book club | Simple. I Just Do.

Saturday was National Free Comic Book Day, which I stumbled upon completely by accident. I went on the website to see if any store in our area was participating, and was really surprised to see the book store at the beach listed. We decided to head over there to visit a friend’s grand opening of his new skate shop, and then I suggested we check out the book store. Sure enough, they were making it a big deal, and The Boy immediately found 5 free comics he was interested in, like Spongebob, Teen Titans Go, and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comic, as well. Then we went to look at the real comics, and found a Sonic comic he didn’t have.

While we were there, I thought we’d look for a book to read together this summer. I had some ideas, and even looked for “Wonder” which Nancy recommended on my facebook page when I wrote about our backup summer plans in lieu of no summer camp. They didn’t have “Wonder” yet, but put it on their list to order, and instead, I went looking for “The Giver” by Lois Lowry, which is one of my all-time favorite books, and perfect for The Boy’s age group.

As we talked about it, The Boy was more than agreeable to reading a book with me this summer, and almost sounded excited about it, which in turn makes me excited. 😀

If there is anyone else that would like to read “The Giver” with us this summer, we’ll be doing some book club type stuff on the Simple. I Just Do. facebook page so we can all participate. I’ll even put the questions in the comments so we don’t have any spoilers if you aren’t quite at the same pace as we are. Even if you don’t have an upper el or middle school kid to read it with, I highly recommend the book for adults, as well. We’ll start about the second week of June. That gives you about a month to get your copy 😉

What do you think? Are you in?

I watched a Daily Show clip this week, and almost immediately ordered the book being discussed. In fact, I paused the clip about 15 seconds in to do so. I’ve mentioned before that I’m not a big reader about autism. I live it, so I don’t necessarily need to read about someone else’s trials and tribulations. That may seem glib, but there’s a limit, you know?

Anyway, something in this interview, and perhaps it was that I respect Jon Stewart so much for what he has done for raising funds for autism, or the fact that the author being interviewed (David Mitchell, who didn’t write the book, but made it happen) also has a son with autism, but whatever it was, this book seemed compelling.

I think all of us with children on the spectrum would give our own various body parts just to know what our children are thinking, what is going on in that brain of theirs…

And this book was written by a 13 year old Japanese boy with autism, Naoki Higashida, about autism, and about what it is like to be on the spectrum.

I’ve ordered my copy, and will post some book-clubby type posts on my facebook page coming up if you are interested. They’ll start Wednesday, October 7th – does that give you enough time to get a copy and start reading? I hope so. I can’t wait to start reading!