1 . On today’s blog post, I’ll be talking about my favorite magazines. I love reading books & magazines, and I’m learning so many useful tips about healthy living, daily life, etc.
Women’s Health
Women’s Health has a unique content. You can find various interesting information about healthy living or exercises you can do at home. I also love their writers because they explain every topic so simple that you can even understand biological articles.
Healthy Food Guide
I totally recommend it to everyone because it has lots of useful information about being healthy during your daily life. In this magazine, you can find articles about foods you often eat but don’t have much idea what it contains or if they’re healthy. If you are searching for new diets, this magazine gives you all the information.
Time Out
Time Out is a well-known magazine and it’s free in my city. Every time I see a Time Out magazine, I get it because it has lots of useful tips. I got Time Out London when I was in London, and I discovered new restaurants, galleries, museums, and events. This magazine has various information about the city life. For example, it gives you the events that are happening near you. It gives you tips for the railway stations and other transportation choices.
La Cucina Italiana
If you love cooking Italian food, this magazine is for you! It has lots of recipes and also restaurant reviews. You can also find popular restaurants near you in this magazine. I’ve also read articles by famous chefs from my city.
1. What can we find in Healthy Food Guide?| A．Ways to keep fit. | B．Tips on cooking. |
| C．Different eating habits. | D．Information of new restaurants. |
| A．Time Out. | B．Women’s Health. | C．Healthy Food Guide. | D．La Cucina Italiana. |
| A．He lives in London. | B．He loves and enjoys life. |
| C．He often goes travelling. | D．He likes collecting recipes. |
2 . Writers of science fiction often feel more prescient (预知的) than others. Whether the threat to women’s rights in the work of Margaret Atwood, the architectural and social dystopias (反乌托邦) of J. G. Ballard’s novels, or the internet-predicting world of E M. Forster’s The Machine Stops, the genre are filled with prescient writers dealing with ever more familiar issues.
Out of all such writers, few seem more likely to predict our times than the American author Philip K. Dick, who died in 1982. In the 30-year period of work, Dick wrote 44 novels and countless short stories, adaptations of which went on to redefine science fiction on screen.
Dick had a surprising ability to predict what would happen in modern world. The famous science-fiction and fantasy author Stan Nicholls suggests Dick’s work is prescient because it explored the future through the then-present. “His stories supposed the popularity of the Internet, virtual reality, facial recognition software, driverless cars and 3D printing,” Nicholls said—while also pointing out that “it’s a misinterpretation that prediction is the primary purpose of science fiction. The genre’s hit rate is actually not very good in that respect. Like all the best science fiction, his stories weren’t really about the future, they were about the here and now.”
Whether his visions were, as he believed, a product of small problems in the simulation or his fading mental health, one thing is for certain—the world in which the work of Philip K. Dick is well known today feels ever closer to the ones imagined by this most unique and exceptional writer.
1. Why does the author mention three writers in paragraph 1?| A．To explain how great their novels are. |
| B．To explain the women’s rights in the future. |
| C．To show science fictions have the foresight. |
| D．To show the same interest of science fictionists. |
| A．He had the capacity to predict the present age. |
| B．He adapted his four short stories for the screen. |
| C．He often had ideas different from the editor’s. |
| D．He died in the USA in the 21st century. |
| A．They are all about other planets. | B．They all focus on the present |
| C．They should develop various themes. | D．They should make readers feel satisfied. |
| A．Philip K Dick had a great impact on science. |
| B．Philip K. Dick had traveled into the future then. |
| C．People don’t agree to Philip K. Dick’s prediction. |
| D．The world in Philip K. Dick’s works is similar to today’s world. |
3 . If you’ve ever needed an excuse to bury yourself in a really good book, now is the time, 2021 is filled with page-turners, must-reads and novels with beautiful sentences. That’s why we’ve rounded up our favorite stories of the new year. If it’s out now, get your copy; if not, get ready to pre-order.
Outlawed
Price: $26. 00, $18. 18 (30%off)
Welcome to the new feminist (女权主义) world. Anna North’s western novel follows Ada, a 17-year-old who has to run away from her town after she’s unable to get pregnant (怀孕) a year into marriage. It features everything you have ever wanted in a read: strange cowgirls, a group of feminist outlaws and more.
The Push
Price: $26. 00, $16. 16 (38%off)
Nothing like a psychological thriller to kick off a new year that is hopefully not as psychologically disturbing as last year. In Aslhley Audrain’s fiction, a new mother begins to doubt not all is right with her baby.
The Wife Upstairs
Price: $27. 99, $19. 09 (32%off)
This modern adaptation of Jane Eyre trades in Gothic mystery for southern secrecy. In Rachel Hawkins’ latest page turner, expect the romance you love in the original tale with all the modern features.
Aftershocks
Price: $26. 00, $16. 86 (35% off)
This one is actually not a fiction book, but we couldn’t not include—it’s that good. Nadia Owusu’s powerful memoir (回忆录) tells her childhood and perhaps an even more meaningful journey, the one to self-discovery.
1. Which of the following books is the cheapest after the discount?| A．Aftershocks. | B．Outlawed. |
| C．The Push. | D．The Wife Upstairs. |
| A．Nadia Owusu. | B．Rachel Hawkins. |
| C．Anna North. | D．Ashley Audrain. |
| A．It is adapted from Jane Eyre. |
| B．It is a thriller about a mother and her baby. |
| C．It is a western novel about a feminist. |
| D．It tells a writer’s self-discovery journey. |
4 . Tomorrow, When the War Began by John Marsden is a fantastic novel that is about seven teenagers who go on a hike for a week to a remote wilderness called Hell. When the group return home,they discover that their country has been invaded. Their families have been taken prisoner and their town is in a mess. After a series of terrifying adventures, they move back to Hell for safety reasons. While there, the group work out their choices. They decide that they will make their base in Hell but that they will not just hide. They will try to do something for their country and fight against the enemy.
The story is told from the point of view of Ellie, one of the teenagers. She has been chosen by the group as the one who should record what has happened. Ellie’s description of the story shows how seven normal teenagers can change from being innocent high school students to courageous heroes fighting for their country. Desperate and extraordinary events are described one minute and normal teenage worries and emotions the next. For example, Ellie is thinking about happy things at the same time as she is concerned about whether her parents are alive and working out ways to survive.
The main characters are Ellie, Lee, Fi, Corrie, Kevin, Robyn and Homer, and a boy named Chris who they find in hiding later on in their adventures. At the end of the book,great changes occur. The teenage characters have all grown in each other’s eyes and learned a great deal about war, about life and death, and about themselves.
Tomorrow, When the War Began is a realistic story with nervousness, excitement and fear. I found it “spellbinding” — in fact, I can’t wait to read it in one day. I think it’s worth reading for everyone.
1. What happens during the teenagers’ first stay in Hell?| A．Their country is at war. | B．They get separated. |
| C．They find prisoners there. | D．Their nation gives up their land. |
| A．It is highly praised by critics. | B．It is written in the first person. |
| C．It features the struggle of teenagers at school. | D．It encourages people to get on with each other. |
| A．The plot. | B．The setting. | C．The ending. | D．The characters. |
| A．Realistic. | B．Ridiculous. | C．Interesting. | D．Historical. |
5 . This Mother’s Day we asked a handful of children’s book experts and writers which stories and characters come to mind when they think about motherhood.
Runaway Bunny
by Margaret Wise Brown
Since it was first published in 1942, Brown’s Runaway Bunny has never gone out of print. It is pretty much a work of genius! Brown opened the door for parents to feel like they’re reading a story about love and caring about their children while the children are exploring their own individual identity and how close they are or separated they are from the adults in their lives.
Brown Angels: An Album of Pictures and Verse
by Walter Dean Myers
It is a collection of photographs Myers collected over the years. Myers writes, “Seeing their faces scrubbed and beaming and them dressed in their Sunday best makes me think about the hardworking parents and grandparents who have taken time to take care of their children.”
Mommy’s Hometown
by Hope Lim
This story is about a boy and his mother’s trip to her childhood home in Korea. The boy discovers the town is not how he imagined it would be. Mommy’s Hometown starts from the specific lens (镜头) of Korean culture, but has the universal feature of memory and perception.
Happy Dreams, Little Bunny
written and illustrated by Leah Hong
Happy Dreams, Little Bunny is ”a next-generation Runaway Bunny.“ Through a gentle dialogue, it guides us to find peace in our imagination and to grow in autonomy and independence.
1. Which statement of Runaway Bunny is NOT correct?| A．It has been published for 80 years. |
| B．It is appreciated widely. |
| C．It will separate adults and children. |
| D．It can help kids to find their individuality. |
| A．Margaret Wise Brown. | B．Walter Dean Myers. |
| C．Leah Hong. | D．Hope Lim. |
| A．They all have no pictures. |
| B．They are all about Korean culture. |
| C．They all have gentle dialogues. |
| D．They are all suitable for moms and kids. |
6 . Pick Up Something You Can’t Put Down
| How to Help Yourself to Be Who You Want to Be —A Simple Guide for Those Who Are Ready to Take Charge of and Redirect Their Lives. By Pam Grewall This self-improvement book offers a simple handbook to help readers recognize their strengths and weaknesses and to understand how to take control of their own destiny. www. iuniverse. com Publication Date: 10/13/2020 Page Count: 172 Hardback │ Paperback │ E-book │ Audio $23.99 │ $13.99 │ $3.99 │ $9.99 |
| Johnny Catching Fire By Aaron Allen God gave Johnny the strength of Samson. Now he must decide whether lo use his power for good or to get even with those who bullied him. www. xlibris. com Publication Date: 10/29/2020 Page Count:56 Hardback │ Paperback │ E-book $22.99 │ $16.99 │ $3.99 |
| Quotes from the Quiver By Dante P. Galiber, MD, FACC Inspired by time, space and human interaction, this collection offers a series of original and thought-provoking ideas and quotations（引言）designed to uplift and enlighten the readers. www. authorhouse. com Publication Date: 11/17/2019 Page Count: 80 Hardback│Paperback│E-book $43.99 │ $22.99 │ $3.99 |
| Ting Ting, the Girl Who Saved. China By Ryan O’Connor The book provides insight into China’s biggest holiday. It gives a sense of its culture and shows that girls are just as strong and brave as boys are. www. xlibris. com Publication Date: 1/28/2021 Page Count: 48 Hardback│Paperback│E-book $22.99│ $16.99 │ $3.99 |
| A．It has an audio version. | B．It was published in 2020. |
| C．It is designed for children. | D．It is a novel about self-improvement. |
| A．They are both about school life. |
| B．They both have 48 pages in total. |
| C．They are both about Chinese culture. |
| D．They are available on the same website. |
| A．Johnny Catching Fire |
| B．Quotes from the Quiver |
| C．Ting Ting, the Girl Who Saved China |
| D．How to Help Yourself to Be Who You Want to Be |
7 . The Four Best Astronomy Books
This list has been updated 24 times since it was first published in 2015. Our selection includes editions specifically written to attract youngsters, some of which are for more advanced students. Each of them contains breathtaking, full-color images.
●The Backyard Astronomer’s Guide
The Backyard Astronomer’s Guide (about $30) is a great resource suitable for beginners and experts. It offers in-depth guidance on everything from picking the perfect telescope to avoiding light pollution, with tips on how best to explore the deep sky.
Features:
Over 500 bright photographs
Detailed maps of the Milky Way
●Far out: A Space-Time Chronicle
Far out: A Space-Time Chronicle (about $25) takes you on a journey through time using the concept of light speed to introduce the vastness of the universe. It’s a real page-turner, with one impressive photo after another, and will let your imagination run wild.
Features:
Making connections to human history
Written in a poetic style
Informative and thoughtful
●NightWatch: A Practical Guide to Viewing the Universe
This book (about $18) has sold upwards of 600,000 copies of its three previous editions. It comes with a variety of charts showing various events, such as when to expect a solar and lunar eclipse (日蚀和月蚀).
Features:
Great for those using telescopes
Helpful telescope shopping tips
●Astronomy: A Self-Teaching Guide
Perfect for ordinary people or those wanting to get a taste of the subject before devoting themselves to a formal class, this book (about $11) makes it easy for them to learn the main topics and basic rules of a college-level course on their own.
Features:
No math required
Self-tests to check progress
Explaining professional terms
1. What can we say about the book Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle?| A．It is funny and strange. | B．It is exciting and imaginative. |
| C．It is breathtaking and popular. | D．It is instructive and challenging. |
| A．Far Out: A Space-Time Chronicle | B．The Backyard Astronomer’s Guide |
| C．Astronomy: A Self-Teaching Guide | D．NightWatch: A Practical Guide to Viewing the Universe |
| A．They all have colorful pictures. | B．They are all updated regularly. |
| C．They are all aimed at young kids. | D．They all focus on the solar system. |
8 . “The Road Not Taken” appears as a preface to Frost’s Mountain Interval, which was published in 1916 when Europe was engulfed in World War I; the United States would enter the war a year later. Frost wrote this poem at a time when many men doubted they would ever go back to what they had left.
Actually, Robert Frost wrote “The Road Not Taken” as a joke for a friend, the poet Edward Thomas. When they went walking together. Thomas was habitually indecisive about which road they ought to take and when looking back often regretted that they should, in fact, have taken the other one. Soon after writing the poem in 1915. Frost complained to Thomas that he had read the poem to an audience of college students and that it had been “taken pretty seriously... despite doing my best to make it obvious by my manner that I was fooling. ... It is my fault.” However, Frost liked to make jokes, “I’m never more serious than when joking.”
Indeed, shortly after receiving this poem in a letter, Edward Thomas’s Army was sent to Arras, France, where he was killed two months later. When Frost sent the poem to Thomas, Thomas initially failed to realize that the poem was about him. Instead, he believed it was a serious reflection on the need for decisive action.
Frost was disappointed that the joke fell flat and wrote back insisting that the sigh at the end of the poem was “a mock sigh, hypo-critical for the fun of the thing.” The joke made Thomas angry; Thomas was hurt by this characterization of what he saw as a personal weakness — his indecisiveness, which partly sprang from his paralyzing depression. Thomas warned Frost that most readers would not understand the poem’s playfulness and wrote, “I doubt if you can get anybody to see the fun of the thing without showing them and advising them which kind of laugh they are to turn on.” Edward Thomas was right, and the critic David Orr has referred to “The Road Not Taken” as a poem that “at least in its first few decades came close to being reader-proof.”
1. What did the college students think of the poem?| A．It fooled them. | B．It deserved high praise. |
| C．It confused them in a manner. | D．It concerned something serious. |
| A．He felt so hurt by it as to go to Arras. | B．He wrote back to criticize its mock sigh. |
| C．He doubted if anybody could see its fun. | D．He thought it relevant to the situation then. |
| A．Readers were forbidden from reading the poem. |
| B．Readers didn’t know who to laugh at in the poem. |
| C．Readers might fail to appreciate the teasing in the poem. |
| D．Readers couldn’t appreciate the beauty described in the poem. |
| A．A Poem Over-interpreted | B．Friendship revealed by a Poem |
| C．Fun of Rereading a Classic Poem | D．The Secret to Understanding a Poem |
9 . How might you drag a good writer’s work down to a bad one? Try the spell-check button. A study at the University of Pittsburgh indicates spell-check software may shorten the gap between people with different levels of language skills, hampering (妨碍) the work of writers and editors who place too much trust in the software.
In the study, 33 undergraduate students were asked to correct a one-page business letter, half of them using Microsoft Word with red and green lines underlining potential errors. The other half did it the old-fashioned way, using only their heads. Without grammar or spelling software, students with higher SAT verbal scores made, on average, five errors, compared with 12.3 errors for students with lower scores. Using the software, students with higher verbal scores reading the same page made, on average, 16 errors, compared with 17 errors for students with lower scores.
Dennis Galletta, a professor of information systems at the Katz Business School, said spell-checking software is so sophisticated that some have come to trust it too thoroughly. “It’s not a software problem, it’s a person behavior problem,” he said. Microsoft technical specialist Tim Pash said grammar and spelling technology is meant to help writers and editors, not to solve all their problems. The study found the software helped students find and correct errors in the letter, but in some cases they also changed phrases or sentences underlined by the software as grammatically suspicious, even though they were correct.
1. On whom might spell-check software have a bad influence?| A．Authors who have age gaps. | B．People with lower language levels. |
| C．Writers having too much faith in it. | D．Editors seldom taking advantage of it. |
| A．Using spell-check software helps reduce the mistakes. |
| B．Spell-check software causes students to make more mistakes. |
| C．There is no obvious difference after using spell-check software. |
| D．Spell-check software has advantages over the old-fashioned way. |
| A．Advanced. | B．Complicated. | C．Difficult. | D．Cheap. |
| A．Spell-check restricts writers’ creativity. |
| B．Spell-check software can make writing worse. |
| C．The advantages and disadvantages of softwares. |
| D．The reasons for people’s abandoning spell-check software. |
10 . Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler
Saint Maybe is an example of how one small mistake can result in tragedy (悲剧) for a family with lives changed forever. The true strength of the novel lies in the author’s ability to write with sincerity and understanding. I’ve read this book many times over and always find it inspirational when it comes to writing my own novels about the complexities of family life.
— Eric James
Silly Verse For Kids by Spike Milligan
This book is so tiny and thin, but I loved all these funny poems inside-and it made me want to write rhymes. After reading this, I started writing my own poetry. I like including silly poems and lyrics in my books, which is definitely down to the influence of this book. It’s a book that you would read as a kid and it would really stimulate your imagination.
— Liz Pichon
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
A book read at my father’s knee and one that inspired my imagination and shaped my writing life. My desire to fall down a rabbit hole that might take me to Wonderland surpassed (胜过) my other childhood wishes. Wonderland with its Cheshire Cat and never-ending tea parties, which were reflected in a life-long love of cats and cakes, suited me best.
— Menna van Praag
Bambi by Felix Salten
My mum read this to me before I could read, and later I read it to myself again and again. In the Suffolk countryside where I grew up, I would often spot deer in the fields. This book made me stop and study the animal tracks on the ground and made me think about the world around me in a different way, setting me on the path to being a writer.
— Polly Crosby
1. What is the advantage of Saint Maybe?| A．The content of the book. | B．The example in this novel. |
| C．The complexities of life. | D．The author’s writing abilities. |
| A．Saint Maybe | B．Silly Verse For Kids | C．Alice in Wonderland | D．Bambi |
| A．They influence the four readers greatly. | B．They are mainly recommended for kids. |
| C．They can stimulate readers’ imagination. | D．They allow readers to see the world differently. |
