CW: racism, starvation

Well that was an interesting verse novel about a friendship at odds with the shifting views prior to the 1812 war.

Twelve year olds Anikwa and James struggle to understand the growing tension between their people as preparations for a seige at Fort Wayne are underway. James' trading community are starting to turn against Anikwa's Native American Miami tribe with devastating consequences. I didn't know anything about this period in US history and spent quite some time after on the intermaweb with Mrs Google learning about the seige at Fort Wayne and the 1812 war. An interesting middle school novel that would be a good introduction to this period of conflict. ( )

I have loved all of Helen Frost's books. This one was a little more special to me. I grew up in Indiana. I lived on a farm until we moved to Florida when I was fourteen. One of my favorite past-times along with my sisters was looking for arrowheads on our property. Helen's book about a friendship between a Native American Family and a white family was hopeful and hard at the same time. What do you do when you hear rumblings of war? For James and his family who have a trading post outside the fort, they continue on the way they have always gone. They trade with the Indians, who are their friend. James best friend is Anikwa, a young boy of the Kekionga, a part of the Miami tribe. He too has heard rumblings of war. Many of his people have decided they will side with the British if it comes to war.
I felt so terrible for James and his family. James had to witness his friend Isaac's hatred for the Native Americans. He really has no basis to his hatred, which makes it all the more tragic. As I read and saw what each side did I wondered if Anikwa and James could remain friends. You will need to read the book to find out what happened. ( )

This tale, recounted in verse, is set during the War of 1812 in Ohio and Indiana and follows two young boys as their friendship is put to the test across conflict and cultural ties.

Children's historical fiction/friendship. The two voices are each produced in their own style of poetry (namely, the spacing of the words creates either a diamondy native american pattern or horizontal stripes a la the American flag), which doesn't hurt the narrative too much--it's not done BADLY, but it is so sparse that the sense of place and time is a bit lacking. Maybe I should have read this one while camping (or, after reading up on the time period, etc.). Again, it's not BAD, but I wasn't significantly impressed by the time I'd gotten 50-100 pages in. This is one of our potential mocknewbery titles, but I didn't think it was all that stellar so I'm moving on to the next. ( )

Salt is a story of native Americans, The Miami People, living alongside Americans in the Midwest. They are different but so much alike as they help each other survive. The War of 1912 is pending. The families prepare for the worst to happen and it does, but there is really no way to prepare for war. As the people become divided, these families keep alive a deep friendship that war was unable to tear in two. ( )