Inukshuk
3 journalers for this copy...
This book was offered through LibraryThing's Early Reader program. I thought the details sounded interesting, as it is set in Alberta and has an historical component that deals with Sir John Franklin.
Is it just me or are we in the 21st century becoming fascinated by the attempts made to discover the North-West Passage and especially the story of Sir John Franklin? I know I learned a bit about this in school (many years ago) but in the past decade it seems like every year, at least, another book comes out about Franklin or other explorers who tried to find the North-West Passage. This Wikipedia article has a list of books but I know it misses some that I have read:
Darkness at the Stroke of Noon by Dennis Murphy
Race to the Polar Sea: The Heroic Adventures of Elisha Kent Kane by Ken McGoogan
This book views the Franklin Expedition through the eyes of a teenaged boy, Thomas Franklin. Thomas is fascinated by the details of the expedition. He has plans for a movie and he's drawn extensive pictures as a story board. He even is trying to replicate the conditions experienced by the men on the journey to the point of not eating anything with vitamin C so that he can get scurvy. Thomas is a pretty strange boy but he also has normal teenage hormonal urges. So when his younger female neighbour invites him into her house they start to fool around.
Meanwhile, Thomas' father, a school teacher, is struggling with his own emotions. His wife has left him to work in the north and he's not sure if he wants to try to reconcile or if he should act on his attraction to the mother of a student.
The whole book takes place over a short period of time, most of it just in 2 days, but it seems longer because there is so much packed into it. Both Thomas and his father seemed very realistic to me. In fact, I really wanted to shake some sense into both of them. By the end of the book they each have an epiphany about their life and I was glad about that. However, I was left feeling slightly disappointed by the whole book in terms of how it dealt with the Franklin Expedition. I know that there are still questions about where it went and what happened to the people on it and I suppose this book is as good a supposition as any. I just felt that it kind of petered out after exploring the minutest details.
Nevertheless I would recommend this book to anyone who is curious about that chapter in our history or who likes to read about the emotional lives of men and boys.
Darkness at the Stroke of Noon by Dennis Murphy
Race to the Polar Sea: The Heroic Adventures of Elisha Kent Kane by Ken McGoogan
This book views the Franklin Expedition through the eyes of a teenaged boy, Thomas Franklin. Thomas is fascinated by the details of the expedition. He has plans for a movie and he's drawn extensive pictures as a story board. He even is trying to replicate the conditions experienced by the men on the journey to the point of not eating anything with vitamin C so that he can get scurvy. Thomas is a pretty strange boy but he also has normal teenage hormonal urges. So when his younger female neighbour invites him into her house they start to fool around.
Meanwhile, Thomas' father, a school teacher, is struggling with his own emotions. His wife has left him to work in the north and he's not sure if he wants to try to reconcile or if he should act on his attraction to the mother of a student.
The whole book takes place over a short period of time, most of it just in 2 days, but it seems longer because there is so much packed into it. Both Thomas and his father seemed very realistic to me. In fact, I really wanted to shake some sense into both of them. By the end of the book they each have an epiphany about their life and I was glad about that. However, I was left feeling slightly disappointed by the whole book in terms of how it dealt with the Franklin Expedition. I know that there are still questions about where it went and what happened to the people on it and I suppose this book is as good a supposition as any. I just felt that it kind of petered out after exploring the minutest details.
Nevertheless I would recommend this book to anyone who is curious about that chapter in our history or who likes to read about the emotional lives of men and boys.
I'm going to put this book in the Cross-Canada bookbox which will be going to Ontario soon. Hope whoever gets it will enjoy the read.
This stopped by in the Cross Canada Book Box.
i'm one of those people with a bit of a fascination with the Franklin expedition. I was happy to pull this from the bookbox. thanks.
