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Legendary scout Kit Carson's sassy daughter Adaline, or Falling Star, as her Arapaho mother called her before succumbing to cholera, is mute with grief. Her widowed father has left her with his racist, cruel relatives until he returns from his Rocky Mountain expedition. But her cousins' treatment of her is more than she can bear. Instead of allowing her to go to school, they force her to work as a servant in the schoolhouse. Due to her "half-breed" status, she is barely considered human. Her mixed heritage causes her plenty of internal confusion, as well. "I'm a mix, I reckon, of white and red blood, and also a jumbled love for free roaming and the Fruits of Civilization, which is what Doc Hempstead calls reading, writing, and geography." Adaline's intelligence and sensitivity keep her alive when her impulsiveness provokes her to run away to find her father. Her bravery and gritty frontier resourcefulness rival her father's, but her compassion is all her own. In this lively and touching account, Mary Pope Osborne has fictionalized the life of Kit Carson's real but little-known daughter. Osborne is the renowned author of the very popular Magic Tree House series, as well as many other books for children and young adults, including a collection of yarns about American folk heroes called American Tall Tales. (Ages 9 and older) --Emilie Coulter
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