Rating: 
Summary: A Tale of the Dust Bowl
Review: This tale of the Dust Bowl, told through a young girl's diary, brings to life the bleak and dusty landscape of Oklahoma during the 1930's. Billie Jo's dreary life is brightened when she plays on her mother's beloved piano until a terrible accident takes her mother's life and leaves scars on Billie Jo's hands and her heart. For those studying the Depression, this story will bring to life the hardships of life in the Dust Bowl.
Rating: 
Summary: Out of the Dust is Excellent
Review: I thought the book was excellent. As a historical fiction novel goes the setting and general circumstances of the dust bowl were realistic. Even the horrible accident that happens to Billy Joe's mother was based on real accounts. Strangers are treated with kindness and compassion. Reading Karen Hesse's 1998 Newberry speach, I found that she had reseached several years worth of newspaper accounts from the Boise City News. The main conficts in the book were Nature vs. Character (the land verse the people) and Character vs. Character (Billy Joe vs. Self : dealing with guilt and grief of her mother's death) Billy Joe's battle within herself was the major conflict. This a very realistic confict for any time period, and many people had to deal with loved ones dying during the dust bowl years. Many terrible accidents happened along with suicides.
Billy Joe is very dynamic character in the book, and the story is told from her point of view. This is extremely important since through her eyes we witness the pain, sorrow and ultimately the growth of her spirit. She changes a great deal throughout the story. And although the father at first seems like a flat character as the story progresses we see that he too is a dynamic character. Like many men of his time he was in charge of the farm work and earning the money. He didn't display his love for his daughter in an obvious fashion, but as the story unfolds we see his love for her. Two of the strongest themes in the book were forgiveness and dealing with the pain that life will bring. Billy Joe had to learn to forgive herself and her father in order to deal with her mother's death. Like many poems this one had many examples of figurative and symbolic language. What sticks out in my mind however is how the land parrelles Billy Joe's and her father's conlficts. After her mom's death Billy Joe and her father start to withdraw and slowly die on the inside just like the land. They all want the rain to give them relief and just like rain did come during the dust bowl the relief usually didn't last long, and neither does the relief that Billy Joe and her father ocasionally come by. They never give up hope though that the some day the rain will come and the plants will grow again, just like they never give up hope, that they will get their own type of rain and will start growing inside again. What an important and worthwhile them to discuss.
Rating:
Summary: EXCELLENT! Abstract & beautifully portrayed.
Review: This novel is simply stirring. Hesse uses rough verse to make an entire novel and to weave story of Billie Jo, though the young girl's eyes. She makes the tiny pieces of human thought into poetry to an amazing degree. Billie Jo is the only child of her Ma and Pa. Ma is uncomfortable in the Oklahoma Dustbowl, sick of dust everywhere and slowing wasting away until she dies after an accidential fire. Her father is a stubborn farmer who refuses to give up on the land he loves with pain. Billie Jo and her father are so alike; quiet and not sure what to make of the silence after Ma's and little Franklin's (the child she was carrying) death. And Billie Jo, who longs for something she can't have in the Dustbowl, who once lived to play the piano, cannot play without enduring severe pain from her burned hands; another pain stolen from her after the fire.
Slowly, she learns the lesson of growing anew in place that has no suitable soil and how starting afresh can be good. A beautiful story and better crafted. Then again, sometimes it was hard to follow Billie Jo. She talks casually and sometimes we don't understand what she is doing. Sometimes the writing is boring, sometimes extremely interesting. You must be captivated by the story to read this book, otherwise I would reccommend you read something less abstract. This book is for people who are able to see art in writing. Happy Reading! -Lia
Rating:
Summary: Out of the Dust
Review: In the book, Out of the Dust, it tells about the struggles that a fourteen-year-old goes through in life. Billie Jo lives in a shack with her father. They don't live in a rich county. Therefore, the schools and houses are not great. They do the best they can with what they have. The troubles all begin when the crops don't grow in the county. The people try to deal with that situation. Then, two major events happen to Billie Jo that will change her life physically and mentally. Now, her family is trying to cope and move on with their lives. Will Billie Jo be able to handle it? Well she finds a way to deal with it. She later realizes that she knows where she belongs. Things seem to be looking up.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Karen Heese Material
Review: I still can't believe Karen Heese wrote this. It's like a social studies book. I've tried to get through this book for I don't know how long but I still haven't finished it. I've read enough to know I don't like it and I would only recomend it to people who like the Laura Ingles Wilder books. It's very old fashioned and well, boring. The plot doesn't have a climax, a begging, or even really an end. It drags on way too long.
If you wanna read a GOOD book by Karen Heese, then read "Music of the Dolphins". That is one of my absolute favorite books. That's why I can't believe she wrote "Out of the Dust". It is way different than Music of the Dolphins, and it didn't take place 100 years ago. Don't judge Music of the Dolphins from reading Out of the Dust, trust me. You wouldn't know they were by the same author if her name wasn't on the book.
Rating:
Summary: a good book
Review: This is a book about a teen girl.She has it real bad first
she loses her mother and than her baby brother.and its all
becaese of gas.the teen girl loves to play the paino but
she doesnt cuz the gas birnt her hands to.
Rating:
Summary: Out of the Dust Critique
Review: If I were to rate the book out of the dust from one to ten, one being the worst and ten being the best, I would give it an eight. I chose an eight because I really liked the style of the book and how it was written, in different poetry forms, but I didn't really like the subject of the book. The dust bowl was a very depressing time because so many people had to give up their homes and their land because the crops wouldn't grow. I don't like sad books as much as I like books with happy endings. I do think that this book was written very well though. The story makes sense and everything seems to flow nicely. Over all I enjoyed the book Out of the Dust and I recommend it to everyone.
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Summary: Out of the Dust
Review: I think this story was one of the best written novels I have ever read. It was tough to put down the book once u started to read it. It was both interesting and exciting, as well as very informational about the dust bowl. This story taught me many things about the dust bowl that I had never known before. This book was also very real about the strugles the people in that time went through. It gave very allaborate details on how one girl dealt with all the struggles. All in all it was a very good book and I would highly recommend it for any person of any age to read. You will thoroughly enjoy it. ...
Rating:
Summary: Out of the Dust Review
Review: Well, before I begin, I want to stay that the book Out of the Dust, is one of my favorite. It is one of my favorites because the plot, characters are awesome! The plot explains the life of a young girl by the name of Billie Jo. Billie Jo is a red haired, long legged, and cheekbones like bike handles type of girl. She lives the in Panhandle of Oklahoma with her Ma, and Daddy. In the beginning Ma is pregnant, and the family is happy. Then a terrible accident occurs, leaving Daddy and Billie Jo alone. Now Daddy and Billie Jo never have gotten along. Then through out the rest of the book, their relationship gets stronger, and stronger. This book is surely a classic. I praise Karen Hesse for her wonderful work. ~Nicole Truskowski
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Summary: Thriller
Review: This story of love, tragedy, and fear, is a great book about the depression and the Dust Bowl. 14-year old Billie Jo narates the story from her point of veiw, giving good perspective from a young persons eyes. Papa is taking the Dust Bowl the hardest, and put a bucket of Kerosine by the cookstove. It starts on fire. Young Billie Jo doesn't know what to do, so throws it out of the house. Mama is coming back into the house, and she starts on fire. Little does the family know that Mama's baby is coming soon, and when she has the little child, Not only Mama dies, but so does Baby Fredrick. To find out how the family is doing, read this awesome book. I was supposed to read it for school, and thought is was going to be boring since it is like a diary. But from the moment I picked it up, I couldn't put it down.
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