Whale Talk

LS 5623 Book Review
Adventure, Sports & Mystery

Bibliography
Crutcher, Chris. 2001. WHALE TALK. New York : HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 0440229383.

Plot Summary
In WHALE TALK, TJ Jones squares off against his rivals, the jocks of the school. TJ gathers together all the misfits and outcasts of the school to form a swim team. As the swim team tries to earn the coveted varsity letter jacket, they may just learn a little something about themselves along the way. A subplot running through the book deals with prejudice and bigotry and how this affects lives.

Critical Analysis
The greatest strength of WHALE TALK is the author's portrayal of all the characters. The swim team has seven members which could have been unwieldy but, Crutcher handles all of the characters well. The characters are so real that readers invest into each one. The readers have a clear enough picture of each character that when bus trips to the swim meet turn philosophical the readers can be astonished at the soul searching the characters reveal. The readers feel exactly like TJ who says,"I can't even imagine it, can't believe he is telling me." Most of the team's interaction happens on the bus on the way to swim meets. Crutcher uses this setting to give the readers an in depth look at each character. "But the fun is the ride. We study first, then play sports trivia or word games on the trip to the meet, eat pizza and leak out a little bit of our lives on the way back." In addition to strong characterization Crutcher also allows the reader to draw on their "root for the underdog" mentality, by using all the misfits of the school readers can identify with the characters and relate this to a time when the reader felt left out. By the time of the books close we are all rooting for the boys to earn their varsity letter jackets just as much as the boys themselves are. Publisher's Weekly says, "The book's shocking climax will force readers to re-examine their own values and may cause them to alter their perception of individuals pegged as "losers."

Connections
* Have students compare stereotypes of groups (jocks, smart kids, outcasts) to actual people. For example, are jocks really dumb?
* TJ ends the book speaking of little acts of heroism, have students share when someone they know was heroic.