Thunder Rolling in the Mountains

Authors: Scott O'Dell and Elizabeth Hall.

Publisher: Dell Publishing.

Pages: 128.

Price: $3.99, paperback.

Thunder Rolling in the Mountains is a true story based on the hardships of the Nez Perce, an American Indian tribe. Told by Sound of Running Feet, the daughter of Chief Joseph, the novel focuses on the journey that white people forced the tribe to make from Oregon to Montana and their battles with the white people along the way.

The thoughts and feelings of Sound of Running Feet play a major role in the book, bringing the story to life. Telling the story from her point of view helps the reader understand the hardships that the American Indians encountered in the late 19th century.

A tragedy

Sound of Running Feet explains the way she feels about Chief Joseph (her father), Swan Necklace (her love), and white people in general.

Toward the end of the book, Sound of Running Feet and Swan Necklace are separated from the rest of their tribe. Swan Necklace is killed by a warrior from a rival tribe and Sound of Running Feet expresses her grief concerning his death.

Tears spilled out of my eyes and ran down my cheeks. I could not speak.

Alighting Dove led me to the place where Swan Necklace lay dead. She signed that I might bury him. I wrapped my love in our wedding blanket. On his chest I placed his war whistle, which had protected him in battle but did not save him from death. I laid him in a shallow grave and chanted a song of mourning. The death of Swan Necklace had taken my heart away. In my breast where my heart once beat was a piece of cold stone.

Although the beginning of the story contains useful background information, it did not hold my interest.

But the book correctly displays the life of the American Indian in the late 1870s, and that's what I liked best. Authors Scott O'Dell and Elizabeth Hall traveled the trails that the characters traveled and visited the places that the characters visited. They also interviewed people who were alive when the events in the book took place.

After O'Dell's death, his wife, Elizabeth Hall, finished the book. In the forward of the book, Hall says, "(the American Indians') courage and determination in the face of cruelty, betrayal and bureaucratic ignorance moved him deeply. So deeply that he continued to work on the manuscript until two days before he died."

I recommend this book to people of all ages. It has a little bit of romance for those of you who enjoy romances, but it also has action for those who like adventure.