Quest

Book Club ideas

VENUE: A picnic trip to the shore or a nearby lake or river would be a great way to begin a discussion of QUEST. But if the weather is bad or you don’t have a body of water nearby, create your own QUEST at home. Have your book clubbers bring in a shoe box, the top showing a map of their lives, the bottom their sea chest. What things have they discovered about others along the way? What have others discovered about them? What things would they store in their sea trunk if they were to leave for several months?

FOOD: If you are truly adventurous, you could serve frog’s legs, as this is what the crew ate when stranded in the ice (Really, it does taste like chicken!) But as this would take a strong stomach for some, check out what crews really ate while onboard ship: salted fish, salted pork and beef, olives, chickpeas, beans, rice, lentils, olive oil, almonds, cheese and salted sardines and cod in addition to fresh fish caught along the way. So what can you do with this? Why not serve a meal of olives, cheeses, almonds, small bites of fish or meat. And eat it all with your hands at a plank of wood! That’s the way they would have eaten! (Maybe that’s what’s meant by all hands on deck – just kidding!) Hardtack biscuits would be good to be served with the meal, as they were a staple of ship’s kitchens. Because they were so tough, they were dipped in beer or rum but root beer would work just as well! Hardtack biscuits can actually be ordered from the following website:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/1213040043/crunchtime-hardtack-organic-survival?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=hardtack&ref=sr_gallery-1-1&frs=1

Or you can try making your own with the following recipe:

Hardtack Recipe

6 parts flour
1 part water

Knead dough until thoroughly mixed. Roll out on a floured surface until about 1/8 inch thick (or thereabouts). Cut into squares–there is an actual size piece of hardtack pictured in Hard Tack & Coffee by Billings – seems to be about 2 3/4 by 3 1/2 inches.

Pierce the hard tack 13 times with the tip of a knife, making sure the holes go all the way through the dough.

Bake at 325ºF for at least an hour, turning over the hard tack once. Check to see that it is cooked through completely. Take out & let cool overnight to get that real hard & dry feeling. Some people bake at 300 for a couple of hours, just to get it real dry. The finished hard tack will still look pale.

ONLINE RESOURCE: http://www.solarnavigator.net/history/great_explorers.htm

SPECIAL GUESTS: There are people who sail in every town across the United States. Why not invite someone who loves sailing to your book club. Have them discuss how they navigate today and compare the new techniques used to what was available to Henry and his crew in 1610. Or is there someone in your community who builds ship replicas? Perhaps they have a model they have completed of an old sailing vessel. Compare it to today’s models and discuss the differences in living conditions aboard modern vessels compared to those of the past.

Discussions

Social Studies

1. What choice would you have made had you been faced with Seth’s dilemma? Would you have risked the possibility of being hanged for treason or would you have gone with the captain and hoped to make it back by shallop?
2. Have you ever betrayed a friend before? Did the friend find out? How did you feel afterwards? Has anyone every betrayed you? How did you feel about it?

History

1. Discuss and compare modern day explorers to the explorers of the past. How were their lives similar? How were they different?
2. In each of Richard’s chapters, I tried to illustrate the life of 1610. Can you find one or two differences between your life and Richard’s and explain how modern advances have made your lives a lot easier to live.
3. Spies have always been a part of the race for economic dominance. In World War II, Matta Hari was an infamous spy. How have spies worked in the past? What techniques have they used? And how has spying become more complicated with the technology of today?

Math

1. On a map, locate the longitude and latitude where Captain Hudson and his crew found themselves trapped.
2. From the point you’ve located and with an average speed of 9 knots, how soon will the Discovery make it to London? If Captain Hudson’s small shallop has an average speed of 4 knots, how much longer will it take him to reach the same destination?

Science

1. Navigators in 1610 used plumb lines to measure for depth and the stars and a compass to guide them. Discuss how this is done now technologically.
2. Knowledge of illnesses in 1610 was limited. Most doctors believed that patients had certain “humors” that sometimes became unbalanced. To remedy this, they often bled their patients by attaching leeches to their skin and letting the animals suck out blood. Scurvy was common among sailors, causing them to lose teeth. Discuss what caused this disease and what prevents it today. Can you think of other illnesses that have been cured since then?
3. Scientifically, what would have happened had the men left the Discovery where it was, floating on the water early in the season rather than pulling it to the top of the ice that had already formed?

Language Arts

1. QUEST is told from four points of view. Discuss how this helps the story unfold. If it was to be told from only one perspective, which character’s viewpoint would you have chosen and why? (This need not be one of the viewpoints I used)
2. Define the following words:
   

   1.  petulantly 2.  supremacy 3.  ostensibly 4.  surmised 5.  indiscretion 6.  brandishing 7.  lapses 8.  admonished 9.  sullenly 10.  adept 11.  usurp 12. coveted

   13.  insinuate 14.  incorrigible 15.  tutelage 16.  demoted 17.  levity 18.  poultice 19.  livery 20.  precarious 21.  odious 22.  scoffed 23.  wily 24.  sequestered

   25.  venomous 26.  composure 27.  quelled 28.  tedious 29.  pompousness 30.  impasse 31.  propriety 32.  introspective 33.  callousness 34.  infernal 35.  whims 36.  pervasive