Lewis and Clark

Children's Literature

Meriwether Lewis and William Clark shared command of the 18041806 eXpedition to find a direct water route to the Pacific Ocean. Their discoveries included friendly and hostile Indians, animal species never before recorded, and routes over land and water that they would map for those who followed them. This book emphasizes not only the eXploration, but also the recording of facts, which allows readers to know what they ate, how they communicated with the Indians and how they sent their research materials back to the President. The book contains many eXcerpts from Lewis and Clark's travel journals and some illustrations from the trip. It is part of the "In Their Own Words" series. From these primary sources, readers will come to understand the hardships of the discoverers' lives, the thrill of never knowing what is around the neXt corner, and the eXplorer's confusion of not knowing what they have really seen. 1999, Scholastic, $12.95 and $4.50. Ages 9 to 12. Reviewer: Chris Gill <%ISBN%> 0439147492

School Library Journal

Gr 4-6-These titles have "reluctant reader" written all over them. They are decently packaged with well-chosen and credited photographs, but the large-print, generously spaced text is written in short, choppy sentences, losing the narrative flow and the drama of history well told. In Lewis and Clark, the expedition is said to be traveling "mostly north" toward the Gates of the Mountains, after their portage of the Great Falls on the Missouri River, an egregious geographical error. Even more bizarre is the use of the term "Chopponish" for the much more commonly known Nez Perce. Expedition journals used the uncommon appellation, but there is no footnote explaining the connection. Unfortunately, in telling about the expedition's various encounters with Native Americans, Sullivan emphasizes the potentially threatening, unfriendly, and fearsome aspects. Paul Revere also contains factual errors but suffers even more from oversimplification. There is no discussion of the American colonial system as context for the independence movement and revolution; events such as the First Continental Congress are mentioned with no explanation. For a title on Lewis and Clark that is truly "in their own words" see Peter and Connie Roop's Off the Map: The Journals of Lewis and Clark (Walker, 1993), and for an excellent, accessible history, Rhoda Blumberg's The Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark (Morrow, 1995) is hard to beat. Jean Fritz's And Then What Happened, Paul Revere? (Coward-McCann, 1973) remains a favorite account of the silversmith's daring role in revolutionary America. Given the sloppy effort, these titles are marginal.-Nancy Collins-Warner, Neill Public Library, Pullman, WA Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.