Echohawk

Rating:
Summary: Echohawk
Review: Adventure of the Indians

Echohawk is an Indian and all this weird stuff happens like his father didn't find any deer, the starrfire almost went out, and the nets got ripped. So the men were going to take all the boys to a new hunting ground and he shot some deer in the new land and the sachem told he should us a musket now after his hunt. He and he's father are going to get the guns from the English men. But, for them to get the gun they must trade for it so they traded their bear skin for 3 rifles. So they returned to their camp grounds were he had a vision.

This book is ok if you like the way the Indians do the way they think that they should do. I thought that Indians didn't have visions and I thought that they don't have muskets either. I don't know if she added anything to it or was it all true? But it's an ok book and I liked all the animals running for their lives, and the Indians were so dangerous. I think that the legend of Johnny was like this book because it's about a white boy who was raised by Indians.

Rating:
Summary: Echohawk
Review: At first I was skeptical about reading "Echohawk" but as I started to read it, it really held my attention and it turned out to be a great book. It is about a boy who is taken by the Mohicans and the boy lives the way the Indians do for 8 years. His adoptive father, Glickihigan, sends Echohawk and his little brother, Bamaineo, to school to learn English. When he finds out that the teacher is going to take him to Boston, he runs away with his brother.

Rating:
Summary: A Prequel to "The Last of the Mohicans?"
Review: When I read Lynda Durrant's "Echohawk," I got the feeling that she had been heavily influenced to write this story by "The Last of the Mohicans," not the James Fennimore Cooper novel, but the outstanding 1992 movie which starred Daniel Day-Lewis as Hawkeye.

At age 4, Jonathan Starr was taken captive by Mohican Indians, adopted into the family of the warrior Glickihigan, and renamed Echohawk. For eight years, he lives among the Mohicans, forgetting his real family, and yearning for the day he can take his place as a man in the tribe. Although, Echohawk knows that he was born white, and indeed faces prejudice from members of the tribe due to his skin color, he really does not dwell on why he has come to live among the Mohicans. However, his adopted father decides that Echohawk has reached an age when he should be allowed to decide whether he wishes to remain a Mohican or return to the people he was born to. So Glickihigan enrolls Echohawk and his blood son, a mischevious seven year old called Bamaineo, in a whiteman's school and has them board at the schoolteacher's home. Glickihigan wants his sons to be able to speak English and understand the whites' ways so they can survive in a world that is coming to be dominated by the Europeans, but he also wants Echohawk to make a decision on who he will be in life.

Of course, being immersed in the whiteman's world triggers Echohawk's memories of his former life as Jonathan. These memories cause him to recall his real family and ask the question: what happened to them? And just as important, what was Glickihigan's involvement in how a white boy called Jonathan Starr ended up living as a Mohican called Echohawk?

Durrant seems to have written a story that could be very well be construed as a sort of "The Last of the Mohicans: The Early Years" with Glickihigan as Chingachgook, Bamaineo as Uncus, and Echohawk as Hawkeye. In fact, Durrant even describes the destruction of the Mohicans from disease and thus sets the stage for Glickihigan and Bamaineo to be "the last of the Mohicans." As stated before Durrant seems to be more influenced by the film than Cooper's novel, in that, like the movie, the Hawkeye-like character, Echohawk, is the adopted son of the Chingachgook-like character, Glickihigan, and not just a friend as in the novel. Also, Echohawk is starting to develop the skills of an outstanding hunter and marksman- how Hawkeye like!

I think young boys between the age of 9-12 might enjoy this book especially if they have interest in American Indians and history. However, it's not exactly an action packed saga, but more of a coming of age story of a boy figuring out his past and what his future will be. And thus, it may not appeal to boys looking for a pure adventure story. Finally, Durrant has written a sequel to this book called "Turtle Clan Journey." It would be interesting to know whether she continues to write about Echohawk and, if so, does she plan on letting him grow into a juvenile literature version of Daniel Day-Lewis' Hawkeye?