Oct

eBook Review: iFrankenstein by Bekka Black

Verdict: 5 Stars

One of the challenges that young adult readers often face is the need to balance their preferred methods and formats of reading with the requirement—usually as part of school curricula—to read the often dreaded classics, but author Bekka Black has found a way to make even those oldest tomes more up-to-date and easily comprehended.

Continuing with the iMonsters line of print and ebooks that she began with iDrakula (Sourcebooks Fire), Black released iFrankenstein with the same embedded enhancements and updated language that makes the story line come alive for YA fans. Told through text messages, email correspondance, website views, and graphics, the story follows a young Victor through the creation of a virtual reality Victor that gains senscience and becomes evil.

In the spirit of Halloween this week, iFrankenstein may arguably prove to be all the more chilling than Mary Shelley’s rendition due to its updated scenario and premise. While older crossover readers may have trouble following the text message conversations, the longer back-and-forth exchanges provided by emails continue to keep the readers’ attention with very readable style and voice.

iFrankenstein is available now from Amazon.

Mercy Pilkington (1130 Posts)

Mercy Pilkington is a young-adult author and a teacher in a correctional facility. She does not have a single textbook in her classroom. With the top-of-the-line technology at her disposal and the low reading ability of many of her students, there’s no need for standard paper texts. Instead she relies on e-readers, iPads, desktop PCs, Polycom video conferencing equipment for virtual field trips, live streaming for science demonstrations, and text-to-speech read-aloud software to teach English and science. Within the next ten years, public school classrooms across the country are going to look a lot more like Mercy’s classroom because the educational possibilities with these kinds of technologies are limitless. Have a question? Send an email to mercypilkington@yahoo.com