The Book Club

During these past few months, I have been apart of a book club activity with a small group of people. We discussed in Today's Meet and on a forum about the book Jump Cut by Ted Staunton. It features a young boy named Spencer, who, along with his brothers, receives a quest from his deceased grandfather's will. The will asks Spencer to film himself receiving a kiss from a movie star who once acted in films which have long since been labelled 'old,' but it turns out things are not all that they seem. The overall theme focuses heavily on that life can exciting, and dangerous, just like a film. In our discussions, we spoke a lot about what was fitting and necessary or unnecessary to the story and theme. My favorite discussion was of the characters. We spoke about how Spencer and AmberLea seem very plain and unusual in a book full of crazy characters. Other characters, like Gloria Lorraine, seem straight out of an old movie that features original guns and gangsters. They are characters that are exaggerated and would say things like 'sweet cheeks' as they put on their fedora and vanish into the night, or characters that smoke long cigarettes just for the pose and vision, which Gloria Lorraine actually does in the book. All the characters in the book to do with adventure and danger are kooky characters, while the protagonist, and those who are generally staying out of danger, for instance Spencer's brothers, are generally normal.