Reviews

Gr 4-7-An exciting, page-turning adventure story that will keep children reading until its gripping climax. Dickon's comfortable childhood changes abruptly with his father's death and his mother's remarriage. Apprenticed to a tanner, he hates the thought of killing animals and seems to be the constant target of the mistress's anger and disdain. While on an errand to the Bear Garden where bears are used to bait attack dogs for entertainment, he befriends a frightened cub. Drawn to it like a magnet, the boy continues to visit the animal until a visit at the annual fair changes his life forever. Seeing the cub's mother fighting in the ring, he becomes determined to save the cub from this fate. At the same time, a bear handler sees Dickon's gentle way with animals as a threat and tries to kill both boy and bear by starting a fire. Dickon and the cub escape to France with a tumbling family where they find themselves once again in a fight for their lives. Readers will identify with Dickon's efforts to save the creature while learning how bears were once mistreated for people's entertainment. A rich and interesting cast of characters from the evil Bear Catcher to the gentle Rosa, daughter of the tumblers, bring the time and place convincingly alive. This is an example of the best sort of historical fiction that involves children in an exciting story while giving them a memorable hero and a taste of life in another time.-Jane Gardner Connor, South Carolina State Library, Columbia