Thunder on the Plains

by Gary Robinson

Overview

It's been two years and middle-school student Danny Wind is still not over his father's death. When his mom marries a white man and they move to a new "white bread" neighborhood, Danny's life changes. The school principal considers him a troublemaker, and he has to avoid Willy, the school bully, who calls him "redskin" and "Tonto." After Danny acts out and gets suspended from school, his mom decides to send him to a summer survival camp for Native American teens.

Danny is sure he is in for a boring summer on the reservation, without Internet access even. Instead, he meets other Native kids, learns to ride and care for horses, and develops a relationship with his grandfather, who teaches him the ways of their tribe. And even though life on the reservation is pretty cool, never in his craziest dreams did Danny expect to become involved in rescuing bison in Yellowstone National Park!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781939053008
Publisher:	7th Generation
Publication date:	04/15/2013
Series:	PathFinders
Pages:	96
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.30(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

About the Author

Gary Robinson, a writer and filmmaker of Cherokee and Choctaw descent, has spent twenty-five years working with American Indian communities to tell the stories of Native people. His previous works include From Warriors to Soldiers, which examines American Indians in the US military from the Revolutionary War to modern times, and The Language of Victory, the story of the American Indian code talkers of World War I and World War II. Robinson currently lives in the central California coast region.

Editorial Reviews

An unhappy "urban skin" from Los Angeles reclaims his Cheyenne heritage in the course of an adventurous summer with relatives on the reservation. Saddled at home with a stepfather and at school with both a hostile principal and a bully who calls him "Tonto" and "redskin," Daniel Wind is relieved to be sent off to a summer wilderness-survival camp in Montana run by his uncle. Though he is pleased to discover that the reservation has television and Internet access, he absorbs traditional values and culture from his grandfather as he makes friends, learns to ride and comes to appreciate the Big Sky Country's beauties. Ultimately, he uses both digital and organizational skills to head up a rescue of buffalo ("Buffalo People," as his grandfather calls them) slated for culling from the Yellowstone Park herd. That 200-mile bison drive passes in just a few paragraphs, though. Unfortunately, Robinson devotes more attention to spiritual homilies ("Our special gift is knowing that all things on this earth are related"), a simplistic explanation of white prejudice against Native Americans and the formal naming ceremony that Daniel earns with his "rite of passage." The agenda riding this unvarnished tale may leave young readers who aren't Native Americans feeling like they're on the outside looking in—not necessarily a bad thing, considering the vast quantity of books that do the opposite. (Fiction. 10-16)

Kirkus Reviews