I thought the action was described well and the fight scenes were gripping. I specially found that I identified with Isabel since she was a brave and funny character. I liked the two main characters Curzon and Isabel the way their relationship developed through the plot was very moving. The American Revolution is not a historical period I knew much about apart from tea being thrown overboard, so it was interesting to have an insight into the period. I thought its historical context was interesting. Things improve once he meets up with his fellow slave and escapee, Isabel, mainly because we become involved with the dynamic of their relationship and the horrors of Isabel’s experiences of slavery. He has to be slightly detached – which affects the reader.

This may have been because this is a first-person narrative and Curzon is understandably wary of confiding too much to his fellow, white, soldiers. Objectively, I sympathized with Curzon’s position, but somehow I wasn’t emotionally engaged. Having said that, I read it perfectly happily without being particularly involved. The author’s research is thorough without being intrusive, and the story illuminates a little-known aspect of the War of Independence, that of the suffering of ordinary soldiers from the ineptitude of the planning and the food shortages. I had no difficulty in understanding what was going on. How can he ever gain his freedom when he’s freezing and half-starved?įorge follows on from Laurie Halse Anderson’s award winning Chains, but it’s a standalone book the necessary back story information is skilfully woven into the Prelude. Curzon must cope with not only the prejudice of some of his fellow soldiers, but also cold, hunger and lack of shelter. The winter of 1778-79 is bitterly cold, and the regiment is poorly equipped and badly-organized.

Soon, he is fighting with Eben’s regiment and involved in a war which he is only half-convinced is his war there’s no guarantee that the Americans will grant him his freedom any more than the British did. He gets caught up in a skirmish between British and American soldiers and saves the life of Eben, a young soldier in the newly-raised 16 th Massachusetts Regiment. Curzon, a slave, has managed to escape from his British master and is on the run.

America is fighting for independence from Britain. Review by Elizabeth Hawksley Ella McNulty (aged 15)ġ777.

Forge laurie halse anderson