True North: A Novel of the Underground Railroad

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Summary: Quick, different, accurate, & enjoyable.
Review: The story, told from two people's point of view, of a slave's escape from Virginia to Canada in 1858 along the Underground Railroad. Told from the perspective of the slave, Afrika, and a young girl who helps her from Boston to the border, Lucy, this is a fascinating, accurate, and well-told picture of the way the Railroad worked. Not everyone is who they seem, even in Boston, and Lucy's discovery that her Pap ~ grandfather ~ is occasionally a conductor is the least of the surprises. A delightful book, written for early teens, but certainly enjoyable by adults also.

Rating:
Summary: very good
Review: This book was exciting and kept my attention throughout the entire story. The comparison of life in the highest social class at that time and slavery was equally amazing and sad.

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Summary: Alright....
Review: This book, I found was to be good, interesting, yet boring. It didn't have much action, and it was kind of dull. I liked to story, and I liked how we got to know the characters, but this is not one of my favorites. I am glad I read it, because it was intersting, but I don't think people, like me, who are not to hot on history, would enjoy is as much as some other of Kathyrn Laskey's books. By all means, go read it, but just remember, if this is the first book of Laskey's that you have read, go for a better one first. Thanks.

Rating:
Summary: A delightful tale of two teenage girls in the mid 1800's.
Review: This story is suspense-filled and moves quickly to reveal a delicate plot that is easy to follow but takes some mind to fully comprehend. This is a great experience for anyone interested in stories of the Underground Railroad.

Rating:
Summary: Abominable Book
Review: True North is possibly the most abominable novel in the entire cosmos. The two plots (plot 1 being the dillapidated Lucy and her disgusting grandfather, plot 2 is about the slave Afrika escaping from the slave catchers) are underdeveloped pieces of horrible atrocities. The two main characters, Lucy and Afrika, only exacerbated the horror of the vile book. The plots were so simple, I guessed the ending within 20 pages.

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Summary: True North is a true struggle for freedom.
Review: True North was one story that I felt transported to. One minute I was sitting on my bed reading and the next I was in 19th Century Boston. The book is a story of two very different girls whose paths cross. The first is Afrika, a fugitive slave girl who is travelling on the Underground Railroad. Afrika had previously been sexually abused by her overseer and the result, her child, died. The other is a tomboy named Lucy Bradford, who feels out of place amongst her sister's wedding plans and life in Boston. Suddenly, Lucy learns the truth about her beloved grandfather, Pap. He is a conductor on the Underground Railroad. But a sudden tragedy forces Lucy to graduate from childhood forever. Thus on her path to womanhood she meets Afrika; who is depending on Lucy to take Pap's place. I liked this book and was astounded by the realism of the girls' predicaments, while at the same time I thought that parts of True North were unrealistic.

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Summary: FANTASTIC
Review: True North, by Kathryn Lasky, is one of the best books I have read about the Underground Railroad. It tells the parallel stories of Lucy Bradford, the youngest daughter of a well-to-do Boston family, and Afrika, a fourteen-year-old slave girl who is escaping on the Underground Railroad. As the story moves on, the two girl's lives grow closer together, as Lucy discovers a well-kept secret that her grandfather is involved in the Underground Railroad. As Lucy is trying to avoid the seemingly endless parties leading up to her sister Iris's wedding, Afrika is sleeping by day and walking miles upon miles at night, following the stars and the moss to reach Canada and freedom. Kathryn Lasky wrote a masterpiece here, interweaving fact with fiction to create a highly educational and enjoyable story.

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Summary: Truly A Horrid Book
Review: True North, by Kathryn Lasky, is probably the worst book I have ever read, and I am a voracious reader and writer. This story has weak characters who expirence absolutely no feeling or emotion. Lucy, one of the main characters, is a rebellious, annoying character who absolutely fails at capturing the readers interest. She has all kinds of plights that the reader must put up with the get to the slightly more interesting parts about Afrika. Afrika's story, in turn, possessed some good ideas, but the writing was appalling.

Lucy's solving the code at the end of the book was completely impossible. If grown people and scholars could not crack a code, then a 14-year old girl would definitely not be able to, not in the few minutes she had!

The characters, especially the minor ones, were watery and feeble. A word or two was used to describe them but no evidence was given to back them up, or the evidence was contradicting the description. For example, Lucy's sisters. One of the sisters (Oh, all of them had been named after flowers.) was described as mild-mannered, but she is rude and teases her sisters later. Something in this story that had me rolling on the ground laughing, and not in a good way, was Lucy's mother. Her proclamation that Lucy was "absolutely terrible," or whatever she said, was unrealistic. What sane mother would call her daughter that? I mean, really.

The only half-way decent part of this story was the plot. If the author had elaborated more into the characters and made the events more believeable, this woulld have been a meidiocre book.

Overall, I found this book a slap in the face of literature. I tutor second graders in writing and other subjects, and even they can write better! But, if you want to read it, I won't stop you. You can even get it free from my compost heap!

Rating:
Summary: True North
Review: When I started reading the book True North, I really thought it was a very good book. The novel was about two girls who meet and were both headed North to freedom together. My favorite part of the book is when the two girls meet and traveled North to freedom with courage. I really liked the ending of the book because life changed for both of the girls.