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
 
Voigt, Cynthia
IZZY, WILLY NILLY
New York : Atheneum, 1986.
IL 5-8 RL 7.2
ISBN 0689312024

(2 booktalks)

Booktalk #1

What is a nice girl like Isobel Lingard, age 15, doing in a place like this -- orthopedics wing of the local hospital waking up from the operation that amputated her leg? Izzy was a sophomore cheerleader who was invited to an after game party by Marco, a popular senior. What she didn't count on was that Marco would be stone drunk when she needed to get home to meet her curfew. She also doesn't count on her being too embarrassed by the situation to allow Tony, another popular senior to take her home when he offers to do just that. After all, what could happen in just two miles? What could happen did. Marco swerves to the other side of the road, hits a telephone pole and passes out for over an hour -- while Izzy is pinned inside -- so long her smashed leg can't be saved. Here's the story of Izzy's reaction and the reaction of her friends to her trauma.

Booktalk #2

Isobel was a normal girl. She was a cheerleader, 15 years old, pretty, and had PLENTY of friends. She even got asked out by a senior! There wasn’t one person who didn’t want to be friends with her.   All this changed when Isobel’s date, Marco, drove her home the night of a party. He had had a few beers, more than he should have, and was acting kind of strange. He was going WAY too fast, and they swerved off the road and into a tree.  “Isobel? I’m afraid we’re going to have to take it off,” the doctor said, with sadness in his voice. They were speaking of her leg. How would her friends treat her now? And boys… that was out of the question to her.   Then, surprise hit her in the face. A girl she knew, Rosamunde, not “popular” at all, and not at all pretty, came to visit her in the hospital. Izzy can’t imagine how life will be without both her legs… but Rosamunde shows her a few positive things about the accident, and that there is still a life for her … To find out more about Isobel and the accident, read Izzy Willy-Nilly, by Cynthia Voigt.  (Vasiliki G., 8th grade student, Rundlett Middle School)

SUBJECTS:     Amputees -- Fiction
                        Physically handicapped -- Fiction

© 

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.