Nancy Keane's Booktalks -- Quick and Simple
 

Main Page
Author List
Title List
New This Month
Interest Level
Subject List
FAQ's
Contributors
Booktalking Tips
Book Review Sources
Reading lists
Awards
Nancy Keane's Children's Website
nancy@nancykeane.com
 
 
Babbitt, Natalie
TUCK EVERLASTING
New York : Farrar, 1986.
IL 5-8 RL 5.9 .
ISBN 0374480095 

(2 booktalks)

Booktalk #1

Mae Tuck, Miles, Jesse and Tuck (father) have drunk from a spring that keeps them from dying. Winnie Foster finds them at the spring. They keep her overnight to make sure she knows it's better if the spring is kept secret. She's a bit of a wishful rebel. Great nature setting with sunlight, sound connections (music box, boat into water). Winnie acts on her own, separate from parents.

Booktalk #2

Winnie lives with her family outside the town of Treegap.  The Fosters are not the kind of people who welcome you to their home.  That is probably why no one ever trespasses on the woods on their land.  Winnie rarely goes into the woods but on this beautiful day, she does.  And what does she find?  A teenage boy drinking from a spring that flows deep in the woods.  Winnie questions the young man about why he is on her land.  The young man tries to explain what is happening but then Winnie finds herself the victim of a kidnapping!  Can what this strange family tell her possibly be true?  They tell her they will live forever.  You see, the water from the spring has magical qualities and once you drink it, you never grow older again.  And, you can never die.  What seems to be a good thing can actually be a curse.  The Tucks try to convince Winnie not to tell anyone about their secret.  But isn't this a miracle that should be shared? If it's true that they have found the fountain of youth?  Would you take a sip if it were offered to you? 
 

SUBJECTS: Fantasy

© 

Permission is granted for the noncommercial duplication and use of this resource, provided it is substantially unchanged from its present form and appropriate credit is given.