Book Review

Title : Sacajawea

Author : Joseph Bruchac

Publisher : Scholastic

Place and Date of Publication: New York, 2000

Number of Pages : 194

Where I found the Book : Christian Heritage School Library

~Story Review~

It is about about a women's journey and her adventures, which is also told by the perspective of Sacajawea herself and a man named William Clark. This story is about a young Native American girl ,from the tribe of the Shoshone, named Sacajawea, who is taken captive from her village by white traders with her friend named Otter Woman. They then are both given to a woman in another village and are put to work in her fields. But one day the meet a man named Toussaint Charbonneau. Who won her and Otter Woman from their Minetaree captor. Charbonneau married the young Sacajawea, and they had a son. Soon after, Charbonneau was hired by Lewis and Clark to accompany their expedition along the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean, and Charbonneau was invited to bring his family along with him. Which is great news for Sacajawea, who dreams to be reunited with her Shoshone family once again. Sacajawea is very helpful because of her skills in language, her ability to find food and serve as a great interpreter. The title is called Sacajawea because she plays a very important role in this story. The theme of this book is travel, because the whole book was about travel. This book was meant to be around the early 1800s. The main characters in this book are Sacajawea, Charbonneau, Captain Lewis, and William Clark.

~Christian Perspective~

This story was not written in a Christian perspective. This book does mention praying though. It doesn't really mention anything religious in this book besides Sacajawea and the other Native people and their spirituality. Sacajawea does tell lots of stories of respecting the earth and all the creatures and people in it. As a Christian I thought it was good because most of the Native people had respect for others and most of the traders treated them well. Their beliefs and Chritianity are very different in many ways but they do have some similarities. Some of them are to treat other people well and to respect nature that the Creator (God) has made for them. I wouldn't judge her and her friends because they aren't Christian but they do seem like good people. But most of the time the characters delt with conflict in a Godly way.

~My Thoughts~

At first I got a little confused when I first read the book but after when I started to read it more I began to understand how it was written. Then in the beginning chapters I didn't like the book, but the more I read, the more I became interesting and started to like it. I would recommend this book to people who like history and stories of Native people and traders. This book gives you an idea of how it was to travel in those days in foreign land and meet new people and also how trading went. I'd give this book about a 8 out of 10. I liked this book because it was very interesting.

Have An Awesome Day & Hope Ya Read The Book!

Book Review

Title;Milkweed

Author: Jerry Spinelli

# of pages:208

Publisher: Scholastic

Place and Date of Publication:New York 2005

Where I found the book: Christian Heritage School Library

Genre: historical, realistic-fiction

Milkweed

Milkweed is written from an old man's point of view, looking back on his own life as a young, Gypsy boy from Poland, living in the streets of Warsaw, in 1939 during WWII. He doesn't know who he is or his own past. During a day of stealing bread from women in fur coats, he is grabbed by an older boy, with red hair, named Uri. He brings him to his group of friends and introduces him to everyone. Uri gives him the name Misha Pilsudsky and gives him a story.Misha loved his story. When they are out, they see an army of Nazis. A soldier was smiling down on him and stood tall with the tallest, blackest, shiniest boots Misha has ever seen and continues to march off. Misha wanted to become one and have tall, shiny boots of his own.He thinks that 'Jackboots' are the some of the nicest people. One day while he is looking for food in someone's garden, he meets seven year old Janina Milgrom. As days go by, food is starting to get less and less on the shelves of stores and Jackboots start to become cruel. Misha begins to stay with Janina most of the time and sees Uri less. On one night, soldiers invade the house and force everybody to line up. Then they start to beat Janina's mom and her Uncle Shepsel. That day he loses his identity as Misha Pilsudsky the Gypsy and becomes Misha Pilsudsky the Jew. Janina starts to see him as her older brother and Mr. Milgrom thinks of him as a son. She starts to follow him around and goes with him on his food runs at night. The Milgroms begin to lose all hope but he tries to stay positive. On another terrible day, Jews are taken away on trains, but Misha and Janina are told to hide and are left behind. One day Janina runs away and he tries to catch her until he gets shot in the earlobe by a soldier. Misha sees a familiar flash of red hair, could it be? But the most important thing for him is to find his sister Janina. I think that this author used the title Milkweed because it is mentioned in the book a couple of times.

-Christian Perspective-

I think that this book was not written in a Christian perspective. It does talk about angels and heaven but it doesn't talk about God. If it was, it would talk about God and praying. If the characters were Christian they would have strong faith in God. This book also has some non Christ-like attitudes from the older boys in Uri's group of friends.

-My Thoughts-

I liked this book and the reason why I chose this book because it sounded very interesting to read.I think that Milkweed is good to read for young adults. This book is about wars and history. I would recommend this to people who like realistic-fiction, history or who are interested about the World Wars because this is what Milkweed. This book also gives you an idea how it was to live during WWII and living during hard times. I liked this book because Misha tries to keep a positive attitude and I thought that this book was well written. The reason why I didn't like it is because it retells of a sad life. But it has a happy ending to the story.

Hope Ya Read the Book!:)