Castle Diary: The Journal of Tobias Burgess

This is an excellent reader for an upper level 2nd grader up to a mid level middle schooler. It makes the world of knights and castles come to life from the viewpoint of a young boy studying to be a squire in his uncle's castle. My son loved it and I found that he related well to the history text that described medieval life because of it. It is written at a read alone level and includes illustrations here and there to emphasize the story.

Why do I say "amazing"? Author Richard Platt writes a fictional diary for young readers based on ACADEMIC RESEARCH. The diary is a brilliant vehicle to make the facts fun, digestable, and memorable. Platt makes the history of a medieval castle come to life with vivid characters, action, and suspense. Why do I say "pathetic"? I'm a language arts teacher and therefore have some insight on the following scenario: If you ask a young reader to pick out a book, he'll inexorably choose junk like Animorphs or something by R.L. Stine, and adults are inclined to think, "Well, at least he's reading." Yeah, he's reading junk, and as he grows older he'll continue to read junk. I spent a weekend hunting down this incredible book, Castle Diary. Barnes & Noble didn't carry it, and only one of three Borders bookstores in town had it---and only one copy, at that. And yet they carry enough R.L. Stine, Animorphs, and other trash to sink a battleship. Pathetic. Parents, expect a little more from your child's reading habits. Buy this book for starters.

It's always a challenge to find elementary-level quality literature for earlier time periods, but this was perfect. The illustrations in this hardback edition are wonderful. My kids couldn't wait to read it each day. I recommend it highly to homeschoolers.

Castle Diary is a wonderful book about the Middle Ages. It is the diary of a young boy, Tobias Burgess, who spends a year as a page in a castle. He hopes to later become a knight. Tobias has many fun adventures and enjoys the castle life. He gets to ride in a hunt and discovers a poacher near the castle. He is always getting into trouble, as he is not used to the castle rules. His punishments are very harsh. Tobias always keeps up with his journal, because he always wants to remember his experience. I loved this book because I learned so much about the Middle Ages, and the illustrations were absolutely wonderful!

An extremely descriptive book, both in text and illustrations. Each page is riddled with short passages (by day) and small illustrations to follow most passages. The text is exploding with vocabulary used by the people of the year 1285 (The Dark Ages). The illustrations are very detailed and descriptive. There are many double page illustrations that add a lot to the book. The detail, color, and facial expressions used in the illustrations catch an observer's eye and force their eyes to wander throughout the illustration to acquire all the information it has to give. Illustrations include the layout of the castle, as well as the inside of many rooms. The text is broken up into easy to read and find sections and a glossary and index is included to aid the reader. At the end is a great section titled "Toby's World". This is a small section that goes into good detail about weapons, armor, houses, castles, and titles of the day. An informative short novel that could be enjoyed by children age 9 to 99. It can be used as a reference, an enjoyable reader, or as an addition to a Dark Ages discussion or curriculum.