The Dead Boys
By:  Royce Buckingham

Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice Nominee 2013
Grades 6-8

Submitted by Lee Cline – 6th grade Language Arts Teacher, French Settlement, LA
And Tammy DiBartolo – Youth Services Manager, Rapides Parish Library, Alexandria, LA.

Buckingham, Royce.  The Dead Boys. G.P. Putnam’s Sons. 2010.  201 pages.

SUMMARY

When Teddy Matthews moves to the desert of Richland, Washington, his mom urges him to go out into the neighborhood and make some friends.  But the boys he meets all have something a little strange about them.  Eventually Teddy begins to piece together a town mystery.  He begins to realize that all of the boys he has encountered disappeared under mysterious circumstances, and the town believes them dead.  He also begins to realize that the house next door and its creepy sycamore tree have something to do with it, and he may be next.  
	Instead of taking its energy from the desert sun, the sycamore tree soaked up the radiation from the Columbia River, where the Hanford nuclear plant had dumped waste many years ago.  The radiation changed the tree, and it grew hungry for more.  It discovered that the energy from young boys would also quench its thirst.  
So, begins Teddy’s journey to solve the mystery of the boys’ deaths and to save himself from suffering the same gruesome fate.

AWARDS
2011 Cybils Award Finalist; Fall 2011 Junior Library Guild Selection; St. Louis, MO Battle of the Books; Isinglass Teen Book Awards Nominee

AUTHOR’S BIOGRAPHY

Royce Buckingham now lives in Bellingham, Washington with his wife and his two sons.  Buckingham grew up in Richland, Washington near the Hanford nuclear plant. The fact that toxic waste was dumped into the nearby river until 1971 gave Buckingham the idea for a perfect setting for The Dead Boys.  Growing up, Buckingham read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Phantom Tollbooth, and The Hobbit.  Fantasy and Science Fiction were of great interest to him.  He obtained an English degree from Whitman College in Walla Walla, WA, and then attended the University of Oregon to receive a degree in law.  He worked as a prosecuting attorney in juvenile court.  It was his experience as an attorney and his love of fantasy that led him to write his first successful novel, Demonkeeper.

CLASSROOM CONNECTIONS

SCIENCE

Nuclear Power/Energy:  
Royce Buckingham draws his inspiration from the Hanford nuclear power plant.  Do a search for this power plant and the consequences of its toxic waste in the nearby Columbia River. 
Also do research to understand what radioactive waste is, its purposes, and its dangers.  The following websites contain many lesson plans and informational sites for teachers to view when planning lessons.

http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/earth/inside-the-earth/nuclear-waste/
http://encyclopedia.kids.net.au/page/ra/Radioactive_waste
http://tiki.oneworld.net/energy/energy7.html
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/basic-ref/teachers/unit3.html
http://teachertech.rice.edu/Participants/mborrow/Lessons/nuclear_.html
http://www.efmr.org/edu/nuclear2009.pdf
http://www.energyforeducators.org/lessonplanstopic/nuclear.shtml
http://apps.caes.uga.edu/sbof/main/lessonPlan/Calculating%20Halflife%20Twizzlers%20MMs.pdf

Trees/life cycle:
http://www.realtrees4kids.org/sixeight/cycles.htm
http://www.larne.gov.uk/uploads/docs/Investigating%20Trees%20Worksheets%20Mono.pdf
http://www.teachthechildrenwell.com/science.html#tree

Dehydration:
In the book, the tree’s first boy fell victim to dehydration. Talk to your students about the importance of proper hydrations and about signs of dehydration. 
http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_Parents_Coaches/

READING

1.	Write a short composition explaining which genre of fiction The Dead Boys fits into.  Which category would you put it in?  Mystery, Science Fiction, Fantasy?  Choose the genre and use details from the novel to prove it matches the characteristics discussed in class.
2.	Read one of the following books and compare and contrast it to The Dead Boys:  Coraline by Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman,  A Monster Calls:  Inspired by an idea from Siobhan Dowd by Patrick Ness.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Explore the history of Richland, Washington and the Hanford nuclear plant.  How was it utilized during World War II?

http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=5671
http://gk12.rice.edu/trs/science/Atom/man.htm
http://www.hanford.gov/page.cfm/WorldWarIIEra
http://www.psr.org/chapters/washington/hanford/hanford-history.html

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1.	Teddy is moving to a new town with a new school and new friends. If you were Teddy, how would you feel about the move?
2.	What were some of the first clues that tell the reader that Teddy’s new friends, Albert, Walter and Sloot may have been “different?”
3.	When Teddy did a computer search for his new hometown, Richland, what did he find out? 
4.	What was the Manhattan Project and why was it important? What happened to the radioactive waste from the Manhattan Project?
5.	When Walter and Teddy were at Linwood Court, what did Walter mean when he said that “this was his last chance?”
6.	What did Teddy find when he went to the cemetery?
7.	What was the Sycamore tree doing to the boys and why?
8.	What finally happened to the tree?