Summer Reading Questions

For my summer reading assignment, I read the book Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher. It was about a boy named T.J. who was discriminated by kids at his high school so he started a swim team for kids who did not fit in, like him.



Andrew B.




Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher Social Issues: Adopted children, prejudice

The Book

1. T.J is the main character in the book. He is athletic because he is a gifted swimmer, emotional because he gets worked up about everything, and strong because he must overcome numerous racial comments.

2. In the beginning of the book, T.J. realizes that he wants to make a swim team at his school since he was a great swimmer in the past and starts recruiting kids to be on the team. In the middle of the book, the swim team has decided that they will get letter jackets if they all improve their race times every week and they start practicing and performing in various swim meets across the area. In the end of the book, a guy named Rich Marshall starts to cause trouble and T.J.’s family is trying to get him put in jail, but on the other hand, everyone on the swim teams earns a jacket to prove that not only jocks can wear the jackets.

3. I think the author is trying to say that everyone deserves to live on Earth, even if they are different or do bad things, and we should live our lives to the fullest while avoiding obstacles in our way.

The Issues

1. These issues affected TJ because people were discriminating him and saying racial comments so therefore, he got in a lot of fights at school and wanted to seriously hurt the people that bothered him. Also, the racial issue made TJ start a swim team and get players who would respect him ant treat him fairly to get away from the bad people. The adopted issue helps TJ because he can live a better life with his new adopted parents rather than his biological parents, who did drugs.

2. One event in the book that contained a social issue was when Rich Marshall shot TJ’s dad at Hoopfest in Spokane Washington. Rich Marshall was trying to get revenge on TJ just for being a different skin color and he fatally shot his dad after a tough loss to his team in a game of basketball. TJ was devastated by this and did not care what would happen to Rich Marshall but instead he cared about his dad. Another instance in the book that contained a social issue was when the Athletic Council did not allow the swim team to get letter jackets. The Athletic Council said if the swim team can meet all of its goals at the end of the season, they could get letter jackets. They completed all of the goals, but the Athletic Council did not allow it just because the kids were different from the rest. Prejudice was in effect in this event, and the author made it very clear that just because you do not look or act like the rest, it does not mean you should not live with the others.

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