Product Description
Acclaimed historical novelist Ann Rinaldi makes her "Dear America" debut with the diary of a Sioux girl who is sent to a government-run boarding school to learn the white man's customs and language. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (70)

Deceived
"This book is aimed towards young adult readers, but is suitable for adult readers as well who are interested in Carlisle Indian School and Native American studies. This is a story about a young Sioux girl named Nannie Little Rose who describes her life at Carlisle Indian school in 1880 through a series of diary entries. Through her eyes we get a glimpse into what life was like for Indian children sent to Carlisle.

Unfortunately, though this book has some historical accuracies, it is NOT a true story. Nannie Little Rose did not write this diary, in fact, she never existed. The author, Ann Rinaldi, visited Carlisle and its graveyard and, fascinated by the names on the headstones, decided to write a story about Carlisle and its students using the names on the headstones to create the characters in a fictional account. She did do research and used events that occurred at Carlisle to weave her story, however the events did not take place in the time period covered in her book and any feelings or events specific to the characters are not real - just their names. I found this to be very disappointing, especially after reading the entire book and THEN finding the disclaimer, "While the events described and some of the characters in this book may be based on actual historical events and real people, Nannie Little Rose is a fictional character, created by the author, and her diary is a work of fiction" on the VERY LAST page of the book. I felt like I was purposely deceived, as everything in the book is made to appear that it is a true accounting and diary, complete with an epilogue detailing what happened to Nannie Little Rose after she left Carlisle - down to the number of children she had and the year of her death.

In addition, because this is a FICTIONAL accounting by someone who is not Indian, one has to question the feelings presented by the characters she has invented. As someone who has some knowledge of what Carlisle was like for its students and how it made them feel and how being there affected their entire lives (my father-in-law was a Carlisle student and spoke about what life was like for him there), I feel that only someone who is Indian, or who has spoken to an Indian who experienced Carlisle, could truly represent their thoughts and feelings about what it was like for them. Rinaldi should have attempted to find someone who actually attended Carlisle to get their personal story to base her characters' thoughts and feelings on. Otherwise, it is just another white person's take on what it is like to be Indian.

In this book, Carlisle is presented very favorably. Some of the injustices are described, but in a somewhat whitewash fashion. I did, however, find Rinaldi's description of an Indian child's first day at Carlisle to be pretty realistic and moving. The 'great experiment' that Capt. Pratt practiced on these people was, in all reality, an attempt at ethnic cleansing. These Indian children were forced to attend the Indian schools. They were stripped of their identities (separated from their families and then separated by their sex, clothes taken and burned, forcibly bathed and de-liced, their hair cut - for an Indian a very traumatic event - names taken and given new Anglo/Christian names) and beaten and punished if they ever spoke their language or did anything remotely 'Indian' again. How is this not like the holocaust for the Jews, save being placed in a gas chamber?

Just like Capt. Pratt with his idea for Indian schools like Carlisle, Ann Rinaldi seems to have had good intentions when writing her book. Her writing and story is good and informative, but unfortunately, by deceiving the reader into thinking it is a true story written by a real person - a Native American, who really attended Carlisle - everything she writes is then suspect and colored by a white person whose experience and understanding can never truly compare. I would recommend reading this book to get a basic idea of Carlisle, but to read further in order to obtain a true accounting."

It may not be historically accurate but,
It's still a good book. This book is about a Native American girl named Little Rose. She is taken to an Indian school, where she has to choose a new name, Nannie. This book is very inspirational, and hopeful.

My Heart is on the ground
My nine year old daughter loved this book. It is very well written and a pleasure to read.

My Heart Is On The Ground
My Heart is on the Ground / 0-590-14922-9

This installation in the Dear America series details the life of a Sioux girl, brought to live at a school for American Indian children to learn American English and the customs of the Caucasian Americans. This book has generated a great deal of controversy and concern, but I feel that (as best I can fathom) Rinaldi has done the best she can with a difficult period of history.

The diary format is employed here, as elsewhere, with dual 'languages' - plain type denotes the narrator's attempts at English, italic type denotes her native language. As in other Dear America diaries, the diary device is meant as a teaching device and the narrator's English improves throughout the story. This dual writing device is useful because it shows the narrator's sympathetic struggles with a new language, without muting her inner thoughts or making her seem 'stupid' for her poor communication.

The school is shown in a very mixed light and, I feel, the terrible plight of the American Indians is shown here very starkly. The narrator explains how they have fewer animals each year to hunt, because the practices of the Caucasian Americans are causing the extinction of the animals. She tells with sadness about the slaughter and starvation of her people, and the other American Indian tribes. Although the school staff believes they are doing her a favor in turning her from her 'barbaric' past, she bravely insists that her past is not barbaric, that she is a proud descendant of a unique and beautiful culture. She accepts the training taught to her at the school for HER own purposes only - she wants to use what she learns to go back to her people and help them, in whatever way she can. In this way, I feel that the narrator character is one of the strongest and bravest characters in the Dear America series - willing to take on the world to save her people.

There are some frightening parts here that may not be acceptable for small children. The narrator's closest friend goes into a trance and either dies or (as our narrator is convinced) is buried alive by the foolish medical staff. Other children die of various illnesses, and the medical staff at the school is (probably accurately) shown as not very competent. The teachers are, in general, cruel and vicious and refuse to treat the different tribes as different - they treat all the children as one conglomerate whole of "Indians", which chafes the students and causes much private dissention.

I cannot say with accuracy how much of this book is correct in terms of tribal customs of Hopi, Sioux, etc. I can say that this book seemed, to me, to be very sympathetic and in the spirit of the best of the Dear America books. I would recommend this to any child, and any inaccuracies I would use as a stepping stone to learn more about this subject and to explain how poorly the American Indians were treated.

~ Ana Mardoll

HORRIBLE
I cannot believe this bastardization of a historical event is still on the market. This is horribly inaccurate, using the actual names of Native American children that died, probably because of abuse,malnutrition,ect while they stayed at this horrible boarding school. The author obviously knows NOTHING about this particular tribe's customs and generalizes everything. I would not want any child to read this novel and get the wrong idea about what happened in the past. This does not deserve to be titled a historical fiction, rather it is a book written by an ignorant woman who has NO respect for the deceased, or Native Americans. What was scholastic thinking? ... Read more

Product Description
This is the story of one family, one of the many families that compose the characterof America. For typical Americans, the experiences of our family reflect the experiencesof their own, and those of their neighbors. It is the story of two people who met incollege, fell in love, and married. It is a story about education, about how the collegeexperience was once much different than it is today. It is a story about racialdiscrimination, of how despicable things were, of our experiences related to theintegration of Little Rock Central High school, of my refusal to accept an offered jobas personal secretary to the infamous Governor Orville Faubus. It is a telling of ourdifficulties in raising a gifted child - a child that failed the seventh grade, wasskipped into high school, left high school early to attend and graduate from college. Itis celebration of the joys associated with the adoption of a child. It is the story of afamily dog, of a little poodle we thought to be the world's best and most amusing pet.It is a story about neighbors, about the many good, honest, charitable citizens of thisgreat country. It relates one of the many tragedies of the Vietnam War; the story of alittle brother, one of the great kids in America, who grew in front of our eyes, fromgrade school to high school, as a college student, as a cadet in Navy flight school, anddied a hero killed in Vietnam. It tells of the untimely death of a wife, mother, andgrandmother. Ultimately, it is a story of faith, of one family's faith in the Creatorthat gives direction to every American story. ... Read more

Product Description
Known as Slow when he was little, Native American Sitting Bull becomes one of the greatest chiefs ever known, in an easy-to-read biography that recounts his adventures from the battle of Little Big Horn to Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great children's resource and easy reading.
As a first grade teacher, I find this book to be a wonderful, well written, resource book for any classroom or children's library.Itprovides simple and accurate information in a compassionate, althoughprotectively realistic, easily understood manner.This easy-to-read bookprovides the reader with an enjoyable and meaningful reading experience. ... Read more

Product Description

When best friends Tyler Bohannon and Isaac Peerce decide to head West in search of adventure, fortune, and new beginnings, they leave everything they know and love behind in order to make a fresh start and forget the pain of their past. Now that Tyler's father is dead and his mother has remarried, he longs for a home of his own, especially one that doesn't include his new stepfather. Isaac, a freed slave, is looking for a place where he won't be judged by his race. The boys get more adventure than they bargained for as they are misled by seemingly trustworthy individuals into one dangerous situation after another. And as the boys struggle to survive on the frontier, their friendship is tested...just when they need each other the most.

Patricia Calvert has crafted a rousing novel that explores issues of race and identity, loyalty and friendship in the rugged, unforgiving world of the American West in Betrayed!, the final novel of the acclaimed trilogy that began with Bigger and Sooner. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

end of trilogy
this is the story of tyler and issac adventures when they set of to the west to find there place in the world. When they are given up as slaves to an Indian tribe, Thier world changes dramatcly. Tyler, who is white , is treated badly, while Issac, Ablack former slave, is treated with respect. Tyler is very confused at this. He realizes he is jealous, and begins to question how he treats other people, including Issac, and his own brother. Tyler realizes he has had privliges just because of who he is and the color of his skin. Tyler desperatly wants to escape yet Issac, who has never been treated so well is thinking of staying. This book is more than your simple action adventure story. It explores friendship, race, loyality, and other difficult choices that a boy must make before he becomes a man. This is the follow up to the excellent Bigger, and then Sooner.
All these stories are highly reccommended ... Read more

Product Description

In this biography, Gary Anderson chronicles of life of the renowned victor of the Battle of Little Big Horn, legendary Lakota Chief Sitting Bull.

For many decades, historians have chalked up the results of Little Big Horn to Colonel’s Custer’s faulty strategy of attack, and remember Sitting Bull as the lame duck leader who triumphed only because of Custer’s mishap.  Gary Clayton Anderson, in this riveting biography, reveals a new interpretation of this crucial conflict on the high plains.

The titles in the Library of American Biography Series make ideal supplements for American History Survey courses or other courses in American history where figures in history are explored.  Paperback, brief, and inexpensive, each interpretive biography in this series focuses on a figure whose actions and ideas significantly influenced the course of American history and national life. In addition, each biography relates the life of its subject to the broader themes and developments of the times.

Customer Reviews (4)

An interesting look into the religious and political structure of the Souix
In Sitting Bull and the Paradox of Lakota Nationhood, Gary C. Anderson presents a innovative biography that efficiently uses the life and experiences of Lakota Chief Sitting Bull to uncover the fractural intricacies of Lakota political, religious, and cultural structure. Anderson brings a powerful combination of ethno history, documents, and first hand accounts into play throughout the biography, seamlessly exposing the harsh realities of the plains and the paradox that was the Lakota nation.

If any one common phrase could describe the greatest conflict of the Lakota nation, it is "United we stand, divided we fall." Nationhood is a paradox to the Lakota people. They are unable to come together to face threats like the nation Sitting Bull spends his life trying to achieve. In a moment of truth, the Lakota nation, gathered together for the Sun Dance, destroys American troops under Custer. Despite the unshakable power offered by an unified Lakota, "By August...the great village broke up...the dispersal signaled the beginning of the end for Lakota nationhood." (113) In Little Big Horn, Sitting Bull catches a glimpse of unity, leaving him with a haunting, driving dream of freedom that follows him to the grave.

Anderson plunges into the meat of the matter by covering Sitting Bull's meteoric rise to power in the crucial years preceding the decimation of his people. He unfolds the complex societies and relationships between the tribes through Sitting Bull's interactions with Lakota male sodalities, family, and other power players within the nation, setting the stage and preparing his audience for the destructive force of factionalism that splits the Lakota.

Faced with the deadly threat of an aggressively expansive United States, the Lakota nation shatters, divided on how to respond to the threat.
While Sitting Bull and the Paradox of Lakota Nationhood is a biography about Sitting Bull, it covers the struggles of the entire Lakota nation and raises eerie similarities to the stark factions that exist in the American government today.Anderson brings into focus the power struggles and disagreement, among both the tribes and even Sitting Bull's own following. Unable to stand together, chiefs like Red Cloud of the Oglalas accept the treaties and reservations offered by the United States and others take what they see as the only path to freedom. The actions of Red Cloud and Sitting Bull highlight a terrible truth: leaders can divide a nation, even while trying to protect and help the same people.

Anderson's work has an interesting twist when it comes to the spirituality aspect of Sitting Bull's life. Sitting Bull gains influence and position not only through his leadership abilities, but also through his status as a "wicasa wakan," a man who possessed the ability to see visions, to understand the past, and to communicate with animals. Unlike a traditional historian, Anderson gives Sitting Bull full credence, full faith when it comes to his mystical abilities, allowing the reader a refreshing look into Lakota religious outlook.

Sitting Bull drives home more information about the Lakota in 196 pages than most students learn in their lifetimes. Its small size, innovative approach, and excellent writing provide a text that could truly serve a political science or history undergraduate in exploring a fascinating conflict of the past.

Great book
A very telling tale of the cruel treatment of the Lakota by the American Government. Sitting Bull's story is truly inspirational, and it really makes you wonder what America would've really been like if Native Americans and the government could've coexisted. The injustices in this book speak volumes, and has really sparked a strong interest in Native American history.

Great book, I strongly recommend it.

Good book
I read the book but it wasn't the version i needed which was my fault. good book.

mandatory reading
Great book for the class I am taking.Not sure I would have ever read it since I am not a cowboys and indian buff. ... Read more

Product Description
Winner of the 1995 Christopher Award "Books for Young People" Category.This best seller by the innovative team of Matthaei, Grutman and Cvijanovic is a visually stunning fictional account of a young nineteenth-century Sioux warrior’s quest for knowledge that takes him from the plains of his childhood to a far-off boarding school where he learns the ways of the white world and the value of his own traditions.A hand-calligraphed tribute to the narrative pictographs recorded by Plains artists in the ruled ledgerbooks they acquired in trade, the weaving of Cvijanovic’s richly detailed original illustrations in the "ledger" style into a simply written story inspired by actual events holds appeal for young readers and those who wish to learn about American Indian art and history. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Unique Book
I think this is the third time I've purchased this book. It's a great one to give to a young boy, which I've done a couple of times. But this time, I'm putting a copy in my own library. It's a keeper!

Happy With Purchase
I am very happy with this book.However, I was under the impression that it was a copy from an original journal kept by a Native American.The information on the back page indicates this is not so. The colors and pictures depict a contrast of cultures and it is still a worth while book.

A Native American Story
I received this book in a very timely manner.The price was excellent.This was by far one of the best stories I have ever read about Native Americans.Sad to some degree but really informative.I am so impressed with Amazon.com's web site. Thank you Amazon.

Beautiful homage to the ledgebook storytelling of the Plains Indians
*The Ledgerbook of Thomas Blue-Eagle* is a beautifully designed and constructed book that harkens back to the ledgerbook storytelling of the Plains Indians, especially the young students of the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania. From the marbled endpapers to the ruled and "textured" pages that are the backdrop of this book's storytelling, this is a well executed picture book for all ages.

This book is the fictitious story of Thomas Blue-Eagle, a young student at the Carlisle School who uses "the white man's language" to relate who he is and where he comes from. Illustrated in a pictograph style, Blue-Eagle's story is a poignant imagining of the real-life stories of the Plains Indians at the end of the 19th Century.

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A Guide to my Book Rating System:

1 star = The wood pulp would have been better utilized as toilet paper.
2 stars = Don't bother, clean your bathroom instead.
3 stars = Wasn't a waste of time, but it was time wasted.
4 stars = Good book, but not life altering.
5 stars = This book changed my world in at least some small way.

A superb, multilcultural, timeless, educational masterpiece
Of the many excellent reviews of this book - starred in PW, for example - why did you choose the Kirkus Review's?The Ledgerbook was supervised, vetted and blessed by Arthur Amiotte, a Sioux Elder, with more credentials than you can count.A leading advocate of the power of education, Mr. Amiotte 's approval of and great delight in the authenticity of this book has obviously been overlooked in the KR reviewer's research. Throughout the entire country, this book has been cited again and again by educators and parents alike as being the most powerful, interactive teaching tool they've come across in years, not to mention being an extraordinry feast for the eyes. Please research your reviews before choosing the one that will (incorrectly in this case) represent the book to your many readers.Subjecting an extraordinary book to bad PR out of ignorance should be beneath you ... Read more

Product Description
A Caldecott Medalist turns to an ancient Plains Indian myth for this brilliantly illustrated tale about why crows "talk" all the time. Full-color illustrations. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

The Lesson of Sharing the Earth
The crow chief, a brilliantly white bird, is responsible for a famine among human beings. The humans respond with HOPE and their hope is rewarded by CHANGE, as the crow chief is compelled to learn a lesson of "community" and inter-relatedness, a lesson that results in turning his feathers a beautiful jet black.

The text of this book for young children is elegantly simple and warm in spirit, but as always, it's the stunning illustrations that make the book very special. Paul Goble does not base his drawings on any traditional Native American art, yet the drawings evoke the awe and grandeur of the Native American spirit at its purest. Goble's works belong in a museum, even if it's only the museum of your child's memory. ... Read more