People who read become absorbed in a process of discovery about the world around them; books open doors to otherwise inaccessible places and introduce readers to profound new ideas. Approximately 15 seventh-, eighth-, and ninth-grade members of the StreetSquash Book Club in Harlem meet on Friday afternoons to read, write, and discuss topics inspired by their reading. The StreetSquash Book Club, which is described in this article, encourages young people to become active, engaged citizens by means of thematic units that use young adult novels as entry points for discussion, games, community interaction, and civil activism. The multifaceted and engaging approach of the StreetSquash Book Club not only instills a love of reading and writing in students but also pushes them to comprehend and employ the awesome powers they possess as citizens of a democracy. This article will explore two of the book club's thematic units: the civil rights movement and the presidential election of 2004. The club focused on the civil rights movement for five weeks during the spring of 2004, coinciding with the fiftieth anniversary of "Brown vs. the Board of Education". The club investigated the presidential election for six weeks during the campaign season of Fall 2004.