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Do you think Dunn is introducing a underlying problem that America is facing through refugees today through his novel? Since everyone in Nollopton moved to the states because they couldn’t handle the totalitarian government they were in does that mirror how refugees from other countries are coming to America today?

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I believe that Dunn was relating his book back to how America used to be when we were under British rule and had less rights. We re-wrote our rights, just like Ella re-wrote the sentence, to help restore our country.

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@Will I think that it would be hard to have kids not say any of the letters, they can't comprehend and think that in depth before speaking.

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If you guys were in this situation what would you do? Would you consider yourself more like Tassie or Ella?

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@KyleSprinkle
I think that the government took away land from the people as they moved to show their power. Even though there were a diminishing amount of people to worship in the religious buildings, it made a statement that the council would do anything for Nollop. As soon as the letters started falling, Nollop became more important than the citizens and their rights.

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@Audrey I feel like this book could represent foreshadow of major events. Once guns are out of the picture, its gonna cause an uproar of society.

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@Sprinkle I think that the government saw their beliefs as more of a dire need to continue to expand and had no regard toward their population or the needs of the citizens.

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@Will I believe the council refused to ban children 7 and under due to the fact that they can't fully comprehend the rules and consequences. Children 7 and under would be struggling with the rules quite frequently, giving their parents no choice but to flee to the states with their children.

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@Amber
It is hard to know what I would do unless I was really in the situation, but I think I would eventually leave and go to the US. It is ridiculous to not be able to say or write the letters in our alphabet, and once all the letters fell there would not be an effective way to communicate. That being said, it would be difficult to leave my house and the life I had built up in Nollop.

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@Will Berg I feel like it'd be terrible for the council to start banishing 7 year olds and make them leave their family. I'd think that someone would go with them but there would probably be more of a rebellion against the council if they made all ages be responsible for the letter rules.

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I see the letters in this book as our American rights, slowly characters loose letters they can use and it effects the society in major ways, just like our modern day America where our rights, small or big are being taken as the years pass. We don’t have the same free America that we used to. Now days everyone is easily offended and if you don’t follow someone else’s point of view they consider you against them, by letting people do this we are slowly loosing rights like freedom of speech and expression

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Why do you think the government continuously took land away from citizens in order to make more religious buildings, knowing that their population was quickly declining and they didn't need them?

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@Amber If I was on the island, I would leave and go to the States. I think achieving the thirty-two letter sentence was nearly impossible, and the likeliness of it happening was not worth waiting for. I think acting in my own best interest would mean leaving my life on the island and starting a new one in the States.

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@Amber I would probably just try to get out, there was such a toxic and controlling environment in the novel that I would net want to be there. Despite that being my home, I wouldn't to put up with it.

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@Amber I think a lot of citizens today, including myself, would rebel against loosing a letter because we are known as a generation of action.

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@Amber I would rebel for sure. It is and was important in the book for people to give their opinion and rebel, and I think that I would rebel, which may help other people see that they should rebel

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@Amber If I was in the novel, I would probably leave the island because I don’t think it would be worth putting up with the Council.

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@WillBerg
I don't think the council was taking away letters to be mean, but rather because they truly thought that Nollop was doing it for a purpose. The council knew that children under age 7 are just learning to write and read, so it would be unrealistic to ask them to remove certain letters from their vocabulary.

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@Amber if I was a character in the novel I would’ve left the island when I found out they were banishing people for using the fallen letters. Now since I don’t live on the island my perspective might be skewed

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@Amber I would definitely rebel because I would not stand for getting my rights taken away.

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If you were in the shoes of a character from the novel, would you follow the rules of the council or would you rebel? How would you react?

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@Jackson
I believe that the computer generated sentences that were revealed at the end are a way of showing how incredible and miraculous it was that Ella was able to turn in one of only three possible sentences to save their island. Not only did she manage to find a sentence that fit the guidelines, but she also turned it in hours before the deadline.

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Why do you think Nollop allowed children 7 and under to use all the letters? If they wanted control society they would’ve taken away everyone’s freedom.

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@Audrey I think that the connection is that gun control is slowly being more and more implemented with more and more regulations, just like in Ella Minnow Pea, the letter rights were slowly being taken away, making it harder and harder on the people, but guns laws influence people in a different way

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@Audrey The letter removal and illegality was the same as taking away a part of their lives, it completely removed their ability to be citizens and communicate with others. I feel like this isn't comparable to gun laws, which are just removing an aspect of our culture in the hope it will make us safer.

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@Audrey I think there are definitely correlations to the novel and today's current society with gun laws. I think the 2nd Amendment was written during the time of militias and the idea of bearing arms had different meaning back then than it does now. The same idea is portrayed through the sentence on the statue of Nollop in which everyone is trying so hard to grasp onto things of the past, even though they are outdated and need revision.

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@Audrey I think there is a connection with today involving the gun laws.

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@ Jackson Prescott
The computer generated sentences at the end show how close the island was to total collapse and that the only thing that saved the island was just pure chance. What Dunn was trying to say is that many authoritarian regimes would rather go to their grave just to maintain their power versus coming to a compromise to sustain their society.

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How does the theme of this novel connect to the current situation our government is going through with gun laws? The second amendment being a large part of our countries beliefs, much like the sentence on the sign, being slowly taken away from us?

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@Morris Tassie began to threaten the council in hopes that the council would realize they were being ridiculous and discontinue the strain on their communication. Tassie is a rebellious character in the novel and didn't want anymore of her family or friends to get in trouble with the council.

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@Urbani The islanders tried to protest through various methods, such as Tassie threatening the government, and other families leaving the island or being punished on purpose to show that they were defying the government. The main point of suspense in the novel was when the government agreed to bring back all of the letters if a citizen could create a 32 letter sentence using all of the letters in the alphabet, like Nollop did. This motivated many of the Nollop citizens to try to create this sentence, which was the main plot of the novel.

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@emily I feel like they didn't care that they moved To the states because the system was bound to fail at one point and people were smart to leave when they did.

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@Jackson I think thy added the computer generated sentences at the end to show how the government could’ve saved society if they wanted. It was almost like a test for the community to see if they were worthy of surviving.

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She was trying to change the government and everyone around her was getting in trouble for using forsaken letters and words. She most likely didn't want any more people getting punished for such small things as saying or writing a letter

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Why do you think the addition of the computer generated sentences was included at the end, after they had found a sentence?

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Why do you think Tassie sent threats to the council?

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@sam I think if this happened in real life people would go crazy. I think a lot of people would go against the government and disobey the rules.

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I don't know if lead can lead to a painful death. If i was painful, it most likely was not suicide because people want to leave painlessly.

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What strategies do the islanders use to protest, oppose, and finally overthrow the tyranny of the High Council? How do these strategies create suspense in the novel?

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Do you think the system of taking letters was effective? and why did they base everything of nollops statue, do you think nollop originally had these ideas for his island ?

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@willberg that was definitely suicide. she was trying to die

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@WillBerg
I don't know if Georgeanne knew there was lead in the paint, but I think she would have painted herself whether or not she knew. She was going crazy from the loss of her son and husband, friends, neighbors, normal life. After Georgeanne died, Ella mentioned how she wished she had some paint. Things had become so bad that even Ella alluded to her own death wishes.

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Why do you think the government didn’t care that so many people were moving away/ the states?

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Do you think Georgeanne knew that lead was in the paint? Was it a suicide or accident?

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@Will I think she had just ended up losing her mind and didn't care about anything anymore. She didn't care if it killed her, she needed something to do because she was so bored and had lost so much. For this reason it could also be a suicide.

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I agree with Madeline and Lauren I feel like all the letters are important because the more letters you lose the harder it is to communicate normally and everything you say really has to be thought about, but the vowels are for sure most important because they are used so much.

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Why did the people in Nallop always need someone to praise? Whether it was Nallop or Amos for creating the sentences.

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@sam I think people now days people would flip out and riot.

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@Sam
If a situation like this were to happen in the United States today, it would cause an outrage. Our society today is very outspoken and is not afraid to express their thoughts and opinions, so many protests would break out and no one would follow the rules.

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It's interesting that a theme through all the books we've read have shown that the societies don't really have a benefit for the dictators or the people being controlled. Why would anyone want to exist like that?

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@sam I do not think people would follow the rules, with all of the marches and things occurring today, people would rebel.

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@Annie The removal of the letters affected the characters’ everyday social relationships because they had to be careful of everything they said around others.

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@laurenprice
I agree, you can not choose which letter had the most significance, you need all of the letters to communicate because you can not speak normally with just the loss of one letter.

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@Will I think that O would be the hardest to live without, considering it's a vowel and is used more than any other word

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@annie I think the removal of the letters affected the people also in social ways. People couldn't just go out and do whatever they wanted.

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@Taylor I think this book and the government within it relates to The Handmaid's Tale in the way that the law is enforced. In The Handmaid's Tale, the Eyes (secret police) are disguised and always watching for citizens that break the law. In Ella Minnow Pea, this same idea is demonstrated through the Letter Police who read letters and search for the illegal use of forbidden letters. In both cases, technology is not utilized.

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I feel like the disruption of the letters created more of a rage than any good. -Sam

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@sam I think that people today would react with violence and riots as we do today with other social problems.

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@Will There wasn’t a lot of good that came from the letters being banned. People were cut off from family members and friends and were scared of going to work or out in public because they might get turned in.

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@Will You can't necessarily rank the importance of losing a letter. Each letter has it's importance in each situation. Obviously the vowels are going to make a large impact, but you still can't rank them.

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Most important letters were definitely the vowels since they are used in all words. They are essential in the English language

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@willberg
I do not think that there was any good that came from the gov taking away the letters. It made their lives more and more impossible.

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@Taylor The government in this book does not watch the people as close than in the other books. They rely on the people to turn each other in.

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@audrey I think that having a relationship like Nate and Tassie gave the characters more of a personality and showed that they were capable of having a relationship with people either than family

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Which letter was the least important to fall? What was the most important?

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@sam
I think people would react in a similar way to the events in the book if it happened in real life. Some people would just go with it, believing that a higher power was purposely removing the letters. Some would just leave the island, while others would stay because their life was built there. However, I think that in real life more people would fight against the council/government and overthrow them.

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@Sam I don't think that it would ever happen in real life. Any country or society that tried to implement the letter would be met with an overwhelming amount of rebellion.

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@Annie Losing letters made all of their lives harder, and they lived in fear of accidentally saying a lost letter. People were forced to move away from their homes. Families were also separated and jobs were lost.

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@Will There was not much good that came from the termination of letters, it created distant relationships, people were afraid to talk to each other in the streets and have a slip up, it formed division among the people

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@chuck I think hes trying to say that the leaders are trash

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@will Not really I think most of the bad outweighed the good

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What do you think the importance was of Dunn insetting relationships such as Nate and Tassie?

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@WilliamBerg
At the start of the book, the removal of a few of the letters represented their strong religious views and they were still able to live with it and worship Nollop. However, as more letters fell, they began to realize that they could not live without them and society became corrupt.

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@will yes because it taught the society to reform and change from their old ways with the old Nollop sentence

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How does the totalitarian government of Ella Minnow Pea compare to the governments of other books we’ve read, such as V for Vendetta and 1984/The Handmaid’s Tale?

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with the loss comes of complex sentences and words. In what way does the loss of letters affect the islands culture

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@will Honestly there was nothing that came good from taking the letters away.

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How did the removal of letters affect the people of Nollop in ways other than their speech/communication?

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What do you think some real life correlaries are with the Nollop Council? How much do you think Dunn was influenced by real life?

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What is Dunn trying to say about authoritarian leaders when near the end of the book the characters think that Nollop got the idea of the sentence from a children's book?

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How do you think people would react if a situation similar would happen in real life?

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@madeline I think that it shows that the religious significance of Nollop was exaggerated because a local drunk came up with the new sentence that the council devoted all their laws to

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Tara Minatta:

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What do you think the importance was of Dunn insetting relationships, such as Nate

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What is the significance of Amos Minnow Pea writing, quite by accident, a sentence which surpasses Nollop's illustrious pangram? In what way does this undermine the divine value that the high council attributes to Nollop's sentence?

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Do you think there was any good that came from the government taking away letters?