This charming and involving historical novel brings readers to the Southwest Territory (now Tennessee) in 1792. The Bakers live with an inescapable fear: their ten-year old daughter, Lizzy, suffers from extremely serious asthma, which grows increasingly worse every fall. Lizzy barely survives her first autumn in the territory, saved only by an early frost, and she realizes that she might not survive the next year. No one knows the cause of Lizzy’s illness; the confident local doctor knows even less than the midwife. Meanwhile, on a trip to town, the family meets richly dressed Mrs. Beaumont, who has left Charleston, South Carolina, to join her husband while he speculates on land. The townspeople at first shun the Beaumonts, but Mrs. Beaumont becomes friendly with Lizzy’s family, coming to help when things look the worst. Finally she offers to take Lizzy back to Charleston, where she hopes the sea air will cure her. Lizzy must decide whether she will leave her home, knowing that she may never see her family again. As she tells her story, readers will come to know the period and the lifestyle as well as a little something about pioneer medicine. A sub-theme explores the idea why the Beaumonts hold slaves, a practice Lizzy disapproves of. An author’s note explains the possibilities of Lizzy’s survival and fills in other information about the period. A unique look at early American history. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-385-32769-2
Page Count: 166
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2000
Taking a page from Avi’s The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle (1990), Kehret (I’m Not Who You Think I Am, p. 223, etc.) pens a similar story of a girl who goes to sea. Determined not to be separated from her seriously ill mother, Emma, 12, embarks on a plan that results in the adventure of a lifetime. Sent to live with Aunt Martha and her arrogant son, Odolf, Emma carefully plots her escape. Disguising herself in her cousin’s used clothes, she sneaks out while the household slumbers and stows away on what she believes to be a ship carrying her parents from England to the warmer climate of France. Instead, the ship is the evil, ill-fated Black Lightning, under the command of the notorious Captain Beacon. Emma finds herself sharing quarters with a crew of filthy, surly, dangerous men. When a fierce storm swamps the ship, Emma desperately seizes her chance to escape, drifting for several days and nights aboard a hatch cover and finally carried to land somewhere on the coast of Africa. Hungry, thirsty, and alone, Emma faces the daunting prospect of slow starvation, but survives due to a relationship she builds with a band of chimpanzees. This page-turning adventure story shows evidence of solid research and experienced plotting—the pacing is breathless. Kehret paints a starkly realistic portrait, complete with sounds and smells of the difficult and unpleasant life aboard ship. (Fiction. 8-12)
Pub Date: Dec. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-671-03416-2
Page Count: 138
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1999
PLB 0-531-33140-7 Ketcham’s first book is based on an allegedly true story of a childhood incident in the life of Johann Sebastian Bach. It starts with a couple of pages regaling the Bach home and all the Johanns in the family, who made their fame through music. After his father’s death, Johann Sebastian goes to live with his brother, Johann Christoph, where he boasts that he is the best organist in the world. Johann Christoph contradicts him: “Old Adam Reincken is the best.” So Johann Sebastian sets out to hear the master himself. In fact, he is humbled to tears, but there is hope that he will be the world’s best organist one day. Johann Sebastian emerges as little more than a brat, Reincken as more of a suggestion than a character. Bush’s illustrations are most transporting when offering details of the landscape, but his protagonist is too impish to give the story much authority. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-531-30140-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orchard
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1999
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