Week 2 Book Club

Now that I've described all the characters in my first Book Club blog post, I'll summarize what has happened in the story so far.  Basically in the beginning, readers take a look at the Watsons' every day life.  Most of the time the story takes place at school and it describes how Kenneth and Rufus' friendship evolves, the constant troubles Byron is always getting into, and the sibling rivalry between Kenneth and Byron.  It is obvious that Kenneth wants Byron's approval more than anything, but Byron is very mean to Kenneth most of the time.  After about 1/3 of the way through, the book takes a drastic turn.  Byron comes home and has attempted to straighten his hair without his parents permission.  Because of this being "the last straw" for Byron, his parents decide that he is going to have to live with his grandma for the summer in Birmingham Alabama.  When the father talks to Kenneth about this decision, he explains that Byron needs to see the "real world" so he realizes all that is happening and isn't constantly getting into trouble.  His father fears that as he is getting older, his troubles are only going to get worse and he is going to end up down the wrong path.  He thinks sending Byron to South where there is more action happening will be a nice wake-up call for him.  So, the part of the story I'm at right now is when the family has just left to begin their road trip.  They plan on it taking 3 days to get to Alabama because they decide to make stops along the way.  The mom is very organized and has the entire trip planned to the detail in her notebook.  She figured out all financial aspects, looked up facts about each place they were going, and found games and puzzles to keep the kids entertained on the road.