Book of a Thousand Days
"Book of a Thousand Days," by Shannon Hale, is a great tale about a young mucker named Dashti. Dashti finds work as a lady's maid, and on her first day on the job she finds herself locked in a brick tower where the only connection with the outside world is a small metal flap in the wall to dump their waste. They were locked in the tower because of Lady Saren's refusal to marry Lord Khasar, a man she thinks is a monster. After 3 long years of being locked in the tower Dashti finds an escape, they leave the tower and travel to Song For Evela, the realm ruled by Kahn Tegus who is also the man Lady Saren is secretly betrothed to. They decide not to tell him that Lady Saren is there and pretend to be mucker clan sisters and begin working in the kitchen scrubbing pots in Khan Tegus' house. Lady Saren forces Dashti to say she is her, and also tells Dashti the reason she fears Lord Khasar so greatly, which is because he turns into a wolf at night and sneaks into realms and kills the people living there and destroys the realm. Dashti defeats Lord Khasar, but soon faces death when Lady Vachir, Khan Tegus' betrothed before Dashti said she was Lady Saren, wants Dashti's blood for destroying her betrothal to Tegus. Khan Tegus convinces the honored chiefs to let Dashti keep her life even though she faked nobility. Since Lady Saren was betrothed to Tegus first she has the right to betroth him she keeps her right to betroth Tegus, but exacts it for Dashti and they get married. That is what "Book of a Thousand Days" is about.
One theme I saw in the book was strength. I think strength is one of the themes in the book because Dashti showed a lot of it throughout the book. She had to have a lot of strength to do everything she did. She showed strength when she defeated Lord Khasar. I have strength, but have not needed to use it in situations like Dashti did. That is why I think one of the themes in the book is strength.
Another theme I saw in the book was love. I think love is one of the themes in the book because Dashti's love for Saren and Tegus outlasted all the challenges it faced. Dashti faced death several times yet she still stood by her Lady's side. Dashti loved Saren like a sister and how I love my family. Dashti was very loyal to Saren and she loved her. That is why I think one of the themes in the book is love.
I enjoyed "Book of a Thousand Days." It was a fairly short book and although it had a bad start, I thought it had a really good ending. I think the book was pretty boring at first, but was really interesting later. I would recommend this book to kids that wouldn't mind reading a book that gets off to a slow start. Overall, I thought that "Book of a Thousand Days" was a good book.
I got this photo from:http://www.yabooklove.com/2011/04/book-of-thousand-days.html
