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Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-7-The Oklahoma territory is a bit different from cosmopolitan Chattanooga when Daisy Watson, 13, moves there in 1908. This rather flat historical novel, based on the experiences of the author's family, traces the first nine months or so of Daisy's life in the Big Pasture, the area in which her family homesteads. Prairie fires, lost dogs, a pony that needs breaking, a strict young teacher, and a troubled relationship with a young Kiowa boy, John Three Sixteen, keep the narrative moving along, but the characters never come to life the way the serene yet beautiful landscape does. A strong positive aspect of the novel is Hurmence's compassionate treatment of the Kiowa whose land borders that of Daisy's family, but on the whole the book is too static to read well. There is more action and involvement for readers in Kristiana Gregory's The Legend of Jimmy Spoon (Harcourt, 1990), which deals with the Shoshone on the Wyoming prairie. Libraries with a need for books about the settling of Oklahoma could fill it with this adequate, though bland, offering.-Ann Welton, Terminal Park Elementary School, Auburn, WA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
Based upon the life of Hurmence's aunt, the period piece about a twelve-year-old girl who moves to the Oklahoma Territory with her family has some slow moments. But the protagonist's feistiness, realistic adolescent resentment for her rather strait-laced mother, and struggle to overcome prejudice and befriend the neighboring Kiowa Indians nonetheless make for an engaging, sensitively wrought story. From HORN BOOK 1994, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
The author of Tough Tiffany (1980, o.p.) re-creates her own family history to depict Oklahoma homesteaders. Dixie Watson's father, a revenuer, takes a year's leave in 1907 to try farming on the prairie. The Watsons' acres adjoin Kiowa land; much of the story concerns 13-year-old Dixie's tentative friendship with a thoughtful, unusually intelligent Kiowa boy, John Three Sixteen (his name refers to a biblical verse). Mrs. Watson--conventional, unyielding, fearful--forbids any acquaintance with Indians (her sudden turnaround after they call on her medical skills is one of the few unlikely particulars here). But Dixie's readiness to like and admire John Three is reinforced by knowing she's the inadvertent cause of his losing his pony: Needing money for food, John Three's father sold it to Mr. Watson, who gave it to Dixie. Hurmence's descriptions are fresh, her narrative lively with events recounted in singularly authentic detail (a prairie fire; a brother's going to college; the consequences of building an over-spacious house). The authenticity extends to attitudes toward Native Americans, but the slurs are set firmly in context and balanced by positive portrayals. Dixie is especially well realized, while other characters seem to offer glimpses of fully dimensional people. The same might be said of the book: More a string of incidents than a tightly plotted story, it's a splendid evocation of a setting peopled with characters whose lives and unresolved problems extend tantalizingly beyond its boundaries. Afterword. (Fiction. 10-14)
Booklist Review
Gr. 5-8. In 1908, 13-year-old Dixie and her family move from Chattanooga to the Oklahoma Territory, called the Big Pasture by the Kiowas. Kiowas live on three sides of the family's claim, and Dixie's interaction with her Indian neighbors, especially with the boy John Three, who owns a pony, teaches her what Kiowa lives are like--hedged in by poverty, shaped by missionaries. Some of the Kiowas assimilate; others, like John Three's mother, do not. The characterization of Dixie's family lacks Little House depth, but Dixie's involvement with animals, the nature of the frontier (there are automobiles in the town), and the historical details about Kiowa life make the story appealing. ~--Mary Harris Veeder