The Long Way Westward

America, at last! This classic early reader tells an exciting story and is also a good launching pad for classroom and home discussions. The Long Way Westward relates the experiences of two young brothers and their family, immigrants from Sweden, from their arrival in New York through the journey to their new home in Minnesota. This lively sequel to The Long Way to a New Land follows the fortunes of Carl Erik’s family from New York City to the farmlands of Minnesota. "Historically accurate; will attract competent primary-grade readers and will be equally suitable for less able readers in intermediate grades." (School Library Journal) As a fan of this book and its companion, The Long Way to a New Land, put it: "The books describe the difficulty and dangers of the journey in a way that is non-complaining and full of optimism for a new life in America. Teachers, these books are wonderful for integrating with other subjects and topics, such as immigration, westward expansion, steamships, trains, geography, and American life in the 1860s." Author-artist Joan Sandin's grandfather was born in Sweden and immigrated to Wisconsin with his parents in 1882, when he was only two. Joan herself spent time in Sweden and did extensive research to create her well-loved classic books about the immigrant experience.

"We will go to America!" It is 1868, and Carl Erik's family faces starvation in Sweden. As their hopes fade, they must endure a journey over land and sea to reach a better life in a new country thousands of miles away.

The province's premier journalist tells the story he was born to write. No journalist has travelled the back roads, hidden vales and fog-soaked coves of Nova Scotia as widely as John DeMont. No writer has spent as much time considering its peculiar warp and weft of humanity, geography and history. The Long Way Home is the summation of DeMont's years of travel, research and thought. It tells the story of what is, from the European view of things, the oldest part of Canada. Before Confederation it was also the richest, but now Nova Scotia is among the poorest. Its defining myths and stories are mostly about loss and sheer determination. Equal parts narrative, memoir and meditation, The Long Way Home chronicles with enthralling clarity a complex and multi-dimensional story: the overwhelming of the first peoples and the arrival of a mélange of pioneers who carved out pockets of the wilderness; the random acts and unexplained mysteries; the shameful achievements and noble failures; the rapture and misery; the twists of destiny and the cold-heartedness of fate. This is the biography of a place that has been hardened by history. A place full of reminders of how great a province it has been and how great—with the right circumstances and a little luck—it could be again.

As the U.S. descends into the Civil War, photographer Brenton Baldwin travels west with his sister Jordana, taking pictures of the developing lands and in search of their sister. Along for the trip is young Caitlan O'Connor, who has just arrived from Ireland. Will they make it to California to find their family despite the danger that looms ahead? And can early romance grow into love in the face of trials and tragedy?

Papa will not allow Clara to learn to read—he says "Farm people like us do not have time to read." But when the traveling bookwagon, with persuasive Miss Mary at the reins, arrives at their farm, Papa realizes he must change his mind. Based on the true story of America’s first ‘bookmobile.’ "The free library in a nearby Maryland village is off-limits to the curious child, but Clara's chance encounter with librarian Mary Titcomb and the first horse-drawn 'moving library' changes her father's response. A glimpse of childhood without schools, libraries, literacy and books is presented in easy-to-read historical fiction." (Cooperative Children's Book Center) Clara and the Bookwagon is a Level Three I Can Read book. Level 3 includes many fun subjects kids love to read about on their own. Themes include friendship, adventure, historical fiction, and science. Level 3 books are written for early independent readers. They include some challenging words and more complex themes and stories.

Carl Erik, a recent immigrant from Sweden, becomes the man of the house when his father and uncle go to work in a logging camp, and he learns many things about life in Minnesota while attending school, doing his chores, and trying to put meat on the table.

"El Monstruo!" Every day is the same for Pablo's father. Then one afternoon the ground growls, hisses smoke, and swallows up his plow. A volcano is erupting in the middle of his cornfield!

"...the story of the Pacific Clipper, a B-314 caught between Noumea, New Caledonia and Auckland, New Zealand at the outbreak of World War II and ordered to return home by flying west around the world in radio silence to avoid capture or destruction by enemy forces."--P. [4] of cover.