Bearstone

I bought this book using expideted shipping, it was a book for my son's class work. It took over 16 days for it to arrive, I wanted it within 3 days of purchase because he was using it in class. By the time the book arrived we had purchased it elsewhere and the class was finished reading it. The shipping cost was more than the price of the book and was a waste.

A half Ute , half Navajo is wild and alone. School has failed and his relatives are failing him. He just in time finds an old man to father him. It is a rough story and the boy who calls himself lone bear because of a blue stone he found in an burial cave of the ancient ones. A story or redemption and friendship that grows to love. Very well written and with mining and hunting, besides horses and ranching. Peach trees growing where they aren't supposed to be able to...

Bearstone is about a boy named Cloyd who goes to live with an elderly man named Walter. On one of his adventures he finds the turquoise stone that represent a bear. The bear stone reflected on how he acted throughout the book. For example he cut Walter's peach trees to the middle so they would die slowly. The first couple of chapters were pretty boring, but keep reading and it will get a lot better. Read Bearstone to find out about Cloyd and Walter's life.

One heck of a book. One of Will Hobbs' greatest books yet.

We listened to a audio reading of Bearstone and Beardance on a recent long car trip with our eight-year old son. The books really captured the imagination of us adults, while our son was more interested in the action/adventure themes and a bit less able to take in the emotional and spiritual content. The stories deal with the maturation of a Native American "bad kid". The introductory hook-in is a bit contrived and never resolved, and the teacher character, the wildlife biologist character, and even the kindly old man character are a little bit predictable and thus unrealistic. However the real strengths of the book are the evocations of the southwestern US mountain landscapes, of wildlife, animal behaviour, hunting, and the complex idea of an animal totem and affinity with the natural world. These complex ideas are felt rather than intellectually understood and the author uses language well to bring them out. The ending of Beardance in particular ties together a lot of themes about animals as guardian spirits and helpers and in doing so encourages a respectful view of the natural world. Great books I think for "wild" teen-age boys with enough action to keep them hooked in....buts lets hear from some kids.