Blood On The River: James Town, 1607

Blood On The River: James Town, 1607 - Elisa Carbone
2009 Rebecca Caudill Award Nominee
Viking Press
ISBN: 0-670-06060-7

My rating: 5 out of 5

This book is up for the Rebecca Caudill Award for 2009, and it definitely deserves it. The story begins with action right away and it does not end. Once you start reading, you will not want to stop; I started and finished it in only three sittings in one day.

I really liked how the main character, Samuel, really evolved and transformed throughout the course of the book. I appreciated that his last name is not revealed until after you read the story and we find out that he was real.

I especially liked how the author portrays the native tribes. She really gives them a voice and shows how the European settlers had an impact on their culture. She shows that the natives were not "savages," but they were also not saints either. This book also shows what the relationship between John Smith and Pocahontas was probably really like, as opposed to what Disney may have led people to believe. The afterword provides a great deal of information and tells the reader why certain things were written the way they were.

"Blood On The River: James Town, 1607" by Elisa Carbone is an excellent historical-fiction book that would be fantastic to use when discussing early colonies in the Americas.