A fourteen-year-old boy has to take six thousand sheep up to the summer pasture and tend them all by himself, because his father’s hired man suddenly became ill. The ranch is now shorthanded, so nobody even has time to stay with John and show him how to do things. It’s just him, four dogs, two horses and all those sheep. He’s already anxious and from the very first day things start to go wrong. Rattlesnakes, coyotes, thunderstorms, injuries, flash floods and a bear among them. Just one thing after another, in bewilderingly fast succession. The carnage from predators when they do come seems very high. The boy John admittedly thinks of giving up a few times, just leaving, but he sticks with the job and does his best. And grows through it.
At the end of a month, when his father comes up to the meadow with fresh supplies, he finds a connection to this stern parent he hadn’t felt before. His father shares some things about a legendary grandfather John had long admired. Sounds like he probably shouldn’t have, the relative was not at all a nice man. Legendary for his meanness, and did some pretty bad things that were kept hushed up by the family. John is shocked to find the truth is different from what he’d heard in the community, and glad to know he’s not like that man. But mostly this is about working the sheep, and handling all the problems and emergencies that arise, and the wonder of those smart border collies, who live for their job.
A really good book. I don’t love it like I did Hatchet, but it was much better than The River.
Completed on 7/21/24.
2 Responses
This one sounds interesting, I’m adding it to my TBR list. Thanks! There are a couple other ones by him that sound interesting as well, like Winterdance (Gary Paulsen enters the Iditarod).
Yes. I really like his book Dogsong, though I read it so long ago it’s not featured here yet. Until I do a re-read. It’s in my collection.