By: Jessie Liang
Where the Red Fern Grows is a one of America’s favorite books, and personally mine also. This heartwarming story will truly bring you to tears and tell you the true meaning of leadership and love.
Twelve-year-old Billy is a boy that lives with a poor family with two sisters and his parents that wants two hunting hounds desperately, so he saves up money by picking wild berries, vegetables, and trout and selling them every day to local famers and fishers that bought them gratefully. After two years of hard work, he finally saved up enough money to buy two hounds. Following some magazines that he found, he set off from the hills and to town and got his dream puppies – two redbone coon hounds. On the way back, he rested at a mountain cave, where he saw two names carved in the tree bark, Old Dan and Little Ann, and named his dogs that. When he got home, he trained his dogs to hunt coons, large and small.
One day, Billy’s grandfather heard that there was a coon hunting game in the city, and listening to his grandfather, Billy went to the competition and won a box full of money and trophies and coming home. But sadly, not long after coming home, the dogs got in a fight with a mountain lion defending Billy and got injured. Old Dan died of blood loss, and Little Ann lost the meaning in life without Old Dan. Billy’s mother decided to move to town. Just as they were about to leave, Billy noticed that in between the dog’s graves sprouted a sacred red fern telling Billy that his dogs were not gone but, in his heart.
When I read this book, my emotions were on a rollercoaster, with sudden surges of excitement, fear, and worry. There was a part where his dogs almost froze in the icy river and Billy was devastated, but still desperately trying to save them and succeeded, more grateful than ever. In the end, they die, and he learns that he can’t retain them forever. Loved ones will always be lost but make the time you still have worth. Whenever I lose a pet, I read this book, knowing that it is all going to be okay, and I will remember them in my heart and all missing does is break it.
Sometimes a book is all you need to make your day better.