JOURNEY OF
THE PALE BEAR
by
SUSAN FLETCHER
Middle Grade / Medieval Historical Fiction
(grades 3-7)
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Date of Publication: October 2, 2018
Paperback: October 1, 2019
Paperback: October 1, 2019
Number of Pages: 302
***Scroll down for the giveaway!***
A runaway boy befriends a polar bear that’s being transported from Norway to London in this lyrical and timeless adventure story about freedom, captivity, and finding a family.
***Scroll down for the giveaway!***
A runaway boy befriends a polar bear that’s being transported from Norway to London in this lyrical and timeless adventure story about freedom, captivity, and finding a family.
The polar bear is a royal bear, a gift from the King of Norway to the King of England. The first time Arthur encounters the bear, he is shoved in her cage as payback for stealing food. Restless and deadly, the bear terrifies him. Yet, strangely, she doesn’t harm him—though she has attacked anyone else who comes near. That makes Arthur valuable to the doctor in charge of getting the bear safely to London. So Arthur, who has run away from home, finds himself taking care of a polar bear on a ship to England.
Tasked with feeding and cleaning up after the bear, Arthur’s fears slowly lessen as he begins to feel a connection to this bear, who like him, has been cut off from her family. But the journey holds many dangers, and Arthur knows his own freedom—perhaps even his life—depends on keeping the bear from harm. When pirates attack and the ship founders, Arthur must make a choice—does he do everything he can to save himself, or does he help the bear to find freedom?
Based on the real story of a polar bear that lived in the Tower of London, this timeless adventure story is also a touching account of the bond between a boy and a bear.
CLICK TO PURCHASE
BRAZOS BOOKSTORE ◆ BLUE WILLOW BOOKSHOP ◆ BOOK PEOPLE AMAZON ◆ BARNES AND NOBLE ◆ INDIEBOUND
BRAZOS BOOKSTORE ◆ BLUE WILLOW BOOKSHOP ◆ BOOK PEOPLE AMAZON ◆ BARNES AND NOBLE ◆ INDIEBOUND
“Drowned
Village”
By
Susan Fletcher
Comment:
I
am fascinated by drowned villages-- don’t know why, exactly. In any
case, the territory of the Low Countries must have been half-land,
half-marsh during the 13th
century, and I couldn’t resist writing a scene with a drowned
village. Arthur is hoping to find some tools there to aid his
survival. After a while, though, I realized that the part of the
novel that takes place in the Low Countries was dragging on way too
long, slowing down the pace of the novel. The drowned village, while
cool (at least, I
thought it was cool), was not necessary . I cut a lot of Low
Countries scenes, but this is the one that was hardest to let go.
It
was still morning when, in a boggy patch near a stream, I glimpsed
something that looked manmade a little way off, to the north. It
seemed like a ruined roof, and maybe some leaning, wattle walls. An
abandoned farmstead, maybe? A village? It was unlikely that anyone
would live in such a place, but still...
I
hesitated. The bear had moved some way ahead of me and, though he
never let me fall too far behind, I didn’t know what he would do if
I went off on my own, away from the path he had chosen. Would he
wait for me? Or would he just go along on his way?
I
had a feeling he would wait. We had become… companions.
I
called for the bear, to alert him, then set off toward the farmstead,
or village, or whatever it was.
It
didn’t take me long to reach it, though I had to wade through boggy
water nearly the entire way. And it was a village—or must have
been. Maybe it had been at the edge of a lake at one time, but the
lake had grown, and now the houses stood in shallows of the lake
itself. Most of the houses had collapsed; they were only mounds of
wood beams and twigs and mud just below the surface of the water.
But the few walls and roofs of those houses nearest dry land still
jutted into the air.
It
was strangely quiet. A heron perched on a piece of ruined thatch and
stared into the water. A bullfrog croaked, lazy and low. A
dragonfly buzzed past my ear, and a warm breeze whispered through the
reeds.
I
wondered what had happened to the people who had once lived here.
Had the waters come gradually, giving them time to prepare? Or did
the village flood all at once?
And…
Had they left anything useful behind?
Flints,
for instance. I would sell my soul for a fire-making flint!
I
moved into the water, waded toward the nearest building. The door
had rotted off its hinges long ago. It was a tiny cottage, as small
as one of the outlying sheds on my stepfather’s steading. Light
cut slantwise through the gashes in the walls, through holes in the
roof. It smelled of moss and of mud and of moldy things. The water,
clotted with lily pads, rose past my knees. I doubted this place
would survive the storms of the coming winter. The water was black
and dangerous. Anything could be down there—something sharp, or
something to trip over, or a snake. I could see no sign of anything
left behind, but just in case I forced myself to scoot my feet along
the flat surface where the clay floor had once been, hoping to
stumble across a waterlogged basket or a wooden chest—anywhere a
family might keep its flints and tools.
But
I found nothing. Discouraged, I moved to the next cottage, where I
met with the same luck.
It
was in the ruins of a fourth cottage that I saw it—a leather bag
tied to the top of the beam that had once supported the roof. One
end of the beam had fallen, as the wall that supported it had
collapsed. I straddled the beam and shinnied up, clutching the
scythe in one hand. At the top I sliced through the leather thong
that held the bag to the beam and took the bag down with me.
It
was bigger than had first appeared, and heavy. I carried it to dry
land and untied the leather drawstring that held it shut.
A
short knife, wrapped around with linen. A fishhook. A fishnet. A
hatchet. A small iron cooking pot. A ball of twine. Two snares, of
a size to catch rabbits. And, clear to the bottom of the bag… a
flintstone.
Eureka!
ACCOLADES AND PRAISE FOR
JOURNEY OF THE PALE BEAR:
Honor Book, Golden Kite Awards, 2019
Vermont's 2019-2020 Dorothy Canfield Fisher list
2020 Oklahoma Sequoyah Book Award Children's
–Katherine Applegate, Newbery Medal-winning author of The One and Only Ivan
“I loved every single thing about this large-hearted and riveting medieval adventure.” — William Alexander, National Book Award-winning author of Goblin Secrets
Although Susan loves to write about long-ago and faraway places, she can’t bring those worlds to life without grounding them in the details of this one.
-------------------------------------
***GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY! GIVEAWAY!***
THREE AUTOGRAPHED COPIES OF JOURNEY OF THE PALE BEAR
OCTOBER 10-20, 2019
(U.S. Only)
VISIT THE OTHER GREAT BLOGS ON THE TOUR
10/10/19
|
Excerpt
| |
10/10/19
|
Excerpt
| |
10/11/19
|
Review
| |
10/12/19
|
Guest Post
| |
10/12/19
|
Author Interview
| |
10/13/19
|
Review
| |
10/14/19
|
Review
| |
10/15/19
|
Guest Post
| |
10/15/19
| ||
10/16/19
|
Review
| |
10/17/19
|
Review
| |
10/18/19
|
Guest Post
| |
10/18/19
|
Scrapbook
| |
10/19/19
|
Review
| |
10/19/19
|
Review
|
blog tour services provided by
No comments:
Post a Comment