Stone Fox by JR Gardiner
age 9
Little Willy lives on a potato farm. Little Willy’s grandfather would wake him up every morning very early. But one morning he didn’t wake him up. So he investigated. And he found his grandfather wanted to die. Then he didn’t know what to do. He called the doctor and the doctor told him that his grandfather didn’t want to live anymore. And so one day, Little Willy was playing the harmonica and his dog Searchlight would howl with him. Every time Little Willy would get off a note he would howl. He thought that if the harvest was good he might get better. But they didn’t have a horse. Searchlight wanted to be like the horse. So they hooked her up to the sled and they got over two hundred big bags of potatoes. But his grandfather didn’t get better. One day Little Willy saw a sign-up sheet for a dog race with a prize of one thousand dollars. They signed up right then and there. So the next day they went to the race and there was a dog there named Stone Fox who had never lost a race in his life. Then the race began with a bang. Little Willy was in fifth place and they were passing people left and right. Then they got to second place. Stone Fox was in front of them. Then they passed Stone Fox and they won! And then Grandfather got better.
I liked this book. It was the first one I read on my own.
I (the mom) would like to add a few notes to this review. The author of the above narration-review is an age 9 reader who is still improving – an emerging reader. He was able to read this book entirely on his own. He was very proud because it looks like a ‘real’ book. He is really still at the reading level for the ‘step into’ or ‘level 3 or 4’ readers. But this book has the look of a real book….you know, with a spine and chapters. He needed a bit of help with a few words which I picked up from his daily narrations when something wasn’t making sense. But if he missed other words, you can tell from the narration that he was very much getting the point. It is a good morale booster book for a young reader.