A peak into Thursdays with the Crown and Chasing Cheetahs

Happy Friday !

So, I am sitting here literally and metaphorically surrounded by elementary/middle school nonfiction books that have been nominated for a Cybils award.

This is putting rather a crimp into other reading but I just have to talk up Thursdays with the Crown by Jessica Day George. This is the third book in the series, the first two being ...

Wednesdays ended with rather a monstrous cliff hanger so I am going to try to be careful with this ... for Book Beginnings on Friday, hosted by Rose City Reader here is something from the beginning of Thursdays with the Crown ...

"You are not leaving me behind," Celie repeated. 
Rolf and Lilah exchanged looks, and Celie could see her brother and sister were preparing to side against her. She braced herself. 
"Someone needs to stay here with Pogue," Lilah said in a wheedling voice. 
"But you could stay with Pogue," Celie retorted. "You don't want to get dirty hiking around the forest do you?" 

And since I have piles of nonfiction next to me ... I will take something off the top of the pile. How about something from Chasing Cheetahs: The Race to Save Africa's Fastest Cats by Sy Montgomery ...

Shortly after we leave the city, the parade of wonders begins: thorny acacia trees hung with straw nests of weaver birds, like Christmas ornaments; termite mounds as tall as people, pointed like the turrets on sand castles; road signs like those for deer crossings back home, only featuring silhouettes of warthogs and kudu. Along the road, we pass one sign with a crocodile above a crossed knife and fork, advertising a ranch that offers the reptiles for people to eat (instead of the other way around), and another sign advertising the Ombo Ostrich Farm.


This needs pictures!

An acacia tree full of nests of weaver birds (Source)

Greater kudu - Wikipedia

---

For The Friday 56 hosted at Freda's Voice here is something small from page 56 from Thursdays with the Crown ...

[Male character] strutted up the corridor to the room where they'd left the others. Celie wasn't sure how much he understood of what just happened, and how much he'd known was going to happen. Had he sensed the egg, and wanted to go to it ? Or had he merely wanted to stretch his legs, and found the egg by accident? And what would have happened if they hadn't arrived? Her heart clenched at the thought. 

"Where have you been?" Lilah's face was pasty white with fear when they reached the room again. "We heard noises and ... oh!" 


From page 57 of Chasing Cheetahs (page 56 is a photograph) ...

Ryan Sucaet holds the antenna out the window of the Land Rover and presses the receiver to his ear. "I think Bella's going to be near here," he tells us.

With Rachel Shairp, Ryan has been tracking Bella and another female cheetah, Padme, since sunrise. "They're doing great," Ryan tells Laurie. "They're finding prey, the right kind of prey, and the right amount of prey. I'm proud of them!"

Ryan is a recent graduate of Michigan State University. Rachel, after her stint in Namibia, is headed for a master's degree in her native England. But Bella and Padme are students too - at a school for cheetahs. Their classroom is fenced, eight-thousand-acre former game reserve called Bellebenno, where they're learning to be wild cheetahs again. 

Bella - the black wire with the silver top is the antenna on her radio collar.
http://cheetah.org/2012/06/when-bella-caught-a-duiker-in-bellebenno/

Have a great weekend!