Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls and was first copyrighted 1961. This book could either be realistic fiction or historical fiction. A young boy named Billy lived on a farm in the prairie and wants two (expensive) hound dogs very badly, but his family can not afford them. So, Billy saves up his money for two years to buy the hound dogs. Billy and his dogs were a great hunting team, but after a mountain attacks his, one of the dogs dies because of wounds, and days later the other dog dies because of a broken heart.
This story is told in a 3rd person point of view. A young boy named Billy lived on a farm in the prairie and wants two (expensive) hound dogs very badly, but his family can not afford them. So, Billy saves up his money for two years to buy the hound dogs. He trains his two dogs to be great hunters and together, they kill lots of game, which really helps their family. Billy even enters into a contest for hunters, which he won giving his family more money! While hunting, Billy and his dogs run into a big mountain lion which his dogs defeat, but one of his dogs ids badly wounded and dies. The other dog then dies from loneliness. After Billy buries the two dogs, a red fern grows over the dogs, showing the Indian myth that only an angel can put there. The overall theme of this book is that now matter how crazy your goals are, if you work hard you can achieve them. The intended audience for this book is anyone from 6th grade and up. The book can either fit into a historical fiction or a realistic fiction. It could be a historical fiction because the time frame was somewhere in the mid-1900s and included some older attributes, but it could be a realistic fiction for the same reasons, it just depends on the way you classify it. The author kept me interested by using big cliff-hangers, but in other parts did not keep me interested because I felt like the story dragged on. I think that the authors style is to use his past history and incorporate it into the story. Wilson Rawls used to live on a farm, like the character Billy, and I think that he used personal experiences and mixed them into the Billy. I think that it is not effective for the intended audience because, like I said, some parts drag along and are boring. But also, some parts can spark up our interests by the way he uses his own experiences; it is easier for us to connect to Billy.
Honestly, this book did not affect me on a personal level. Although at some parts I did get emotional, it really did not affect me. I did not necessarily enjoy this book, as I have said before, I feel like the storyline just drags along. One idea that did change for me about this book is the way upperclass people change lower-class people. Before I read this book, I did not realize the way the upperclassmen, the villagers, treated the lower-classmen, the "hillbillies", from a perspective from a hillbilly, only from a villager (but keep in mind that times have changed). Now that I have read this book, I realize how things used to be/how things are. That fits in with what I think on my own personal world view because I normally only think of us (people who have things easier than others), but I don't think of the people that have it hard, just like Billy. This book did not bring up memories from other books or authors. I think that is so because I do not normally read this genre, not the realistic fictions but how it is almost intended for boys.
Overall, I liked this book. I liked how the author tied in his own experiences into the story, it made it easier for me to connect to Billy, just because instead of having to create all of the character traits for Billy he could just connect to his own life experiences. I also like how the author added in an emotional perspective on the book, some parts I was crying, other parts I was almost laughing, and other parts were "nail-biters". The one thing about this book is that the author dragged some parts along. For example, the part where Billy first goes into town to get his dogs seemed a little long to me. Maybe for others it was fine, but I feel like it was just in the authors style of using descriptive detail. I would recommend this book to boys in 6th grade and up. It was a manlier book with the main character being a boy who loves hunting, but some of the parts would be confusing to younger boys.
Meggie Cunningham
December 17, 2013
RATING: *** 3/5
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