Whale Talk Review

Manufacturer: Listening Library
Author(s): Chris Crutcher

ISBN: 0807207098 EAN: 9780807207093
Binding: Audio Cassette
Reading Level: Young Adult

Average Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

There's bad news and good news about the Cutter High School swim team. The bad news is that they don't have a pool. The good news is that only one of them can swim anyway.

A group of misfits brought together by T. J. Jones (the J is redundant) to find their places in a school that has no place for them, the Cutter All Night Mermen struggle to carve out their own turf. T. J. is convinced that a varsity letter jacket--unattainable for most, exclusive, revered, the symbol (as far as T. J. is concerned) of all that is screwed up at Cutter High--will be an effective carving tool. He's right. He's also wrong.

Still, it's always the quest that counts. And the bus on which the Mermen travel to swim meets--piloted by Icko, the permanent resident of All, Night Fitness--soon becomes the cocoon inside which they gradually allow themselves to talk, to fit, to bloom.

Chris Crutcher is in top form with a cast of characters--adults, children, and teenagers--fighting for dignity in a world where tragedy and comedy dance side by side, where a moment's inattention can bring lifelong heartache, and where true acceptance is the only prescription for what ails us.

User Submitted Whale Talk Reviews

October 6, 2008
Balance and reason wins out against racism and abuse
T J, whose full name is The Toa Jones (there's a joke there if you pronounce it correctly), relates the story of his eighteenth year, the year he graduates. He has been asked by his English teacher to form a college swimming team, but there is no pool, and it seems T J is the only swimmer.

T J gives a frank account of events of that year, not omitting his own short-comings. Raised by adoptive parents, he being the biological son of a European mother and Japanese/black American father, in a predominantly white small town outside Wahington, he struggles to keep his temper in check in the face of the many injustices resulting from the racism and bigotry of small-minded jocks.

Accepting the challenge of forming a swim team he assembles a curios bunch of misfits and the downtrodden and champions their cause as he strives to attain a coveted varsity Letter-Jacket, normally the preserve of high achievers in the accepted sports, for each member of his team.

It is a heart-warming tale as the team unite in their cause despite the fact they seemed doomed to failure from the start. At the same time likeable T J has his own problems to deal with, but here his stable family upbringing helps him to maintain balance despite himself.

At times funny, at times moving, with a tense and gripping finale, it makes for an involving story. It does get a little preachy at times, but it is a good cause, showing up racisms and family abuse for what it is; written by someone who clearly has some experience in such matters.

March 19, 2008
Not just for kids!
A good story with a universal theme in touch with numerous current social issues - Whale Talk is worth listening to!

January 1, 2008
Good story
I was quite impressed by this book. I really enjoyed it. I don't understand why it's one of those books that is "challenged" by people. Here's an idea: read the books your kids are reading and discuss with them if you feel there's something questionable.

July 13, 2007
Hilarious, moving & instructive
This book might win a Newberry Award if it were for younger kids and didn't use naughty language. That's the sort of thing I'd compare it to.
I've never written a review before, but this book, which I listened to in my car with my 12-year-old daughter, was wonderful. We both laughed out loud a number of times; it's extremely witty (and the audio narrator does an excellent job). It's heart-breaking at times (child abuse, loss). And it's very instructive for young people trying to make sense of the world, especially complex issues involving race, psychology, child abuse, and such.
It's arguably a bit much for a 12-year-old -- lots of questionable language (authentic, but "naughty"), and a few references to people having sex (nothing graphic, though). I'd prefer it for years 15 and up, but my daughter seemed to get a lot out of it, and the parts that worried me ... well, I hope they sort of went over her head. But I was delighted to have her hear about life from the perspective of a multi-racial kid, especially one who accepts himself but still has to put up with grief from morons in his high school.

June 13, 2007
Talking Whale?
Whale Talk

Do you have a big heart full of the kind of love that you would give a friend or even a complete stranger? That's how the Tao (pronounced The Dow) is in the book Whale Talk by Christopher Crutcher. The book takes place in Spokane, Washington. T.J Jones (The Tao) and his teacher, Mr. Simet, get together a swim team for Cutter High School. Mr. Simet has one reason for the swim team, and T.J. has another for the team, but it's the complete opposite of Mr. Simet. T.J. wants to help Chris Coughlin out of his bulling problem (Chris is handicapped). T.J. ends up going to the State championship and winning two events. But after the Championship, a tragedy strikes, one that will haunt T.J. until the day he dies.

My favorite part of the book is when Chris Coughlin gives T.J. some love back. Through out this book, T.J. shows Chris the love a friend would give a friend. This makes it special because T.J. loved Chris as a friend, that Chris gave him love, in the form of something, in return, even when it wasn't expected.

The theme of the book is love. This book shows that if the world doesn't have love, it has hate and if you don't have love, you have hate. With out love in the world, there would be no peace. It also shows us that even if you are a different color you still have the right to be loved.

This book was one of the best books I've read. I would recommend it to anyone who has a big heart with enough love for everyone in the world. I liked this book so much, because it caused me to stop and think, to check and see if I had enough lover in my heart for everyone in the world, just as the characters had.

March 8, 2007
Definitely worth the time to read
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.

February 9, 2007
WHALE TALK IS A VERY , VERY GREAT BOOK
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)

January 18, 2007
A whale of a good book!
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.

December 11, 2006
Popularity, courage, honesty, struggle - it covers it all.
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.

August 24, 2006
It takes a book this good for people to want to censor it.
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. **** ½

For more Whale Talk reviews click here.