This Tender Land is so much more than an homage to Huckleberry Finn. William Kent Krueger is so immensely talented at creating living, breathing characters and setting them in a landscape that you can see and hear and touch.
Mose's Indian name means "broken to pieces," and so many things are broken to pieces in this marvelous book, first and foremost the lives of the characters. It's how hard they try to put those pieces back together that warms your heart.
More and more, I'm coming across books that are set during the Depression. It's such an incredible time period, and Krueger brings it to life. Rootless people with no money, no hope, and no homes. One cataclysm after another that they must endure. No wonder thirteen-year-old Odie believes God is a tornado. Another of the strong elements in This Tender Land is showing what so many children were forced to endure in Indian boarding schools throughout the United States and Canada.
With a rock-solid foundation of a setting, I couldn't help but be swept along with those four children in their canoe as they paddled down one river after another. On the run, hungry, scared, encountering people from all walks of life, and being placed in all sorts of situations. Krueger is superb when it comes to depicting the strength of the human spirit and the beauty of the land. If you want to be fully immersed in the next book you read, pick up a copy of This Tender Land.
Mose's Indian name means "broken to pieces," and so many things are broken to pieces in this marvelous book, first and foremost the lives of the characters. It's how hard they try to put those pieces back together that warms your heart.
More and more, I'm coming across books that are set during the Depression. It's such an incredible time period, and Krueger brings it to life. Rootless people with no money, no hope, and no homes. One cataclysm after another that they must endure. No wonder thirteen-year-old Odie believes God is a tornado. Another of the strong elements in This Tender Land is showing what so many children were forced to endure in Indian boarding schools throughout the United States and Canada.
With a rock-solid foundation of a setting, I couldn't help but be swept along with those four children in their canoe as they paddled down one river after another. On the run, hungry, scared, encountering people from all walks of life, and being placed in all sorts of situations. Krueger is superb when it comes to depicting the strength of the human spirit and the beauty of the land. If you want to be fully immersed in the next book you read, pick up a copy of This Tender Land.
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