Set in the thickets of late nineteenth-century Florida, the story follows Jody Baxter, a boy living a precarious existence on a frontier farm. His father, Penny, struggles to extract a living from the sandy soil while protecting their livestock from a marauding bear. Amidst this isolation, Jody adopts an orphaned fawn named Flag. As the deer matures into a yearling, it begins to destroy the family’s vital food crops, forcing a confrontation between Jody’s emotional attachment and the brutal realities of survival in the scrub.
This book serves readers interested in the historical realities of American pioneer life and the difficult transition from childhood to adulthood. It attracts those who value detailed descriptions of the natural world and the moral complexities of subsistence living. Readers finish the book with a concrete understanding of how environmental pressures dictate human choices. They see the exact moment when a young person must abandon innocence to accept the heavy responsibilities required to maintain a family’s survival in the wilderness.
Contemplative and clear-cut; an easy read.
Best for readers like The Story Seeker. Which reader are you?
- Published
- 1938
- Language
- EN
