We started off class Tuesday talking about the introduction of “Good in Bed”. One of the first things that was discussed was how similar Cannie is to Jennifer Wiener, the author of the novel. We discussed if Cannie and Wiener were indeed similar and what aspects they shared or how they were complete opposites. We also went over Team A’s discussion questions.
In class on Thursday, we began by taking 5-10 minutes looking for stories that are told by Cassie, and what each of these stories means to the readers/audience of the novel. After working individually, we were put in groups of 2 or 3 to discuss what we found and were to decide on two stories that would be shared with the class. Group 5 (consisted of Danny, Nicole L and Tori) went first and Tori talked about the story in chapter six where Cannie reflects back on her relationship with her father. At first, her dad was very much in her life and cared about her a lot, but then slowly drifted out of her life as she got older to the point where he was barely involved. Tori also mentioned the quote in the chapter about rats and magic and compared that to the relationship between Cannie and her dad. The takeaway message for the readers was to get out of any relationship when you know nothing good is coming out of it. Nicole L. then talked about Cannie’s internship story about photocopying and that you have to be ambitious and stick up for yourself in order to succeed. Professor Bergren also added the point that sometimes you need to tell a few white lies in order to succeed. Nicole K and Jack pointed out the story where Cannie first meets Bruce and that it means that love is unexpected. Professor then added a great point that woman need to be unaware of how attractive they actually are and thats where their attractiveness comes from. Maddie then talks about when Bruce kisses Cannie after an arguement they have, Cannie forgets about the fight and loves Bruce again. She brings up the point, is the story trying to say that it was a bad relationship or was he actually the perfect man for Canniie and was it a mistake that she let him go?
After sharing the stories and they’re meanings, we moved to the topic of round and flat characters. Jon defined flat characters as characters that don’t bring much to the story. Jack defined round characters as ones that distinct from others; Professor added that they are someone that has complex motivations and temperament. We then began classifying some minor characters as a class. We said that Maxi was a round character that was characterized by dialogues with Cassie, descriptions and articles. We said that Lily was a flat character that was characterized by dialogue only. Dr K. was categorized as a flat character (but getting rounder) and was characterized by description and dialogue. Cannie’s dad was categorized as a flat character and characterized by flashbacks (her stories). Jack added in that if a character was round, they were categorized in many different ways and Nicole added in that flat characters have much less of an impact on the novel, and really only characterized by dialogue.
We then began brainstorming on how to do research for our essays. We used two examples: Finding Nemo and Taylor Swift. For the movie, we decided that the best resources to use would be to watch the movie, read reviews and also use imdb. For Taylor Swift, we decided that the best resources to use would be to listen to her music, watch her music videos, read reviews and also buzzfeed.