Book
Club
Discussion Guide
Author Information
I know I began reading when I was four or five, because I
couldn’t stand not being able to. I must have tried writing soon
afterward. Fortunately, very few samples of my early writing
survived the eighteen moves I made before I was eighteen years
old. I say fortunately, because the samples that did manage to
survive are terrible, with the single exception of a rather nice
letter I wrote to my father when I was seven.
A lot has happened to me since I wrote that letter. During World
War II, we lived in Virginia and North Carolina, and when our
family’s return to China was indefinitely postponed, we moved to
various towns in North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia,
before my parents settled in Winchester, Virginia.
By that time, I was ready to begin college. I spent four years at
King College in Bristol, Tennessee, doing what I loved
best-reading English and American literature-and avoiding math
whenever possible.
My dream of becoming a movie star never came true, but I did a
lot of acting all through school, and the first writing for which I
got any applause consisted of plays I wrote for my sixth-grade
friends to act out.
On the way to becoming a missionary, I spent a year teaching in a
rural school in northern Virginia, where almost all my children
were like Jesse Aarons. I’ll never forget that wonderful class. A
teacher I once met at a meeting in Virginia told me that when she
read Bridge to Terabithia to her class, one of the girls told her that
her mother had been in that Lovettsville sixth grade. I am very
happy that those children, now grown up with children of their
own, know about the book. I hope they can tell by reading it how
much they meant to me.
After Lovettsville, I spent two years in graduate school in
Richmond, Virginia, studying Bible and Christian education; then
I went to Japan. My childhood dream was, of course, to be a
missionary to China and eat Chinese food three times a day. But

China was closed to Americans in 1957, and a Japanese friend
urged me to go to Japan instead. I remembered the Japanese as the
enemy. They were the ones who dropped the bombs and then
occupied the towns where I had lived as a child. I was afraid of
the Japanese, and so I hated them. But my friend persuaded me to
put aside those childish feelings and give myself a chance to view
the Japanese in a new way.
If you’ve read my early books, you must know that I came to love
Japan and feel very much at home there. I went to language
school, and lived and worked in that country for four years. I had
every intention of spending the rest of my life among the
Japanese. But when I returned to the States for a year of study in
New York, I met a young Presbyterian pastor who changed the
direction of my life once again. We were married in 1962.
I suppose my life as a writer really began in 1964. The
Presbyterian church asked me to write some curriculum materials
for fifth- and sixth-graders. So I began writing. By the time the
books were published, I had moved three more times, acquired
three children, and was hooked on writing.
But I decided I didn’t want to write nonfiction. I wanted to write
what I love to read – fiction. I didn’t know that wanting to write
fiction and being able to write fiction were two quite separate
Photo and author
things. In the cracks of time between feedings, diapering,
cooking, reading aloud, walking to the park, getting still another
information taken from
baby, and carpooling to nursery school, I wrote and wrote, and
Katherine Paterson’s
published practically nothing.
website:
A friend in the church in Maryland, where we were living, felt
sorry for me. There I was, four babies in just over four years (two
terabithia.com/
adopted and two home-made), trying to write but with no success.
So she decided to take me to an adult education course in creative
writing one night a week. Eventually the novel that I wrote in the
course was published, and I had become a writer.
If you like this Author try . . .
The sign of the chrysanthemum
 Come sing, Jimmy Jo
 Jacob have I loved
 Of nightingales that weep
 The master puppeteer
 Bridge to Terabithia
 The great Gilly Hopkins
 The flint heart
 The day of the pelican
 Bread and roses, too


Blueberries for the Queen
 The same stuff as stars
 The field of the dogs
 Preacher’s boy
 Parzival
 Flip-flop girl
 The king’s equal
 Lyddie
The tale of the mandarin ducks
 Park’s quest
What’s it all about?
Jip was abandoned on a poor farm in Vermont. No
one knows exactly how old Jip is but they think he
was two or three when he was found in 1847. Jip has
grown up believing he was abandoned but in1855 Jip
finds out the truth about his mother and his unknown
past.
W EBSITES
TO CHECK
OUT
Katherine Paterson’s official
website:
terabithia.com/
Reading Rockets interview with
Katherine Paterson:
www.readingrockets.org/books/
interviews/paterson/
Discussion Questions
1) Can you relate to Jip even though
he lived over 100 years ago? Is
Jip a good person? Would you be
friends with Jip if he lived today?
2) Jip thought he was a gypsy all his
life until he found out his mother
was a slave. How do you think
this affected Jip’s idea of who he
is? How does he react to this
change?
3) What roles do Jip’s friends play in
shaping his identity?
4) How does the town and even
some of Jip’s friends treat him
differently once they know his
mother was a slave? Why do you
think this happens?
5) When Jip learns he must runaway
to avoid the slave catchers, why
does he feel he can’t leave Put
behind? When Luke and Teacher
help Jip they are breaking the law.
Do you think it was wrong of
them to break the law? Why or
why not? Do you think they
realized the danger of breaking
this law? What would you have
done?
6) After Jip is free he decides to
return and fight in the Civil War.
Why would he do this? Do you
agree with his reasons? Do you
think you could have done the
same?
7) The book Jip features Quakers
and other abolitionists. Do you
think the book portrayed them
accurately? Why or why not?
8) Music plays a large role in the
lives of Put and Jip. What does
music mean to you? Do you feel
it connects you to other people in
the world?
9) What do you think happens to Jip
after the story ends? Why? Do
you like how the author ended the
book or do you wish she gave you
more information?
10) Did you have trouble
understanding the book?
Excerpt for Lyddie by Katherine
Paterson:
www.amazon.com/Lyddie-Puffin
-Classics-Katherine-Paterson/
dp/0142402540/ref=sr_1_1?
s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=137382
4602&sr=11&keywords=lyddie+by+katherin
e+patterson
NPR interview with Katherine
Paterson:
www.npr.org/2013/03/13/174198
170/write-a-little-every-day-youllhave-a-book
Goodreads’ trivia and quizzes
for Jip:
www.goodreads.com/trivia/
work/865519-jip-his-story
United States of YA Image and
list of books came from Epic
Reads:
www.epicreads.com/blog/theunited-states-of-ya/