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| Whale Talk | 
 enlarge | Author: Chris Crutcher
Publisher: Laurel Leaf
Category: Book
List Price: $6.99
Buy New: $0.01
You Save: $6.98 (100%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  (79 reviews)
Sales Rank: 82476
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Reading Level: Young Adult
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 6.8 x 4.2 x 0.7
ISBN: 0440229383
EAN: 9780440229384
ASIN: 0440229383
Publication Date: December 10, 2002
Release Date: December 10, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Definitely worth the time to read March 8, 2007
Whale talk was an incredible book. Not only was it written in a way that kept your attention every second of it, but it covered several important themes. Almost anybody in highschool or even older would enjoy this book because of its relevance to school life. The subject of racism in this book makes the reade think. The main character is one of the only non-white residents of their town, and even their area of the state. His struggles with racism are mainly in an attempt to make life better for another little girl in his town, not to stand up for himself. The main character is all about fairness, and he will do whatever it takes to stand up to people making life worse for someone else. He is responsible for starting a swim team at his school that makes it easy to get a varsity letter. The biggest reason why he did that was so that the brother of a now-deceased school hero can get his coveted varsity letter. Because their school is such a jock school, the team of misfits is not very widely accepted. The team is made of social outcasts and unlikely athletes, but they all end up very close to eachother. This book was inspiring athletically and thought-provoking socially. I'd reccomend it to anyone.
 WHALE TALK IS A VERY , VERY GREAT BOOK February 9, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
WHALE TALK WAS VERY, VERY GOOD. I LIKED IT A LOT. IT HAD A LOT OF SWEAR WORDS IN IT, WHICH MADE ME WHAT TO READ IT MORE. THE PEOPLE IN THIS BOOK SWEAR A LOT LIKE I DO. THIS BOOK IS ABOUT SWIMMING AND SPORTS IF YOU LIKE SPORTS AND LIFE AND LITERATURE, THAN YOU SHOULD READ THIS BOOK. THIS IS THE FIRST TIME A TEAHER I HAD EVER ASSIGNED ME A BOOK WITH THIS AMOUNT OF SWEAR WOODS WHICH WAS ODD. THIS BOOK WAS A LITLLE HARD FOR ME TO READ BY MYSELF. THIS BOOK WAS A 220 PAGE BOOK, I LIKE LONG BOOKS WITH THAT MANY PAGES. YOU SHOULD ALSO TRY TO READ THESE OTHER CHRIS CRUTCHER BOOKS LIKE IRONMAN, STOTAN,AND CHINESE HANDCUFFS. CHRIS CRUTCHER SOUNDS LIKE A VERY GOOD AUTHOR.
ERIC, 16 YEARS OLD MISS WATER IS MY TEAHER
(Written by a student of mine to fulfill a class project. JW)
A whale of a good book! January 18, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is perhaps the best book Crutcher has penned. It is a good technical novel with plenty of literary merit, but more importantly it will put your brain on spin cycle if you ever thought you had your mind made up about just about any social issue. It will literally turn your soul and make you think about the power of what comes out of your mouth as you brush up against the human condition each day. You might think they are mere words, but Crutcher shows us that what flows out of our mouth has the power to curse, or to bless--no matter what you believe about God. If you have any reluctant readers in your world hand them a copy of this book. I have used it in the classroom for my more rebellious students, and I have yet to have a kid hand it back to me without finishing it and then asking for another Crutcher book.
Popularity, courage, honesty, struggle - it covers it all. December 11, 2006
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I loved this book - couldn't put it down. I'm always on the hunt for good reads for my high school aged children, one loves to read, the other hates to read. This book kept them both interested. It has messages about inequalities, popularity, courage, honesty, struggle, human frailty. Crutcher addresses all these issues in a well-crafted story with unexpected twists and turns. I'd recommend this book for older high school kids of either sex.
It takes a book this good for people to want to censor it. August 24, 2006
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
Chris Crutcher, Whale Talk (Dell, 2001)
It's always the best books that poke their heads up over the radar, only to have them lopped off by people who just don't get it. Whale Talk is listed by the American Library Association-- the folks who put out those neat lists of books that inbred know-nothings feel the need to attack in school libraries (aka the lists of "this is what I'll read next" for thousands upon thousands of American high-school kids)-- as one of the ten most challenged books of 2005. This makes perfect sense, because Whale Talk is probably the best young adult novel I've read since I first discovered Philip Pullman's wonderful (and similarly challenged) trilogy His Dark Materials.
T. J. Jones is a mixed-race high-school student in the Pacific Northwest, and he's also got something of an attitude problem. He's athletic, but ignores organized sports at his competition-rabid school until he sees the younger brother of a now-dead local hero getting pushed around for wearing his brother's letter jacket. Jones decides to retaliate by starting a swim team-- at a school that doesn't even have its own pool. He recruits a number of misfits (including Chris, the pushed-around, mentally challenged kid), lines up a coach, and sets out to, if not humiliate the sports freaks around him, at least show them that the outcasts can perform, too. What he doesn't expect is that the long bus rides to swim meets around the region will create a sense of camaraderie among them.
The most important thing that makes this book so good is the characterization. Crutcher has filled his book with well-drawn, memorable, interesting characters who will keep the reader entertained for its duration. Dropping them into an amusing David-and-Goliath plot helps, but the real kick with the plotline is the way Crutcher drags in portentous events and makes them unpredictable; we expect some sort of great revelation, for example, when Crutcher dumps his busful of kids off the road in the snow, but instead gives us the far more practical outcome of a tow truck. It's little pieces of realism like this that keep the ball rolling along as well as it does.
Yes, there is bad language. And yes, there is racism. It's not surprising when you're dealing with the only mixed-race student in an entire high school (especially one who refuses to play football or basketball). But then, that's one of the novel's big points-- that the racism T. J. encounters is not just the overt uses of the N-word, but the pervasive attitude that surrounds him. It's exceptionally well-done, which may be the root of the reason why the moronic contingent seems so scared of this novel. After all, the better you get your point across, the more that point is likely to scare those who fear your point. And in this case, Chris Crutcher has done a truly exceptional job. This one's likely to end up on my ten best reads of the year list. ****
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