Available copies
- 2 of 2 copies available at LARL/NWRL Consortium.
- 2 of 2 copies available at Lake Agassiz Regional Library. (Show preferred library)
Current holds
0 current holds with 2 total copies.
Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Status | Due Date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Fosston Public Library | Y LEA (Text) | 33500013779236 | New | Available | - |
Lake Park LINK Site | Y LEA (Text) | 33500013779244 | New | Available | - |
Record details
- ISBN: 0823443426
- ISBN: 9780823443420
-
Physical Description:
232 pages ; 22 cm
print - Edition: First edition.
- Publisher: New York City : Margaret Ferguson Books, Holiday House, [2023]
Content descriptions
Summary, etc.: | Seventeen-year-old Rebecca Leavitt has traveled by covered wagon from Utah to the Northwest Territories of Canada, where her father and brothers are now homesteading and establishing a new community with other Latter-Day Saints. Rebecca is old enough to get married, but what kind of man would she marry and who would have a girl like her--a girl filled with ideas and opinions? Someone gallant and exciting like Levi Howard? Or a man of ideas like her childhood friend Coby Webster? Rebecca decides to set her sights on something completely different. She loves the land and wants her own piece of it. When she learns that single women aren't allowed to homestead, her father agrees to buy her land outright, as long as Rebecca earns the money --480 dollars, an impossible sum. She sets out to earn the money while surviving the relentless challenges of pioneer life--the ones that Mother Nature throws at her in the form of blizzards, grizzles, influenza and floods, and the ones that come with human nature, be they exasperating neighbors or the breathtaking frailty of life. |
Target Audience Note: | Ages 12 and up Holiday House. Grades 10-12. Holiday House. |
Reviews
Author Notes
- Booklist Reviews : Booklist Reviews 2023 April #1
*Starred Review* Loosely based on her ancestors' history as Latter Day Saints homesteaders in Canada's Northwest Territories, Leavitt's heartfelt novel opens in the year 1890 with her protagonist, 17-yearold Rebecca, sitting next to God and contemplating the beauty of the landscape. If sitting thus seems impossible, so is Rebecca's determination to have land of her own, as it's illegal for a single woman to own land. Though perhaps she won't be single much longer. There are two young men in Rebecca's life: Coby, practical, warm, and safe; and handsome Levi, who has a way of making naughtiness seem all right. Rebecca's story is beautifully written ("the mountains glowed as if they'd swallowed the moon") and its treatment of setting, superb, while the plot is an impressive balance of the quotidianâa Dominion Day celebration, marriage, birthâand the exceptional: a flood that carries the family's house away, a blizzard that threatens Coby's life, and a plague of the grippe that brings death to the community. As for Leavitt (Calvin, 2015), she brings all of her characters to vivid lifeâwillful, stubborn Rebecca, of course, but also her parents, stoic Father and slightly too perfect Mother. A vivid celebration of life and insightful exploration of faith, this novel proves the enduring importance of sometimes undervalued historical fiction for YAs. Grades 8-12. Copyright 2023 Booklist Reviews.
Martine Leavitt is the author of several award-winning books for young readers, including Calvin (winner of the Governor Generalâs Award), My Book of Life by Angel (finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and winner of the Canadian Library Association Young Adult Book of the Year) and Keturah and Lord Death (finalist for the National Book Award). She teaches in the MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults at Vermont College of Fine Arts, where she is serving as the Katherine Paterson Endowed Chair. Martine lives in High River, Alberta. Visit her at martineleavitt.com.
Search for related items by subject
Genre: | Novels. Christian fiction. Bildungsromans. Young adult fiction. Historical fiction. |