The Denver Post •

CK Reporter of the WeekEdward Jeffers, Evergreen

The new movie, “Forever My Girl” is based on a 2012 novel by Heidi McLaughlin.

The prologue primes us to expect the worst of the protagonist, even before we actually meet him, by depicting what happened when he left his fiancée at the altar back in St. Augustine, Louisiana, to pursue his musical career.

Flash forward eight years: Liam Page (Alex Roe) has made fame and fortune as a country music star.

However, appearances of selfishness can be deceiving: He still treasures his antiquated flip-phone (that even has an antenna) because it contains a forlorn message left years earlier by Josie, the woman he left behind (Jessica Rothe).

Of course, he has never answered that message, since he didn’t know how to start.

The worst part is that, over the last eight years, he hasn’t even contacted his father.

However, when he receives word of a childhood friend’s death in an auto mishap, Liam decides he needs to take a return trip to St. Augustine.

Once he’s there, it doesn’t take long for him to have an awkward encounter with Josie.

When she sees him, she punches him. It takes only a bit longer for him to realize that Billy,

a seven-year-old girl and Josie’s precocious daughter, (Abby Ryder Forston) is the child he never knew he had fathered.

Much of “Forever My Girl” is about Liam’s eagerness to bond with Billy.

However excited he is when Billy -- named after his mother -- wants him in her life, Josie is very nervous about it, and she has every right to be, considering what he did to her.

Another big piece of the movie is about Liam building back his relationship with both his Dad and

with Josie, with whom he is still in love. His father, a pastor, is still mad about what

happened with Liam when he first shows back up, but throughout the movie he and Liam bond through replanting Liam’s mother’s rose garden, sharing a new espresso maker, and admitting to each of their mistakes.

They might have done better to expand upon some potentially interesting plot elements, such as the response of the other townspeople to Liam’s years-ago departure, and the musical career of Liam’s late mom, which is fleetingly referenced, then immediately

forgotten. But the movie is a touchy country romance that will

make you cry, laugh, and smile and, all in all, I would recommend seeing the movie.

January 30 , 2018

Writing Is Fun!How Would You Like To Be A Real Reporter?

Find out about all the cool benefits when you apply to be a Colorado Kids reporter at Colorado NIE.com

or by emailing dplewka@denverpost.com.

Love means being responsible

By Ariana Bates-Erlich,11, a CK Reporter from Arvada

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“The Maze Runner: Death Cure,” is latest in the Maze Runner series, based on the books by James

Dashner, and the finale for the popular films.Before getting tickets for this movie, you

should watch, or read, the first two movies or books.

If you choose not to, the movie will be very confusing, the characters won’t make sense, and you’ll miss out on some surprises that will only surprise those who have seen the other two movies.

Another thing that might be good to note is that the movie has maybe two minutes of rising action in the beginning, and then there’s nothing but action from there on, which may be a good thing for some people but others may like slower-paced movies.

Thomas (Dylan O’Brien), and his friends are sent out to find their friend Minho, (Ki Hong Lee), after he is captured by WCKD.

Along the way Thomas, Newt and two new characters, Jorge and Brenda, find out about WCKD’s headquarters located in a place called the New City.

Upon getting there they meet an old friend that helps them get into the city. Once inside, Thomas locates another old friend at WCKD.

After doing some scouting in the city, Thomas plans a mission, and, if you want to see what happens after that, go see it.

Some concerns I have about this movie would

be strong language, explicit hand gestures, and heavy gun fire, gun shots and crashes. If you are sensitive to these things, I wouldn’t recommend the movie, which is PG-13.

I think that’s reasonable, because anyone under that age would probably have a tough time thinking about the zombies and explosions/gun fire.

It’s very loud, too, which would probably scare younger viewers.

The movie seemed a bit oddly paced, meaning that some things happened that didn’t make sense logically.

For example; Thomas and Newt were sealed in an elevator surrounded by guards, but in the next scene they were casually walking down the hall unharmed.

Other than that, the movie was a good action-packed film, it had a few jumpy moments, and it was just good to see Thomas get justice.

In all honesty the movie is one of those films where everybody wins after joining the right side.

‘Maze Runner’ ends with loud action

By Van Brown,13, a CK Reporter from Littleton

The Denver Post •

It’s a beautiful day outside. The sun is shining, the grass is green, and chocolate is bountiful in the stores.

You turn on the TV to The Seven Show, with a troubling report.

They have found a prophecy ordaining that by this Sunday, all chocolate will disappear!

Welcome to the world of “The Chocopocalypse!” by Chris Callaghan.

Jennifer “Jelly Welly” Wellington lives in the town of Chompton-on-de-Lyte, the world’s biggest chocolate hub.

Long story short, chocolate is the life of the town and even the thought of no more chocolate is enough to send the entire town into hysterics.

Students and teachers alike munch on the remaining bars, as the flow of chocolate slows and finally, no more chocolate is being shipped to stores anywhere.

Is the Chocopocalypse an elaborate and well-executed plot?

Or is it real? Jelly Welly loves chocolate. Like almost everybody else

in the world, it is her favorite thing to eat. So when The Seven Show announces that in less than

a week all the chocolate will be gone, she runs to her grandmother, a retired scientist.

Together they pick up on a trail of clues that suggests that perhaps the Chocopocalypse is the work of an evil mastermind.

And on top of it all, she still has to think of a science project that will get her a good grade!

Callaghan’s novel is a work of art (that is, if art were covered in chocolate).

The humor in the book is reminiscent of Roald Dahl, and the plot is full of unexpected twists and turns (Who is that mysterious chocolate shop owner Garibaldi Chocolati? Why does his chocolate taste so bad?).

“The Chocopocalypse” is a wonderful book to read in a few sittings, or with a cup of hot cocoa.

I would recommend “The Chocopocalypse” for kids ages 10+, however it can be an easy and fun read for older teens too!

A horrible disaster looms in funny novel

By Maria Ciobanu,13, a CK Reporter from Denver

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This flu season isn’t a record, but it certainly isn’t goodThat flu shot you had a few months ago (You did

get one, didn’t you?) began nearly a year ago, with some data collection and a lot of predictions.

Unlike other diseases, influenza comes in many types and continues to evolve and change.

This means that, each flu season, health providers face a slightly different mix of flu viruses.

The vaccine they begin making in February needs to be able to fight the most likely types of flu that will be around the next winter, and it takes research, knowledge, experience and some luck to know just what formula to inject into the eggs in which the vaccine will grow.

This has been a very bad flu season, with some deaths but mostly a whole lot of sick people, in-cluding many needing to stay in hospitals.

It hasn’t been the worst: 2014-15 was worse. But it’s been bad enough that the Center of Disease Control has reminded people to stay safe.

Remember that flu shots help and are very im-portant, but, like seat belts and air bags in cars, they can’t protect everyone every time.

If you are sick, stay home. Don’t spread your germs!Cover up if you sneeze and wash your hands often.The worst of flu season is over, but it’s still going

on and you should be careful! photo/FDA

“The Wild Ones: Great Escape” by C. Alexander London is about a raccoon named Kit and his animal friends, the Wild Ones, in Ankle Snap Alley, and is the third

in the popular series.This time, the Wild Ones run into some trouble when the

humans start taking their friends with traps to unknown places.

They start realizing over time that many of their neighbors have gone missing since a season ago, and Kit and the Moonlight Brigade (his animal crew) go to extreme measures, such as capturing a hawk that kills their friends.

Kit ties the hawk down at one of their saloons and interrogates him.

Eventually they set him free, but first they ask him where their friends are going because he sees everything that happens in Ankle Snap Alley.

Kit and his best friend Eeni went to the zoo because Uncle

Rick got trapped by the people, so they ride on the back of a car on a unicycle made out of a old bike wheel.

There, they meet a peacock named Preston Q Brightfeathers, and decide to break their friends and family out of the zoo.

I really enjoyed this book. I recommend it for ages 7 to 11 because it has some big words in it.

It also had some sad parts such as an animal getting shot. For the most part it’s a good book, and it really is intriguing.

The characters seem realistic, and you can kind of picture a lot of the scenes in your head.

‘Wild Ones’ series sends the crew to the zoo

By Ben Vanourek,12, a CK Reporter from Littleton

The Denver Post •

The large county in Norway known as Oppland got that name for reasons you shouldn’t need to speak the language to understand: Say it out loud!

This very mountainous area contains high mountains and large glaciers, and it isn’t a place you’d go very often in winter if you didn’t have to.

But as climate change melts the glaciers, archaeologists are finding evidence that, when food was scarce thousands of years ago, hunters went into the high mountains of Oppland to hunt reindeer.

The hunters sometimes lost tools or bits of clothing that were then frozen in the bitter winters.

For instance, the arrow in this picture is from some time between 695 and 891 CE, which would put it in the Viking Age that ran from then up to about 1050 CE.

“Vikings” are thought of as fierce raiders and the actual Vikings were sailors who raided coastal towns.

But many Norse sailors in that era were also traders and settlers who visited Britain, Ireland and France and sometimes sailed all the way to Sicily and North Africa in search of business.

One thing they traded was hides and antlers, so the hunters may have gone into the mountains despite rough weather so they could make more money!

Whatever their reasons, archaeologists are thrilled to find things preserved in the ice that would have long ago rotted away otherwise.

However, those things are no longer frozen, so it’s important to gather them quickly while they are still in good condition!

Melting glaciers set off scramble for ancient, vulnerable artifacts

Rick Riordan -- who “presents” this novel -- and Roshani Chokshi -- who wrote “Aru Shah and the End of Time” -- have very similar writing styles,

so any fan of his books will definitely enjoy this book as much as I did.

As I finished this novel I understood what Riordan meant when he wrote in the foreward, “It has every-thing I like: humor, action, great characters, and, of course, awesome mythology!”

There is, indeed, everything any book needs, includ-ing humor and adventure.

When you read a good novel, you feel as if you are inside the book yourself and that is how I felt while reading this.

After I read from cover to cover, I started thinking about the possibilities of me being a child of the gods, just like when I read one of Riordan’s books.

The similarities between Aru and I are very notice-able: We’re both in 7th grade, we have big imagina-

tions, we know a lot about Hindu mythology. Another character, Mini, reminds me of my friends

because of her interests. This novel, which draws on the Hindu epic, the Pan-

dava, is set in modern times, and many things are the same but only different.

I would recommend this book to nine through thirteen-year-olds because the plot has elements that someone that age can relate to.

I like how Chokshi integrates the real world to the world of Hindu mythology and that anyone can find themselves lost in the book.

It is hard to imagine that this can’t happen in real life because of the way the story makes the reader want it to be true, except for the tragedies.

Aru cracks under peer pressure and breaks the one rule of her family.

It may be the world’s greatest mistake or the world’s greatest miracle.

All of the things from the mythological stories her mom used to tell her are no longer stories, they’re real, and this can shake the foundations of her world or save it: One imaginator, one germaphobe, and one feisty pigeon to save the world from the end of time.

Novel adds Hindu myths to Riordan-like story

photo/Oppland Museum of Cultural History

On this date in 1948, Mahatama Gandhi was assassinated, so our answers this week will begin with “N” for “nonviolence,” since the day is remembered as International Nonviolence Day in his honor.

1. The Greek goddess of victory, or a brand of shoes

2. This country is often called “Holland.”

3. A railroad -- like the one between Durango and Silverton -- whose rails are closer together than most trains.

4. Nation in the Himalayas between India and Tibet

5. A spice used in pumpkin pie and egg nog and sprinkled over latte

6. To kick a soccer ball so that it goes right between the legs of an opposing player

7. Type of word used for a person, place or thing

8. The only US President to resign before his term of office had finished

9. Very large dog used by fisherman to spread nets and also for ocean rescue work, named for the Canadian province where it was first bred

10. Roman god of the sea(answers on Page Four)

Rules: Every row across, every column down and each of the six smaller boxes must contain numerals 1,2,3,4,5 and 6, one time and one time only.

The solution to this week’s puzzle is on Page 4.

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By Suhani Agarwal,12, a CK Reporter from Centennial

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It is a well-known tragedy of our history that, when Europeans first came to the Americas, they brought with them many diseases that the

people here had never encountered.With no immunities to these new germs and

viruses, millions of American natives died, often of diseases that were serious but not deadly for the Europeans.

One of the earliest examples of these deaths hap-pened in Mexico, where Spanish conquistadores had come in search of wealth for their country.

The war that followed was bloody and many Aztecs and other natives died, but some 20 years later, dis-ease killed far more Aztec people.

It has long been thought that this epidemic, which wiped out many millions of people, was one of the European diseases that also killed many native people in other parts of the Americas.

However, it was never known exactly what disease it was that did so much tragic damage.

Now researchers have found the bacteria, a form of salmonella that may have already been present in the Americas.

This type of research is called “paleopathology,” adding the same prefix found in “paleontology” to the word “pathology” that deals with diagnosing disease.

Paleopathology -- diagnosing ancient diseases -- is hard, but the researchers had a bit of luck to start with.

The epidemic was so horrifying that one Aztec community moved completely, leaving behind a cemetery in which everyone had died of the disease and then nobody else had been buried there.

The other break was not luck but new technol-ogy, a method of examining DNA in the teeth of the corpses found in that cemetery.

It used to be that, if you knew what you were look-ing for, you could use technology to find out if it was there or not.

This new technology identified the various bacte-ria that were present, even if the scientists had not specifically asked about that particular bacteria.

In this ancient cemetery, each of the corpses they examined had the same kind of germ, a type of salmonella. That means it was almost certainly the bacterial disease that killed millions of Aztecs.

Was it brought to America by the Spaniards?That’s not clear. One researcher said it also existed in Norway. But others said it

was likely already in America before the Europeans arrived.This means we don’t have an answer, but we now have a much better question!

Paleopathologists track what killed Aztecs

A native artist depicted this scene of Aztecs and Spanish leaders meeting for the first time in 1519. (Univ of California Bancroft Library)

I like how Chokshi integrates the real world to the world

of Hindu mythology and that anyone can find

themselves lost in the book.

The Denver Post •

is produced by Denver Post Educational Services

Executive Editor: Dana Plewkadplewka@denverpost.com

CK Editor: Mike Petersoncoloradokidseditor@gmail.com

We welcome your comments.

For tools to extend the learning in this feature, look under “Youth Content” at:

www.ColoradoNIE.com

eEditions of the Post arefree of charge for classroom use.Contact us for information on all

our programs.

Denver Post Educational Services101 W. Colfax Ave.Denver CO 80202

(303) 954-3974(800) 336-7678

Stories without bylines were written by the editor.

(see Page Three)

10 right - Wow!

7 right - Great!

5 right - Good

3 right - See you next time!

1. Nike 2. The Netherlands (Nederland) 3. narrow gauge 4. Nepal 5. nutmeg 6. nutmeg 7. noun 8. (Richard) Nixon 9. Newfoundland

10. Neptune

Hot Links to Cool Sites!

NASA’s Space Placehttp://tinyurl.com/ckspace

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How to become a NextGen Reporter!http://tinyurl.com/colokidsreporter

To read the sources for these storiesFlu tips

What killed the Aztecs?

Melting artifacts

go to http://www.tinyurl.com/ckstorylinks

Chapter Four – The Pierce-ArrowOur story so far: Kenny Rascoe lives near the Canadian border in the days of Prohibition. Raymond, the

uncle he lives with, is a customs officer, but his Uncle George is a rumrunner.

Kenny had seen a Pierce Arrow a few times.

Once in awhile, some rich people from Montreal would drive through Plattsburgh on their way to New York. Or some rich people from New York would drive through Plattsburgh on their way to Montreal. They would stop for gas, or to get something to eat, and everyone would gather to look at their beautiful Pierce Arrow.

But Kenny had never seen a Pierce Arrow in Altona until the Saturday morning Eddie Nickels pulled into Pépé’s barnyard in a long, shining new Pierce-Arrow Series 33 Seven-Passenger Touring Car, just like the one in the magazines.

Kenny wasn’t in a good mood. All week, he had sat in class thinking about the weekend, when he would go back to the farm and cut firewood with Pépé and his uncles.

But when Raymond dropped him off at the farm on his way to work Friday night, Kenny found he wasn’t going into the woods with the men; he was going to stay at the farm, catching up the chores that had been going undone during woodcutting.

Pépé had sold his horses and bought a tractor years ago, but when there was heavy hauling to be done in the woods, during sugaring or woodcutting, Paul would bring his team of oxen over from the apple orchard in Chazy.

Kenny wanted to lead the gentle, powerful pair into the forest to haul wood, but, instead, he was alone in the empty barn, shoveling their manure into a wheelbarrow.

He had finished that job and was splitting wood for Mémé’s cookstove when the Pierce Arrow came up the dirt road into the yard.

The man behind the wheel was wearing a striped jacket and a straw hat, and sitting next to him was the most beautiful lady Kenny had ever seen.

And if the Pierce Arrow looked just like the beautiful cars in the magazines, the lady looked just like the beautiful ladies in the magazines, too, only they were both in color.

The man glanced over at Uncle George’s Buick roadster, parked outside the barn now that the oxen were being kept inside. “Is this where George Rascoe lives?”

Kenny stuck the ax into the chopping block and came over to the car. “Yes.”“I gotta talk to him,” the man said, opening the door and stepping out. “Is he around?” “He’s out in the woods. They’re cutting wood.” He looked at the man, who didn’t seem

very patient. “I can go get him, but it’ll take a while.”The man continued to look at him, and Kenny realized that, while he didn’t say anything,

he meant, “So go get him.”“Do you want to come inside?” Kenny asked. “Or, would you like to come sit on the porch?”The man stepped away from the car and the lady came out, too. She was dressed just like the flappers in the magazines, and, when she saw Kenny trying

not to stare, she smiled at him as if there were some little joke just between the two of them. Kenny blushed.

She whispered something to the man and he asked, “Is there some place we can wash up?”Kenny knew what they wanted, but he wasn’t sure how to answer. “There’s a tap in the

kitchen,” he said. “But everything else is, um, outside.”She giggled and the man said, “Never mind. We’ll sit on the porch.”“I’ll go get him,” Kenny said. “Tell him Eddie is here and I have to make an early pickup. Tell him plans changed.”“Okay.” Kenny ran across the hayfield towards the woods, but, as he ran, he thought. Uncle George probably didn’t want Pépé and the others to see Eddie. Mémé wasn’t likely to come out on the porch; She didn’t speak very much English and

didn’t really like to talk to strangers. Kenny knew it would be better if nobody saw Eddie and the beautiful lady.He found Martin and Pépé limbing a tree Paul had just felled, and, when he asked for

George, they nodded off past a thick stand of beech saplings.George had nearly cut through a maple when Kenny burst through the bushes and said,

“Eddie’s here.”“Eddie?” George looked towards where the others were working.“Plans changed,” Kenny said. “He has to pick up early.”George looked towards the house, then again towards where his father and brothers-in-

law were cutting wood.“I can help him, if you tell me where it is,” Kenny offered.“Where what is?” George asked.“I saw what was in the back of your car last Sunday, in the barn,” Kenny said. “What do you

need me to do?” George thought another moment, looking once more towards the woods, and then

towards the farm house.A few minutes later, Kenny was standing on the runningboard of the Pierce Arrow as it

slowly drove down the road, away from the farm and back towards the highway. “Right there, that little shed,” he said.

Eddie pulled over. Nobody had used that old shed for years, and the door hung on one hinge. Kenny and Eddie began hauling the burlap bags full of bottles up to the car and stowing them in the back.

When the shed was empty, Eddie reached into his pocket and took out a money clip. “Thanks, kid,” he said, and peeled off a five-dollar bill.

Kenny had seen a Pierce Arrow before. But he’d never held a five-dollar bill in his hand.

text copyright 2011, Mike Peterson - illustrations copyright 2011, Christopher Baldwin

For a teaching guide, go to http://tinyurl.com/ckserial

Hooch

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