A Reward for Josefina

History, a great story and an authentic historical craft! Not only that, but just the right size for girl-sized hands. A+++++++ Cannot be beat!

This is another one of the American Girls Short Stories series about Josefina Montoya, a nine-year-old girl living in the New Mexico of 1824. In this book, when the family goes searching for pine nuts, Josefina's father offers a reward for the one who gathers the most, and Josefina can't wait to collect the most and impress her aunt Dolores. But, when she is ordered to stay at camp and watch her nephews, Josefina is crushed. She refuses to give in though, and seeks a way to do both what she is told, and what she wants to do! The final chapter of this book looks at rancho life in 1824, and gives directions for making a pastel (a spicy pie that includes pine nuts). As always, Jean-Paul Tibbles has produced some excellent illustrations that add a great deal to this already excellent book. My daughter and I both highly enjoyed this book, and we recommend it to you.

"A Reward for Josefina" is the first Josefina short story that was published. It is set in the Fall shortly after Tia Dolores's arrival to Josefina's family, possibly putting it shortly before or during the time period in "Josefina Learns a Lesson". Tia Dolores is a new adult in the family, and Josefina desparately wants her to think of Josefina as being special. The family and their hired hands go out to gather pinon nuts (pine nuts from a Pinon tree), and as a motivator, a reward is offered to the one who gathers the most. Josefina hopes it will be her, until she is left behind to tend to her oldest sister's two young sons. Josefina and her three year old nephew, Juan, find a way to gather the biggest treasure of nuts without leaving their camp site. Somehow, the reward, a cone of sugar, has run off with a squirrel (in exchange for the nuts?), but Josefina finds the reward that she is looking for.