Guts

Bibliographic information: 

Paulsen, Gary.  Guts.  New York: Scholastic, Inc.  2001. 

Brief plot description:

The story Guts is the story of how Gary Paulsen came up with the ideas for his books.  The book has sixth chapters.  These chapters are “Heart Attacks, Plane Crashes and Flying,” “Moose Attacks,” “Things That Hunt,” “Killing to Live: Hunting and Fishing with Primitive Weapons,” “Eating Eyeballs and Guts or Starving: the Fine Art of Wilderness Nutrition,” and “The Joy of Cooking.”  “Heart Attacks, Plane Crashes and Flying” is about how Gary came up with the information for Hatchet.  Gary talks about how he has been flying in a Cessna 406 bush plane and how his experience with this plane gave way to it being the plane that Brian is in and crashes.  “Moose Attacks” this chapter deals with how a moose is unpredictable.  It talks about his time when he was hunting and he met a moose.  Each chapter teaches a new thing and shows students what it is like to be in the real situations.

  

Brief review:

I think that this book would be an excellent read for students in fifth through seventh grade.  It would be a great book for students to read when they have finished reading Hatchet or any of the Brian books.  It really gives the reader a more in depth look at what it takes for an author to write a book.  It also shows people that the simplest things in one’s life can be written about.  I believe that more boys would read this book, but I also believe that there are several girls that would be drawn to reading the book too. 

Genre label:

Nonfiction, Adventure

Reading level/interest level:

5^th- 7^th graders

Similar materials in style content, theme or characters:

Hatchet by Gary Paulsen

My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George