On the Long Trail Home - Hardcover

Elizabeth J. Stewart

3.94

18 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0395683610 ISBN 13: 9780395683613

Publisher: Clarion Books, 1994

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In a story set in the 1830s, based on the author's own great-grandmother's life, Meli, a nine-year-old Cherokee girl, and her older brother, Tahliqua, escape the Trail of Tears and brave hardship, peril, and the threat of recapture to make their way home.

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From School Library Journal:

Grade 4-6-Meli, a nine-year-old Cherokee girl, is separated from her family as her people are driven by soldiers from their homes in North Carolina and forced to march to government lands in Oklahoma. Somewhere in Kentucky, she and her older brother find one another, escape, and travel on foot the long way home to a reunion with her father and younger brother. Resolutely she faces hunger and danger from both nature and humans. Meli's solitary thoughts and the formal relationship she has with her brother allow for little of the contacts and dialogue that help define character. Some plot elements are jarring, perhaps because the story is based on true events, which don't always plot well. For instance, Meli discovers the dead body of a murdered woman, an incident that is never resolved. Careful attention has been paid to remaining true to Cherokee cultural norms, such as family relationships and accepted behavior. Stewart also incorporates interesting historical details such as Meli's contact with the Quakers and her understanding of their religious beliefs. A long afterword gives information about the Cherokee people and the Trail of Tears, including the diary entry of a soldier involved in the military action.
Sally Bates Goodroe, Houston Public Library
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist:

Gr. 5-7. A young Cherokee girl, Meli, escapes from the white soldiers who are forcing her captive people on the long trail westward in the 1830s. Meli knows that thousands of Cherokee have died of starvation and disease on the Trail of Tears. First with her older brother and then on her own, she makes her way back to the Appalachian Mountains, from which her people were cruelly driven. In an afterword Stewart says the story is based on her own great-grandmother's experience, and a map shows the Trail of Tears and Meli's homeward journey. The core of the book is her survival story, and that's told with simple realism: how she finds food and shelter; how she swims rivers, scales mountains, and makes her way home. There's no tension or surprise; we know she'll get there. Some of the writing is purposive and over-explanatory, and the history is the most interesting part of the book. Readers will feel the sorrow of Meli's haunting memories: the richness of her early life--and then, her mother and baby sister murdered, her people brutally displaced. Hazel Rochman

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