Secret of the Andes

This is the book that famously won the Newbery over Charlotte's Web, and was that ever a travesty. I can accept that a certain number of books will be dull reading for me, but this isn't even well written--there are a number of places where the main character says or thinks things that don't make an......more

The young shepherd boy Cusi has lived high up in the mountains with only the old shepherd Chuto and their llamas for company. Chuto teaches Cusi how to tend llamas as their Inca forebears did. Cusi has no known other world but longs for a family and friends. When he spies a family moving into the va......more

#geography #southamerica #peru #culture Cleanliness: Religious & Supernatural - 8 Incidents: A boy sings to the various stars in a religious chant. A man chants a sunrise call. Mentions how llamas were once sacrificed to the Sun. A minstrel sings a song about the Sun Father (a god). The Sun god is men......more

Secret of the Andes is a quiet story of an Inca boy growing up in the mountains of Peru, raising llamas. This boy, Cusi, knows little of his past, and has no home other than the mountains, no family outside his elderly mentor and his llamas. Time passes and Cusi knows he must leave the mountain, lea......more

This book beat out Charlotte’s Web for the Newbery, and what a travesty that was.......more