have to come with us. We’ll train you to become an agent which shouldn’t be too hard seeing how your sister and your parents are great spies. It must be in the genes.”

My head starts spinning and everything around me slowly disappears. The last thing I here is “Emma, Emma!” before I hit the ground and black out. All of this is just too much for me to handle.

When I wake up I’m I a bedroom with another cot next to me. There’s someone sitting on it and I think it’s my twin. Suddenly I realize I don’t even know my sisters name. She see’s that I’m awake and walks over to me.

“By the way I’m Taylor,” she says.

“Emma,” I say and we both shake each other’s hands.

“We start training and the crack of noon. Don’t be late.”

 I wonder if my life will ever be the same.  

Response to Tangled

Authors Note: This is sort of a rough draft. I'm not sure if I want to use it as my response to the movie.  If you have any ideas please let me know. My 'thesis' is to keep dreaming. I hope that's understood in this poem.

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!

Little does she know that that's not fair.

She takes her power,

Then locks her in a tower.

But this does not stop her,

For she will still dream.

She'll dream, and dream,

'Til she bursts at the seam,

To one day be,

Sitting on a boat,

Deep  in the sea,

Watching what lies before thee.

Lanterns in Tangled

During the movie Tangled, there was one major symbol. They were the lanterns. I believed they symbolized Rapunzel wanting to leave her castle. The lanterns were free, and flew wherever they wanted to. This is exactly what Rapunzel wanted to do.

Creative Writing Piece

Authors Note- These are the words I had to include in my story: Anteaters, Bulge, Cookies, Delightful, Fezor, and Helicopter.

Your are driving across a bridge, toward a country you have never visited before. On the other side of the bridge, you can barely make out what seems to be a series of holes that look to be abandoned, for there is no one in sight. There is a train station with a steaming locomotive parked on the track.

 You see a middle aged woman sitting on the locomotive. She is carrying a crate filled with something you can't make out, until your car starts to approach her. Just as your eye sight is able to see what the woman is holding, the train starts to take off at a racing speed. You decide to take your car off road to follow the woman. Then you begin to hear some heard of animals stampeding.  You look to your left and find anteaters at every angle of the locomotive, and now your car, for some reason. Your head starts to spin as you take in the crazy scene that lays before you. What is going on? You ask yourself constantly.

 You can't seem to take your foot off the gas pedal. Soon your car starts to smoke. As you take a look at the speedometer you realize your going way over your cars capacity. An anteater to your right starts harassing your car, and soon there is a slight bulge on the passengers' seat door.  What do I do, what do I do?! Then, you dream up a master plan to get you out of this situation . First, grab your lunch filled with a sandwich and cookies just incase you get hungry. Second, take your foot off of the gas pedal. Third, jump out of the car door and roll on the ground to insure for a safe landing. Now there's only one thing left to do-actually do it. You gang up the courage and begin your master plan step by step. You've got your lunch in hand, and your foot off the pedal, ready to make a delightful leap into the heard of anteaters.  Your hand grips the door handle, and you take a look out the window. Everything around you is moving, except you of course. Then, you quickly clench the handle, leap out of the car and start to roll.

 Luckily the heard of anteaters are way ahead of you, continuing to follow the locomotive. You begin to feel like the only normal thing in this unknown country. But then, a lonely anteater left behind by his group begins to approach you. It's elephant like trunk drudging along. It looks a little sad. As you begin to move closer to it, you notice a nametag around it's collar. It reads 'FEZOR'. What kind of name is that? What language is it? Where am I? You need to take a break from all of this thinking, so  begin eating your  lunch; every now and then giving a crumb to Fezor. He gives a look that seems as though he's saying  'What is this garbage?'  He starts to have a fit, spinning his trunk around like a helicopters propeller until the food lands on the ground. You take a glance at your car, still smoking, then start to walk away with Fezor towards the train station hoping to catch a ride home.

Short Story Respnse

A young child loses both of his parents in a fatal accident, and is forced to live with a dominant uncle who not only manages his business, but manages his family too.  How would you go about living? You would probably like a friend. This is the exact setup in the story Luke Baldwin's Vow. Luke finds a friend in life that is priceless; a dog whom he relies on deeply. Luke vowed to  his dying father that he would try to learn things from his uncle, but rather, Uncle Henry manages to learn throughout the story from Luke that some things in life are priceless.

During the story Uncle Henry decides that Dan, the Dog, is useless since he does not contribute to him.

"…he just eats and sleeps and gets in the way." Luke knew that Dan benefited his life. It does not seem as though Uncle Henry understood that.  Luke knew that his dog was worth more than money, even though Uncle Henry didn't see it that way. This is a terrible and tragic point of the story.

Although the mode seems tragic, the ending turns out to be romantic. This is because Luke got to keep Dan.  Some words were mentioned that were symbolic such as "dream, luxuries, and gentle". These are all characteristics of the dog. To Luke, it was a dream to him that he had a friend, someone who was gentle, and made life feel like a luxury-at least when they were together.

No matter who you are, you will always have something that means nothing to others but everything to you. These things in life are truly priceless, which is the lesson learned in the story Luke Baldwin's Vow. To some people it seems as though Uncle Henry was cruel, but together Luke and his uncle learned from  each other. Luke Baldwin's vow to his father was achieved.

Animal Farm

During the story Animal Farm, each character develops a personality that resembles someone in the Russian Revolution. The author, Orwell, meant for this to happen. This story is really about what Orwell is saying about those who became the leaders of the revolution.


It seems as though the pigs have taken control over the farm. Even though it is a communist farm, there are still leaders that appear to be ruling it.  Those three leaders in the story are Napoleon, Snowball, and Squealer. There were also three leaders in the real Russian Revolution. They are Trotsky, Stalin and Lenin. Throughout the first few chapters I thought that Snowball resembled Lenin since he was intelligent, although he changed. Snowball is truly Trotsky because he is the only one of the leaders that has disappeared. Napoleon is definitely Stalin since he has a strong military-like feel on life. Lastly, Squealer is Lenin because he was the first ruler, until Stalin took over. This happened in the book too.


Orwell didn't really like the idea of the Russian revolution. He created this book to sort of make fun of it, and let people know what his opinion was. That's how the novel Animal Farm tells the story of the Russian revolution.