A bracing work of historical fiction makes an unfriendly place of the Ohio riverfront as three children fight for their lives. In May 1793 the motherless Dunn family—Papa, Amos, Clara, and Jonathan—have almost completed their long trek from eastern Pennsylvania to the place where they hope to make a new life, the Ohio frontier. Amos, 13, is particularly anxious to start over; his memory of a terrible event and his subsequent guilt can be assuaged only in a new place. When the riverboat that is to carry the family to Marietta is ambushed by Indians, a terrible battle ensues, and in the confusion, the boat goes adrift, carrying the Dunn children down river. A second Indian attack causes them to abandon the boat and they land on the north shore of the Ohio River. Their only course is to walk to Marietta, following the river. Along the way, Amos spots a boy clinging to a floating log, and rescues him. He is an Indian boy, barely alive from a gunshot wound, and the children start to nurse him back to health. Still ahead for them: They are taken prisoner by a band of Shawnee, and need to reach Marietta, hoping to see their father again. Willis (Out of the Storm, 1995, etc.) has created a rousing adventure; it will have readers turning the pages and rooting for the spunky Dunn kids all the way. (Fiction. 9-12)
Pub Date: March 17, 1997
ISBN: 0-395-77044-0
Page Count: 183
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1997
A book of the basic teachings of Buddha, presented through a collection of six classic, simple tales. When a monkey takes refuge from a monsoon in a cave, he happens upon a group of bickering animals—a monkey, lion, turtle, jackal, and dove. Before the fighting becomes too fierce, a small statue of Buddha begins to glow in the darkest corner. To pass the time—and to stop the fighting—wise Buddha spins enlightening stories of tolerance, endurance, sagacity, truthfulness, kindness, and clarity. Buddha recounts his past lives in many forms—from monkey to pigeon to willow tree—to his captive listeners. Such straightforward yet profound tales combine with the art and design for an example of bookmaking that is aesthetically pleasing in every way. Color-washed linoprints cleverly distinguish the stories from the black-and-white narrative frame, while an informative afterword offers brief background detail about Buddha and these six “birth stories” known as Jatakas. (Picture book/folklore. 4-7)
Pub Date: April 8, 1999
ISBN: 0-374-33548-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1999
A fast-paced and fact-laced tale framed in graphic panels puts a young orphan aboard a British frigate for a spot of blockade duty—climaxed by a brisk exchange with a French three-decker and the fiery destruction of an enemy shipyard. Rated “Boy, Third Class,”12-year-old Jack reports for duty with his lubberly head filled with heroic visions. Months of hard chores and gun drills later, he’s ready to measure up when the Defender sails into an ambush engineered by a turncoat crewmember. Though Weigel isn’t much for natural-sounding dialogue (“The Admiralty’s hoping to box up the Frenchies in their ports so they can’t mount an invasion of England,” explains an avuncular bosun) he fills the side margins on each page of his action-packed, realistically detailed cartoon scenes with pithy comments on naval argot and discipline, historical background, warfare, weapons and nautical lore. Though it may be a stretch for the episode’s likely audience to move on, as the author recommends at the end, to C.S. Forester and Patrick O’Brian, Jack’s adventures will leave readers in the proper tar-and-gunpowder frame of mind. (resource list) (Graphic fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-399-25089-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 24, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2010
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