Gr. 2-4. Even very young readers have heard tales of hidden treasure, and Donnelly relates accounts of real hunts for fabulous wealth to be gleaned from pirate stashes, sunken ships, religious offerings, and even train wrecks. Large print, ample but not overwhelming color illustrations, and a narrative style that communicates the excitement of the search together make this a book readers will find difficult to put down. An excellent choice for those looking for adventure stories as well as those who prefer nonfiction.
A true-life novel about Lily Casey Smith (the author's grandmother) who at age six helped her father break horses, at age fifteen left home to teach in a frontier town, and later as a wife and mother runs a vast ranch in Arizona where she survived tornadoes, droughts, floods, the Great Depression, and the most heartbreaking personal tragedy--but despite a life of hardscrabble drudgery still remains a woman of indomitable spirit.
