Island of the Blue Dolphins

Title: Island of the Blue Dolphins
Author: Scott O'Dell
Publisher: Random House Children's Books, 1987
Pages: 204
Reading Level: 9-11
Genre: Historical Fiction

Summary: Karana is a young girl who is the daughter of the Chief of her tribe.  One day the Aleuts come for a different land asking if they can hunt sea otter.  The Chief gave the go ahead as long as they paid them.  When it came time to leave, the Aleuts didn't pay as much as they were expected to.  A battle broke out and the Chief was killed.  The knew Chief decided to take his tribe to a knew land.  On the night they were leaving, Karana's little brother, Ramo was missing.  Karana jumps off the boat and swims back to the island to save her younger brother.
Ramo was then killed by a pack of wild dogs left on the island.  Karana is enraged and makes spears to kill the dogs to get her revenge.  She injured the leader of the pack, but then nurses him back to health and grows to love him.  She named him, Rontu.
The Aleuts return and Karana hides in a cave that made her home.  She befriends one of the Aleuts girls named Tutok.  They exchange gifts and when Tutok leaves, Karana realizes how much she misses her.  Later Rontu dies.  Karana then finds a pup which was one of Rontu's and names him Rontu-Aru.  She then see ships sails and gets dressed.  She then goes to the shore and waits for them to come for her.  They make her new clothes and take her and Rontu-Aru to the Mission in Santa Barbara, California.

Reaction: I loved this book.  It is one of my favorites that I have read in a long time.  I thought that it really set a detailed image of the life that Karana was living and I was able to feel bad and sorry for her as she had so many trials.  The ending was good and made the book that much better.

Potential Problems: This book had a lot of really hard names to pronounce and I struggled with many of them.  Being 9 years old and trying to sound out theses names would be challenging.  Also the chapters were long and didn't really have a lot of stopping spots.

Recommendations: I really recommend this book to everyone.  I think that everyone could benefit from it and gain a lot.  It is easy to understand and follow along.  I will read this book to my children or my class because of what an impact it had on me.