Paulsen - Book Reviews

*** - Excellent
- Good
* - Okay
** - Bad
* - Terrible
+ - Half-star

Hatchet
(The Brian Robeson series, Book 1)
Gary Paulsen
Aladdin Newbery
Fiction, YA Adventure
*****

DESCRIPTION: Brian Robeson's thirteen-year-old life is disintegrating around him. His parents are in the middle of a divorce, and he - unbeknownst to either parent - knows the Secret why. His father has visitation rights, so during summers Brian is sent out to wherever he happens to be. Currently, it's a remote oil drilling facility in the Canadian wilderness, reachable only by bush plane. Before he goes, his mother gives him a small hatchet in honor of his woodsy summer destination. At the time, it seems a token gesture from a guilty parent, but soon Brian will come to treasure that gift. After the bush pilot dies at the controls and Brian's plane goes down after veering far off-course, that hatchet is the only weapon he has - aside from his wits. Can a city kid survive in the Canadian wilderness alone, with no camping knowledge and slim chance of rescue?

REVIEW: This is a classic young adult tale of survival. Brian grows up very fast in his time alone, realizing that his parents' divorce is nothing in the greater scheme of things. In addition to the ever-present danger, there is a sense of grandeur and beauty in the Canadian woods, and even as Brian fights to live he learns to see that beauty. The story moves quickly, with a sense of the real struggle for survival the hero endures.

You might also enjoy:
The Alexander Cold trilogy (Isabel Allende, YA Fiction - An American teen undergoes deeply transformative events in the remote corners of the world)
The Remnants series (K. A. Applegate, YA Fiction - Five hundred years after a meteor destroyed life on Earth, the surviving humans aboard a retrofitted shuttle awaken in a surreal new world)
Beyond the Western Sea (Avi, YA Fiction - Two Irish children and the son of an English lord undertake the difficult journey to America)
Tarzan of the Apes (Edgar Rice Burroughs, Fiction - The classic story of a boy raised in the African jungle by apes)
The Sword and the Cross (Ian Fleming, Nonfiction - The true story of two Frenchmen who set out to conquer the untameable Sahara)
The Call of the Wild and White Fang (Jack London, Fiction - In two stories, a dog learns to live as a wolf and a wolf learns to live as a dog)
Field Guide to the Apocalypse (Meghann Marco, Nonfiction - A tongue-in-cheek guide to surviving and averting various catastrophes, based on the sterling examples presented in Hollywood blockbusters)
Wolf Brother (Michelle Paver, YA Fiction - In the endless wilderness of prehistoric earth, an orphaned boy faces a marauding, spirit-possessed bear with a wolf cub companion)
Life as We Knew It (Susan Beth Pfeffer, YA Fiction - A teen girl's diary chronicles life after a global catastrophe destroys civilization)
Rogue Wave (Theodore Taylor, YA Fiction - Short stories of the sea and more)
A Journey to the Center of the Earth (Jules Verne, Fiction - A professor, his assistant, and an Icelandic guide descend into a volcano and find a lost world beneath the Earth's crust)
Leepike Ridge (N. D. Wilson, YA Fiction - A river's current washes a boy into a hidden cave linked to an ancient secret and ruthless modern treasure hunters)

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The River
(The Brian Robeson series, Book 2)
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA Adventure
****+

DESCRIPTION: Two years after his incredible survival in the Canadian wilderness, the hype and publicity have finally died down. Brian is doing his best to return to "normal," though he knows the experience has permanently altered him. One day, a team from the government shows up on his doorstep. They train pilots and soldiers how to survive in the wilderness, but nobody has studied the psychological changes required to live in the wild for any length of time. They want Brian to go back to the Canadian woods, this time with an observer, to help them teach others how to survive, especially how to think to survive. The wilderness, however, isn't a party to the "game," and before long what was a relatively pleasant return to the woods becomes a real life-or-death struggle, as lightning fries their radio and sends the observer into a coma-like state. Brian must get the man to civilization, and that means braving an unknown river with an untrustworthy map in the middle of nowhere.

REVIEW: This is another excellent tale of Brian in the wilderness. His return to the wilderness teaches him new lessons, building on the old. Highly recommended to people who liked Hatchet.

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Brian's Winter
(The Brian Robeson series, Book 3)
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA Adventure
*****

DESCRIPTION: At the end of Hatchet, Brian is unexpectedly rescued after nearly two months in the Canadian wilderness. By then, he had learned enough to live on his own. But what if events had gone slightly differently, and Brian hadn't been rescued before the weather turned? This is the story of the alternate-history Brian Robeson, who must adapt all over again as the weather robs him of the resources he has come to rely on, except his wits. And his hatchet.

REVIEW: This is an excellent "sequel" to Hatchet, as Brian relies on dim memories and observation of the natural world to survive as the seasons change. The author's extensive experience with the North in winter lends a distinct ring of authenticity to Brian's struggles. As a warning, it does have more bloodshed, as Brian is forced to move beyond fish and small animals to find food. I found I actually preferred this alternate tale to the original ending, if only because I liked seeing how the hero kept rising to the challenges piled upon him by the unforgiving wilderness. A great adventure.

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Brian's Return
(The Brian Robeson series, Book 4)
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA Adventure
*****

DESCRIPTION: After being rescued from the Canadian wilderness in the harsh Northern winter, Brian tried to return to a normal life, but something felt wrong. After two years of growing unease, culminating in an uncharacteristically violent retaliation against a bully, Brian realizes that he needs to return to the woods. Try as he might to deny it, he was changed irrevocably by his survival experience. When he returns to the wilderness, can he find the piece of himself he left behind and resume his old city-bound life?

REVIEW: Another excellent story, the last in Brian's survival sequence. His journey of self-discovery is interesting and powerful. Also interesting is the author's afterword, where he describes how Brian's experiences mirror many of his own. (Barnes & Noble sometimes lists this as the first in Brian's saga, although perhaps it is simply the start of a new trilogy: I see a new hardcover book, Brian's Hunt, is in bookstores now. Considering Paulsen's afterword, which is essentially a farewell-and-good- luck to Brian, I don't know why another book is needed, but I'll be buying it as soon as it comes out in paperback nevertheless.)

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Brian's Hunt
(The Brian Robeson series, Book 5)
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA Adventure
***+

DESCRIPTION: Brian Robeson, the boy who survived for months in the Canadian wilderness after a plane crash, has quickly settled into life in the northern woods. It's almost as if he never left, as if the time between being rescued and coming back of his own accord was some sort of bad dream of noise and crowds and city stenches. One night, a wounded dog comes to his campsite, and he has a chilling sense of foreboding about its arrival. He's been meaning to visit his Cree friends, the Smallhorns, in their camp to the north, and the dog's mysterious arrival - from the north - sets Brian's deepest instincts on edge. Has something happened to his friends? If so, is it too late to do anything to help them? Brian and his new four-footed companion have no choice but to investigate.

REVIEW: This wasn't really a necessary continuation of Brian's story for Brian's sake, as the other books in the series were. It was nice to revisit him, but he was less profoundly changed by his "hunt" than he was by previous events. That aside, it was another good tale of life in the wilderness, where the artificial line we like to draw between man and animal, predator and prey, doesn't exist. The ending's a little disturbing, though.

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Guts
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Nonfiction, YA General Nonfiction
*****

DESCRIPTION: In the widely-acclaimed young adult book Hatchet, a city boy named Brian finds himself stranded in the wilderness, relearning the very basic human skills of observation and survival which modern civilization has largely forgotten. The author, Gary Paulsen, based most of Brian's adventures on his own experiences, from a childhood spent hunting in the Minnesota wilderness to later runnings of the Iditarod. In this book, Paulsen describes the parts of his life that later formed the basis of young Brian Robeson's transformative experiences in the deep woods.

REVIEW: Someday, Gary Paulsen needs to write himself a proper autobiography, but in the meantime this makes for a fascinating glimpse into a life full of adventures that some would relegate to another age: run-ins with insane moose, attacks by bloodthirsty insects swarming thick enough to block daylight, white-knuckle flights in Alaskan bush planes, even watching as seemingly tame wildlife showed its true spirit to unwary, foolish bystanders. Looking beyond the basics, it reveals a way of thinking that too many of us never learned. As an increasingly materialistic and urban civilization, we seem to be forgetting the mentality that made us such a successful species, the ability to observe and become one with the world around us, the drive and desire to know and learn which not only makes survival possible on a basic level, but makes for a more fully- experienced life. I wonder how much longer we will have people like Gary Paulsen and his fictional proxy, Brian, to remind us of that... and tracts of unspoiled wilderness in which to exercise it.

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The Rifle
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA General Fiction
****

DESCRIPTION: In 1768, when America began to chafe under British rule and the first hints of revolution were stirring, the gunsmith Cornish McManus built perhaps the perfect flintlock rifle, impossibly accurate and incredibly beautiful, a weapon and a work of art. From him, the rifle comes to the hands of John Byam, a legendary marksman in the Revolutionary War, before it passes on to another owner... and another... After Byam's death in the trenches, none of its successive owners thought to check the old muzzle- loading gun to see if it was still loaded as it passed through the years to the present day. If they had, things might have been different...

REVIEW: This is a book about what guns mean to various people in various times, and poses the question of whether the gun or the owner is truly the killer when terrible accidents occur. An interesting story which doubles as a cautionary tale about having respect for firearms, even old antiques that seem harmlessly rustic but were truly designed for the purpose of taking a life.

You might also enjoy:
Wolf Rider (Avi, YA Fiction - After receiving a call from a man confessing a murder, a boy can't stop obsessing over it)
Rogue Wave (Theodore Taylor, YA Fiction - Short stories of the sea and more)

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The Transall Saga
Gary Paulsen
Laurel-Leaf Books
Fiction, YA Sci-Fi
***

DESCRIPTION: Thirteen-year-old Mark was hiking across an abandoned missile range in the desert when a strange light from the sky transports him to another place, another world. Here, Mark finds his skills put to the ultimate test. Can he survive in this strange new wilderness, among warring primitive tribes and other, stranger enemies, long enough to find a way back home?

REVIEW: Something about this story just didn't "click" with me, though I can't for certain say why. I've certainly read worse. Paulsen's experience with survival and wilderness adventure lends an air of authenticity to Mark's experiences, but this isn't an alien-world Hatchet. Much of the book concerns Mark trying to fit in with the native cultures and their peculiar customs. Some of the plot twists seemed a little obvious, and Paulsen's girls were essentially decorative pieces so far as characterization was concerned, nowhere near as capable of fending for themselves as Mark or the other men. Paulsen also goes out of his way so Mark can try his hand at the old modern-kid-dazzles -rustic-natives trick of not only remembering the ingredients of gunpowder, but being able to recognize them in their native state, find them all in easy distance, and grind them finely enough and in proper proportions for a nice explosion without any preliminary experimentation or guesswork. The ending... well, it wasn't all a dream, I'll give him that, but it still felt like a letdown of similar proportions. I enjoyed parts of this book, and Paulsen's efforts at creating alien wilderness regions were good, but I'm not sure how well his writing translates to the sci-fi genre.

You might also enjoy:
The Remnants series (K. A. Applegate, YA Fiction - Five hundred years after a meteor destroyed life on Earth, the surviving humans aboard a retrofitted shuttle awaken in a surreal new world)
Beyond the Western Sea (Avi, YA Fiction - Two Irish children and the son of an English lord undertake the difficult journey to America)
The Ancient One (T. A. Barron, YA Fiction - While protecting a giant redwood from loggers, a girl is pulled back in time to face an even greater danger)
A Princess of Mars (Edgar Rice Burroughs, Fiction - A Civil War veteran finds himself transported to the dying, hostile planet Mars)
Tarzan of the Apes (Edgar Rice Burroughs, Fiction - The classic story of a boy raised in the African jungle by apes)
The Wiz Biz books (Rich Cook, Fiction - A Silicon Valley programmer finds himself in a magical world, where he may be the only one able to stop a dark threat)
The Dragon and the George (George R. Dickson, Fiction - Searching for his missing wife, a man finds himself transported to a magical, medieval time... and stuck in the body of a dragon)
Coraline (Neil Gaiman, YA Fiction - A girl finds a mirror version of her London flat through an odd doorway, where a dark being awaits her arrival)
The Sword and the Cross (Ian Fleming, Nonfiction - The true story of two Frenchmen who set out to conquer the untameable Sahara)
The Merlin Conspiracy (Diana Wynne Jones, YA Fiction - A boy gets pushed into another world by a stranger)
The Watchers series (Peter Lerangis, YA Fiction - Six tales of ordinary kids who find themselves in bizarre, extraordinary situations)
The Call of the Wild and White Fang (Jack London, Fiction - In two stories, a dog learns to live as a wolf and a wolf learns to live as a dog)
Pendragon: The Merchant of Death (D. J. MacHale, YA Fiction - A boy's odd uncle takes him through a wormhole to a primitive world)
Field Guide to the Apocalypse (Meghann Marco, Nonfiction - A tongue-in-cheek guide to surviving and averting various catastrophes, based on the sterling examples presented in Hollywood blockbusters)
Life as We Knew It (Susan Beth Pfeffer, YA Fiction - A teen girl's diary chronicles life after a global catastrophe destroys civilization)
Jake Ransom and the Skull King's Shadow (James Rollins, YA Fiction - A boy and his sister are transported to a lost world by an ancient artifact)
Shadowbloom (Justin Sullivan and Samuel Sullivan, YA Fiction - Following a vivid dream, twins find themselves pulled into a dark world where plants run amok)
Rogue Wave (Theodore Taylor, YA Fiction - Short stories of the sea and more)
A Journey to the Center of the Earth (Jules Verne, Fiction - A professor, his assistant, and an Icelandic guide descend into a volcano and find a lost world beneath the Earth's crust)
Leepike Ridge (N. D. Wilson, YA Fiction - A river's current washes a boy into a hidden cave linked to an ancient secret and ruthless modern treasure hunters)

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Paulsen - Book Reviews

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*** - Excellent
- Good
* - Okay
** - Bad
* - Terrible
+ - Half-star