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King, A. S.
ASK THE PASSENGERS
Boston : Little, Brown, 2012
IL YA
ISBN 0316194689


(2 booktalks)
Click on the book to read Amazon reviews
 Booktalk #1

Astrid Jones copes with her small town's gossip and narrow-mindedness by staring at the sky and imagining that she's sending love to the passengers in the airplanes flying high over her backyard. Maybe they'll know what to do with it. Maybe it'll make them happy. Maybe they'll  need it. Her mother doesn't want it, her father's always stoned, her perfect sister's too busy trying to fit in, and the people in her small town would never allow her to love the person she really wants to: a girl named Dee.There's no one Astrid feels she can talk to about this deep secret or the profound questions that she's trying to answer. But little does she know just how much sending her love--and asking the right questions--will affect the passengers' lives, and her own, for the better. (Booktalk by New Hampshire Flume committee)

Booktalk #2

Lately, Astrid's parents have been asking her questions she really doesn’t want to answer. And really, how is she supposed to answer them when she doesn’t know? Sometimes she likes to lay on the picnic table in the backyard and watch the jet planes fly overhead. 

She asks the passengers questions: Am I really gay? Just because she's kissing a girl doesn't mean she's really gay. Maybe it's a passing phase. Maybe she's not strong enough to be gay. Her mom would kill her if she was gay. But the passengers, they don't answer. And she doesn’t want to just put a label on herself because some people want to put her in a box. 

For a thoughtful story about a Questioning Teen, read Ask the Passengers.  (Stephanie Zero, Teen Services Librarian, King County Library System, Washington Evergreen Book Award, 2015)

SUBJECTS:      Love -- Fiction.
                        Lesbians -- Fiction.
                        Family problems -- Fiction.
                        Prejudices -- Fiction.
                        Gossip -- Fiction.
                        High schools -- Fiction.
                        Schools -- Fiction.
                        Love stories.

 
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