Welcome to our Young at Heart book club! This go round we’ve selected three books that reminded us of childhood in order to hopefully have a bit of lighthearted nostalgia. Each of our three books – Judy Blume’s Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and Claribel Ortega’s Ghost Squad – have their own Discussion Posts and don’t forget, we’ll be having our first ever Zoom* Book Club on Saturday May 22 at 7 pm EDT.
(*Sign up for the CBR newsletter, Cannon Fodder, to get Zoom connection info. If you have any issues receiving the Zoom details, please contact us.)
For those of you returning or who might be joining in for #CannonBookClub for the first time (hello new friends!) all are welcome, you don’t have to be registered for CBR13. The topics are numbered, and we ask that you refer to them below by that number to help people find the conversations they are looking for. If you are responding to someone else’s thoughts, please try to reply directly to them.
We will also be talking on our Social Media platforms, and of course in our Facebook group, Cannonball Read Book Chat, we’ll have some additional prompts so please join us there as well. Now, on to the questions!
- Our theme is Young at Heart, did your expectations for the theme match the reading experience of Ghost Squad?
- Why should adults read books written for kids?
- Ghost Squad is peppered with ghosts and other supernatural elements, what meaning do they add?
- Claribel Ortega weaves her Dominican culture into the story. Which components stood out to you?
- There is a dichotomy between Lucely’s experience of being surrounded by family while her father bears his burdens alone. How do you feel about Lucely’s entire extended family being ghosts?
- What distinguishes Ghost Squad from favorite books of your own childhood? Or do you think the way this story approached its themes and characters is similar to your childhood novels?
- Is there anything that makes this a distinctly 21st century novel?
- I have thoughts and feelings that don’t fall within the above topics, grab your jacket and bike and meet me in the comments.