The Sign of the Beaver: A Newbery Honor Award Winner (Cascades S., #28)

by Elizabeth George Speare

[cherryblossommj]

We just finished reading this one today. I'm on the love seat with one child snuggled up against my shoulder, one at my feet, one dashing here there and yonder with building bricks in hand, another on the couch glaring at me with every pause, and the last asleep on my shoulder wrapped in a fleece jumpsuit gone in deeply to a mother's milk coma. With each pause at the end of the chapter, I was egged constantly to continue reading just one more chapter. Today, I think we read about ten chapters or more as they just had to know what happened to Matt and what about his family. This is the second, maybe, third, title that we have read on this journey of an Introduction to American History that has caused a tightening of my throat and the curious feeling of wondering if I am going to cry. Of course, for me, it was from a mother's perspective with a glimpse of love toward each of my sons. If I ever read this in my youth, I do not recall it, but I know there are many a classic that I heard other classrooms reading, while my own did not.

In this story, a young teenage boy is left to keep the cabin snug and the crops growing on the new land plot while the father goes to fetch the rest of the family. Each segment and scene kept my children wrapt with attention and they could even answer comprehension questions which is a huge win and a new skill being caught in the act and not really taught. The vocabulary is simple and my new to chapter books reader was capable at times when I handed the book to care for my infant son. As even a diaper change, or nursing session, wasn't enough to make the story wait a few minutes for continuance. All of the children agreed to rate this one five stars. They begged for a sequel and while I assured them that I did not know of one they eagerly sat down for me to jump into the first chapter of The Witch of Blackbird Pond, another title by the same author.

It is true to say, Matt's story is much further along on our timeline that our other history reads, however, his relationship with Attean and the different cultural aspects of being a youthful boy not quite a man is an important part that we are gleaming here. It is interesting to have this aspect mostly from Matt's perspective while then turning to read Squanto, Friend of the Pilgrims from a Native Amerian's viewpoint. As a person that traces my own lineage back to the eleventh century still on the British Isle, it is a moment in history that does make it difficult for me to favor my own kin. (I have ancestry in Virginia, and later the Carolina's, as far back as the late seventeenth century.)

In all, we enjoyed this one from the ten-year-old on downward (10, 8, 5, 2.5, and nb). We look forward to what else this adventure may lead. I own a paperback copy of this book with a large brown bear on the cover image. It is not the new yellow cover. We purchased our copy in a stall antique store while on a camping trip at the request of my daughter, eight at the time, with a search for adventure to go along with her Will Hobbs continuance.

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