Penned up in Paradise

Penned up in Paradise

by Stasia Cramer

Jacky is kidnapped and finds herself in a world that she could previously only have dreamed of. Her kidnapper considers her his own daughter and offers her a luxurious life at his stud farm, with expensive clothes, rich friends and a magnificent Arabian stallion. Can Jacky really go along with this...?

Book Report Scholieren.com

Student Name: Moi

Summary

Jacky is kidnapped and finds herself in a paradise. A rich life is offered to her, she has everything she could possibly want. In the beginning, she’s a bit cautious in questioning her kidnapper, ‘pop’, who she thinks is an insane psychopath. But later in the book she sees him as a real father and has completely forgotten her real parents.

She gets tons of presents: clothes and jewelry, a gorgeous new room, but also a puppy and the Arabian stallion Ma-Shar. Eventually, Jacky also goes to school just like anyone and gets lots of rich friends.

One day, Jacky gets to ride in a show with Arabian horses. After the show, she goes to buy ice cream and she is seen by a journalist who recognizes her as the kidnapped girl Jacky.

He confronts her. Jacky says that he must be mistaken and has her confused with someone else. She also says that her name is Jaqueline. That is what ‘pop’ calls her, after all. She doesn’t want to leave ’pop’ and Ma-Shar, who she really has come to love. The journalist doesn’t believe she’s telling the truth and calls the police…

A while later, Jacky is sitting in the police station. She hears her mother calling: “Jacky! Where is she? Jacky!“ The door opens and her mother comes in. Jacky bursts into tears, but not because she’s happy. She suddenly realizes that she’ll never see Ma-Shar and ‘pop’ again.

Opinion

I thought Penned up in Paradise was one of the best books I’ve ever read because you can’t predict the end, since it ends really differently than you expect. The book is also very realistically written. The book ends sadly, and that’s also different than most books. You really feel bad for Jacky, at the end I was crying too. If I had to give it a score, I would give it a big fat 9.

About the author:

Profile of Stasia Cramer

Born: 13 April, 1954 in The Hague (Netherlands).

Eye color: Blue.

Hair color: Less and less blond, but thankfully not yet gray.

Height: 16.5 hands (1.68 meters), about as tall as my mare, Tonise Louise.

Weight: I always lie about that, and I don’t like lying. I can reveal that I’m lighter than my mare, Tonise Louise. She does eat far too much hay.

Hometown: Elim, a little village near Hoogeveen, in the province of Drenthe, the Netherlands.

Housemates: Martin, my husband; he’s a video journalist for the newspaper Dagblad van het Noorden. We also have three dogs. First Mosje, our terrier cross. He’s a real comedian. When I eat a cookie, he starts to shake. “I’m so sad,” he says, “and I won’t be happy again until I get half of your cookie.” He doesn’t like dog food. Of course, I don’t either, so we don’t have to share that. Then there’s Senna, the only real Parson (long-legged) Jack Russell in our house. We got Senna from the family next door after our neighbor died. Mosje had once secretly visited Senna in their shed, and of course that creates obligations. In the end, their activities produced lots of puppies, since - after that first litter of six with the neighbors - they’ve also had a litter of nine and another litter of six with us. Twenty-one offspring isn’t bad for a Dutch dog, and it’s certainly more than enough. We got Mosje ‘fixed’, although he probably didn’t see it as an improvement himself. We kept one of Senna and Mosje’s offspring: Bibi. Bibi was the runt of the litter and, after I saved her life several times (all the teats were always taken by the fatter puppies) I just couldn’t say goodbye to my favorite puppy. Logical, although maybe not so sensible, since Senna and Bibi are always fighting for our attention.

Favorite food: French fries with mayonnaise, but not with brussels sprouts.

Favorite color: Azure blue with a white cloud.

Favorite music: Golden Oldies from the sixties, and also anything that’s got a bit of melody in it.

Favorite children’s book as a kid: The ‘Black’ series, ’The Black Stallion’ by Walter Farley, and all sad stories about animals.

Favorite animals: Horses and dogs.

Dream ambition: One of my books translated into Chinese. That would be fantastic. I couldn’t even check if it was really my book; they could just show me anything and I’d believe them.

Hate: Cleaning up and getting up early.

Profession: As a kid, I wanted to be a veterinarian, but I wasn’t very good at Biology. And anyway, I can’t handle seeing blood. So, yeah, what can you do? Teach, of course! I was a social science teacher for thirteen years. Now I’m a part-time writer of children’s and young adult books and a part-time horseback riding instructor and pony camp organizer. I also give readings of my books at schools and libraries. Those are interactive readings. The children participate in a horse rap and get to act out a story about a little girl who’s bullied while I read it to them.

Work schedule: In the winter, I write books; in the spring I do odd jobs and painting around the house and the stalls; in the summer I do the pony camps and in the autumn I wait for spring again.

About writing: I like to set my stories in the world of horses because I rode at stables throughout my childhood. Aside from my own experience with horses and horse riding, my writing is also inspired by the growing reputation of the Netherlands on the equestrian world stage, for example the succesful dressage amazon Anky van Grunsven (3 x individual gold at the Olympic Games) and - the breaker of all dressage records in 2009 - Edward Gal on the wonder stallion Totilas.

I think emotions are very important in a book. These emotions can be very heavy. As a child I loved stories about animals above all: dogs who were separated from their master - and in the most bizarre circumstances - traveled hundreds of kilometers to find them again. I thought those books were wonderful!