About the Author

Deborah Kent's first young adult novel, Belonging, was published in 1978 by Dial. Since then, she has written 18 young adult novels and over 50 children's non-fiction titles, mainly on topics of American history. Educated at Oberlin College and Smith College, Deborah was a social worker for several years before moving to Mexico and becoming a writer. Today she lives in Chicago with her daughter and husband, the children's author R. Conrad Stein.

Reviews

Gr 4-6-In Blackwater Creek, set in 1849, Hungarian immigrant Erika Nagy uses her skills with horses to pay off her family's rent debt. While she works for rancher Hart Latham, her brother and father search for gold in California. When an injured horse runs away, Erika tracks her down and, in the process, finds a gold claim her family can work so they can buy their own farm. All she has to do is protect it from Latham. In Lifetime, Jacquetta May Logan rescues some of her family's Morgan horses from being sent to war by the Yankee soldiers who turn her family home into a hospital. Her encounters with an enslaved brother and sister, Peace and Witness, who carry out the plan to hide the horses, and a Union soldier help her to see the goodness in people and start to question her views on slavery. Both of these adventure/horse stories rely heavily on their strong female protagonists to move the action along, and both have events that work out a little too neatly. Jacquetta's sudden realization that slavery affects people's lives seems forced, and Erika finding the filly on land that contains gold nuggets don't quite ring true, but girls who love horses won't care. Give these books to readers who are horse crazy and tired of Bonnie Bryant's "Saddle Club" series (Random).-Lisa Prolman, Greenfield Public Library, MA Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.