Walks Alone

KLIATT

To quote KLIATT's May 1998 review of the hardcover edition: Most of us recognize the Apache leaders Cochise and Geronimo, but Victorio, the chief of the Mescalero Apaches, is someone less familiar. Burks turns to the year 1879, as Victorio and his small band are facing their last months of freedom. Hungry, pursued, they flee white men and other Apaches who are scouting for the white men, across the border into Mexican territory—but even there they are hunted. Walks Alone is a young woman from Victorio's band, just old enough to be considering marriage, trained in the skills of her people, and this story is hers. To tell it, Burks apparently used 12 references on the Apaches, mostly university press publications, which are listed at the end of the novel in a bibliography. The hardship is relentless, but Walks Alone has been trained to cope with much of what she faces: death, childbirth, thirst, hunger, evading pursuers, taming horses, cauterizing a wound. Although inured to pain and sacrifice, she also feels deeply as her losses nearly devastate her and her fears threaten to overtake her. The reader learns a great deal about Apaches, about the efforts to conquer them, about the territory in the Southwest where the Apaches lived, and how well they had adapted to that harsh landscape. My only criticism of the novel is that I find the narrative style to be awkward; the word clunky even comes to mind. Many—but not all—sentences are brief: e.g., "Walks Alone shook her head. I cannot. I am in mourning." This style does convey a tense, don't waste my time with words when survival is at stake feeling, but it may also discourage readers, especially older YAs who expectmore challenging literature. The ending is realistically bleak, adhering to the historical truth, which makes a powerful statement. And Walks Alone represents the stoicism of her people. KLIATT Codes: J—Recommended for junior high school students. 1998, Harcourt, 128p, bibliog, 18cm, 97-14738, $6.00. Ages 13 to 15. Reviewer: Claire Rosser; November 2000 (Vol. 34 No. 6)

Children's Literature - Gisela Jernigan

In the 1880s, a band of Warm Springs Apache, led by Victorio, resisted the US Army in an attempt to live on their own land, in their own way. One of the individuals of this group, whose life was risked and forever changed by this struggle, was a strong, resolute teenage girl named Walks Alone. Having experienced the coming of age ceremony that marked her entrance into womanhood, Walks Alone is eager to marry young Little Hawk and begin her new life. Unfortunately, as the novel progresses, she meets many obstacles including attacks on her people, the murder of her mother, hunger, thirst, gunshot wounds, separation from her band and family and finally, capture. The simple, but effective language and fast-paced, exciting plot should make this well researched historical novel appeal to reluctant young adults and readers of both sexes. An epilogue giving some historical background and a bibliography are included. The author does a good job of presenting this piece of Southwest history from the Apache point of view.

VOYA - Hillary Theyer

"Walks Alone" is a young Apache woman whose tribe is on the run from soldiers in 1879. When an attack leaves her and her little brother on their own, Walks Alone sets out to find the rest of her family in Mexico. She then encounters a pregnant woman from a different tribe, and in assisting her is captured and held by soldiers in an open pen until her brother dies. Walks Alone escapes and her quest finally leads her to Mexico, where she is reunited with the young warrior she loves. Her peace does not last long, however, as her tribe is again attacked in a fierce battle. The novel ends with Walks Alone as a captive, but still displaying the true bravery that guided her and her people through all their adversity.

This is a powerful novel with a heroine of enduring spirit, like Karana in Scott O'Dell's Island of the Blue Dolphins (Houghton Mifflin, 1960). Even the secondary characters-Walks Alone's brother, grandmother, and other family members-are fully drawn, and the reader feels their place in Walks Alone's life and in defining who she is. No punches are pulled in describing the violence and hardships suffered, but the characters maintain their integrity throughout, never falling into expected stereotypes.

VOYA Codes: 4Q 4P M (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses, Broad general YA appeal, Middle School-defined as grades 6 to 8).

School Library Journal

Gr 5-8Harsh and sometimes brutal, Walks Alone follows its Apache heroine through a series of difficult situations. The book begins with a raid carried out by Apache scouting for the U.S. government, in which Walks Alone's mother is killed, and ends with the girl's capture, along with other members of Victorio's band, by the Mexican army in 1880. Along the way, she endures privation and injury with fortitude and skill, and without complaint, ably caring for her young brother and a teenage widow with an infant daughter. Apache customs, skills, and religion are seamlessly worked into the text, and the tale's point of view is solely Apache. While this provides an enlightening antidote to various "Anglo"-centric tales of the frontier, it also creates a novel in which there are no "good" Anglos or Mexicans, and no "bad" Apache, except for those in the employ of the "White Eyes." Burks's writing style, both lean and formal, may put off some readers, but it also gives a valuable sense of distance from the grimness of the events, thereby helping to prevent youngsters from feeling overwhelmed by Walks Alone's tragedy. The girl's determination is also a key leavening. An interesting and useful, as well as counterbalancing, book to set alongside G. Clifton Wisler's many novels of the frontier and John Loveday's Goodbye, Buffalo Sky (McElderry, 1997).Coop Renner, Coldwell Elementary-Intermediate School, El Paso, TX

Kirkus Reviews

From Burks (Soldier Boy, 1997, etc.), a brutally effective portrayal of the realities of the destruction of Native American culture. The Warm Springs Apaches, led by Chief Victorio, are refusing to go to the barren reservation set aside for them when they are attacked by "White Eye" soldiers. Walks Alone, a teenage girl, is wounded and separated from the remnants of her people, who are fleeing to Mexico. With her very young brother she is taken in by another band, which is rounded up and imprisoned by the White Eyes. When she attempts to get medicine to save her sick brother, she is beaten, and her brother dies. She finally catches up with her people, but they are attacked again, the men massacred, and the women and children enslaved. Based on the historical events leading up to the Battle of Tres Castillos, this is an unremitting tale of the misery inflicted on Native Americans. Burks, as in the past, pulls no punches, so there is no possibility of a happy ending as Walks Alone is marched off to enslavement; the hopelessness of the ending matches that of her people. Since the story is wholly told through Walks Alone's perspective, the actions of others against her and her people are not only vicious, but utterly bewildering to her as well. (map, bibliography) (Fiction. 11-14)