Kirkus Reviews QR Code
IN SEARCH OF THE PETROGLYPH by Sara McAulay

IN SEARCH OF THE PETROGLYPH

By

Pub Date: Nov. 24th, 1978
Publisher: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan

A petroglyph, as some kids may need to be reminded, is a picture ""drawn or carved on rock""--and this turns, sluggishly, on the question which? Thirteen-year-old Jill Anderson, who lives in California's Sierra foothills and has appropriate parents (a speleologist father and a history teacher/amateur archaeologist mother), takes a fancy to the sketch of a petroglyph fish peddled, along with a map of its location, by an old gaffer who promptly disappears. But what Jill remembers of the map, plus what icky friend Mary Beth remembers of a photo-album in the library, enables the Andersons to narrow down the search--if only the odd couple (muscular female, stringbean youth) whom brother Carter saw buying the map don't get there first They do, and with a can of red spray paint--but fortunately the fish was carved, not drawn, so it hasn't been destroyed. Klutzy except for the danger to the petroglyph fish, which does get a certain hold on the imagination.