Wild Man Island - Softcover

Grade 5-9-Set in contemporary Alaska, this adventure yarn follows 14-year-old Andy as he nears the safe conclusion of a guided sea kayaking trip with the nagging thought that he ought to visit the nearby site of his father's accidental death nine years earlier. Sneaking off from the group on the last day, he is soon blown away by a nasty storm. Washed ashore on wild and remote Admiralty Island, he faces starvation, food poisoning, cold, bears, wolves, and the mysterious bearded giant of a man he calls "the Wild Man." Neatly tying together strands of the plot involving his archaeologist father's theories about the early exploration and settlement of North America with episodes that involve caving, wildlife, and a huge Newfoundland dog, Hobbs resolves the story's complexities in ways that protect the characters' integrity and, to a large extent, readers' need for credibility. The author's note explains the mixture of personal experience and collected facts and fictions on which the book hangs in such a way that interested readers might well be persuaded to speculate about the theories posited or investigate those theories with additional research of their own.
Joel Shoemaker, Southeast Junior High School, Iowa City, IA
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