{"id":2190,"date":"2011-02-03T22:28:07","date_gmt":"2011-02-04T02:28:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=2190"},"modified":"2011-02-03T23:21:00","modified_gmt":"2011-02-04T03:21:00","slug":"review-of-forge-by-laurie-halse-anderson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=2190","title":{"rendered":"Review of Forge, by Laurie Halse Anderson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Forge<\/em><\/p>\n

by Laurie Halse Anderson<\/p>\n

Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2010. 292 pages.
\nStarred Review
\n2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out<\/a>: #6 Children’s Fiction<\/p>\n

Curzon is a slave who has just escaped as this book opens. But unfortunately he soon finds himself hiding in a ravine right in the middle of a Revolutionary War battle. Instead of staying nicely hidden, he intervenes when a redcoat is about to kill a young Patriot soldier. One thing leads to another, and he finds himself enlisting as a Patriot soldier, claiming to be free.<\/p>\n

The army ends up wintering in Valley Forge. Curzon is in a company with the boy whose life he saved, and he gains friends and enemies among them. Readers get a fresh view of the deprivations the army suffered at Valley Forge, and will feel like now they really know what it was like.<\/p>\n

However, things change for Curzon when his former master shows up.<\/p>\n

I already knew that Laurie Halse Anderson is an outstanding author from having read Speak.<\/em> So I wasn’t surprised at how well she crafted this book. It’s a gripping story and gives you fresh insight into the Revolutionary War.<\/p>\n

The only drawback for me was that having recently read The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing<\/em>, I felt like I’d already read the definitive story of a black soldier during the Revolutionary War, and I wasn’t really ready to read about more suffering. Now, mind you, Forge<\/em> is for a younger audience. The story is simpler (though still complex — it’s easy to be simpler than Octavian Nothing<\/em>) and the book is wonderfully well-crafted. In a lot of ways I enjoyed Forge<\/em> more. It’s definitely a different story, since Octavian fought on the British side. It was things like when people got sick, I found myself cringing and bracing myself for the kind of epidemics I read about in the other book. (They didn’t happen.)<\/p>\n

Forge<\/em> is a sequel to Chains<\/em>, but I hadn’t read the first book and followed this one just fine. It did make me want to read Chains,<\/em> though, and read more about Curzon and his friend Isabel.<\/p>\n

I was thinking about my knowledge of History today and realized that I have a much more clear understanding of parts of history that I have read in novel form. And now my ideas about Valley Forge, combined with having visited the site, are much more memorable and vivid than they ever were before. <\/p>\n

Compelling historical fiction from a masterful writer.<\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Childrens_Fiction\/forge.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.<\/p>\n

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