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5th out of 27 books
—
15 voters
Sounder
Sounder is no beauty. But as a coon dog, this loyal mongrel with his cavernous bark is unmatched. When the African American sharecropper who has raised Sounder from a pup is hauled off to jail for stealing a hog, his family must suffer their humiliation and crushing loss with no recourse. To make matters worse, in the fracas, Sounder is shot and disappears. The eventual re...more
116 pages
Published
by Scholastic Inc
(first published January 1st 1969)
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This was required reading for me in 6th grade. I remember it opening my eyes to racism and I was appalled that anyone would be treated differently because of the color of their skin. Just after I'd finished the book, I walked into the bathroom in the Miami airport and saw two black women standing against the wall. To prove I wasn't racist, I stood between them until one leaned over and mentioned that it was a line. Sometimes it's better to be blind.
I think this was one of the last books I read aloud to my family. I remember all of us lying on the bed while I read a chapter or two a night. I remember trying to read as I cried.
Certainly, I value the storyline of poor black sharecroppers--it is an important narrative to tell. I did not, however, enjoy the the ways in which Armstrong told this narrative.
Except for the ending, I was bored by his stilted prose. That is my primary issue with the story. In addition, I was annoyed by the nameless characters in this story. I do not buy the suggestion that their namelessness suggests that they represent many poor and rural African Americans during this time. For me, their name...more
Except for the ending, I was bored by his stilted prose. That is my primary issue with the story. In addition, I was annoyed by the nameless characters in this story. I do not buy the suggestion that their namelessness suggests that they represent many poor and rural African Americans during this time. For me, their name...more
I read this on a plane and I read it fast so that I wouldn't cry. Oh, it's so good. I don't know why I never read it in elementary school. I secretly have a tendency to avoid books that involve animals because I ALWAYS bawl. This was no exception. I LOVED the analogies between Sounder and the boy's father.
I highly recommend this book.
I highly recommend this book.
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
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1970 Newbery Medal Winner
I remember reading this book in fourth grade or so. It was really sad. I don't know why teachers insist on reading such sad books because besides this book, we also read Where the Red Fern Grows which is also a sad book involving a coon dog.
I reread it again as part of reading all of Newbery and it was just as sad as I remembered. I understood it better now. It's interesting how 20 years can change your perspective on a book.
The characters in the book are never named ex...more
I remember reading this book in fourth grade or so. It was really sad. I don't know why teachers insist on reading such sad books because besides this book, we also read Where the Red Fern Grows which is also a sad book involving a coon dog.
I reread it again as part of reading all of Newbery and it was just as sad as I remembered. I understood it better now. It's interesting how 20 years can change your perspective on a book.
The characters in the book are never named ex...more
Sounder is a coon dog which lives with a poor, African-American family of sharecroppers in the post-Civil War South. The family consists of a father, a mother, an older son, and several younger children. The father struggles to feed his family in hard times. After working hard in the fields all day, he and Sounder go out hunting night after night but come home empty-handed. Then one morning, a ham is cooking in the cabin’s kitchen. However, that evening, an angry sheriff and his deputies come to...more
I know that Armstrong wrote this as a parallel to the story of Ulysses' dog, and that he intentionally left details ambiguous so that all readers could identify with the characters and setting, but I spent the entire book bothered by the way a white author portrayed an African-American family--none of whom were named. Identity is important, and when a book is written so intimately but without names, it devalues (for me) the importance of the characters themselves. I know Armstrong said he wrote...more
The unnamed narrator of this book is a black boy, living in the south after the Civil War. The boy's father, a sharecropper, struggles to support his family, but can't always provide for their needs. When he comes home with an entire ham, the family is suspicious, and no one is surprised when the police come looking for him. The police lead away the father, in the process shooting and wounding his coon dog, Sounder.
Nobody expects that Sounder will survive, the same as most would doubt the boy's...more
Nobody expects that Sounder will survive, the same as most would doubt the boy's...more
Winner of the 1970 Newbery. Set probably some time in the ‘30s, this book centers on an unnamed black boy who must grow up fast after his poor, sharecropper father is arrested for stealing a ham for his hungry family. The titular dog, a hound/bulldog mix who loves to hunt with the father, is hit with a shotgun during the arrest, and never hunts again. It’s a bleak tale; the boy’s silent rage, in which he visualizes brutal violence befalling the unjust, cruel white men who oppress him and his fat...more
Sounder was a book about an African American boy whose father goes to jail after stealing ham to feed his family. When the boy’s father gets taken away, the family’s hunting dog, Sounder, gets shot and disappears for a very long time. I thought that book was rather strange. I kept waiting for something significant to happen and it never did. The time lapse in the book was very muddled. For example, I thought maybe a month had gone by and once the author finally got around to saying how long it h...more
The story of a poor sharecropper’s family. Sounder is the family’s trusted coon dog whose bark “filled up the night and made music as though the branches of all the trees were being pulled across silver strings.” In order to feed his family, the sharecropper steals some food. As a result, he is captured. As the sheriff’s posse takes the father to jail, ever faithful Sounder tries to help his master, and is shot as a result. The boy—the sharecropper’s eldest son—struggles to help his father, heal...more
8/26/11 Sounder is an older book I read in elementary school in the early 1970's and I remember the thrill of seeing the movie that was made around 1972, and then remade in 2006. Sounder is a non-fiction book based on the true story of an African-American family who were sharecroppers in the late 19th century. The story in between the lines lets you experience the deep love and devotion of a boy to his family, especially after his dad is jailed and away for 7 years; the struggle of a suddenly si...more
An extraordinary coming of age novel that follows a young African-American boy, sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century South. Although they are desperately poor, the boy is happy in his loving, self-sufficent family. Then, his father is arrested for stealing a ham and the family hound, Sounder, is nearly killed by the sheriff. What follows are years of waiting, by everyone including the dog, for the father's return. The brutality of the entrenched racism is hard to comprehend, as when t...more
My favorite part of the book SOUNDER was when they had finally found food to eat because I can imagine them starving. The book reminded me of using my dog to hunt birds the only difference was they used Sounder to catch food, I made a prediction before reading this book that they wouldn't find away to feed the family and there self because they went out every day and dint find and thing but, my prediction was wrong food was found by the dog. I wondered why he dint try to start farming. My favori...more
Sounder is a powerful story about a young african american boy and his sharecropper family. The boy (we are never given his name), their dog Sounder, and his father often hunt for possum and raccoon during the winter months to help feed the family and bring in extra money. Unfortunately the weather is not favorable for hunting and the boy's father steals a ham to feed the family. Shortly afterwards, the white deputy shows up to take the boy's father to the town prison to await trial. As they are...more
Oct 14, 2010
Melody Savage
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
wholesome-teen-reads
A boy must face his father's imprisonment and the many just and unjust reasons for it. Sounder is his dog, symbolizing the animal-like status and suffering of the African American people in the early 20th century. I liked the understated presentation - sort of a "we report, you decide" tactic to obscure the author/narrator and let the action tell the story: "There on the cabin porch, on three legs, stood the living skeleton of what had been a might coon hound." Just a visual of the barely alive...more
Feb 21, 2010
Lisa
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Lisa by:
Newbery Class
Sounder is a coon dog with an exceptional voice who belongs to the boy's sharecropping father. After the father steals a ham to feed his family Sounder is shot by the men who come to arrest him. Sounder crawls off to die or to heal, and the boy searches for him daily, never giving up hope that he's alive. Meanwhile the boys mother works harder to take care of the family and the boy helps and tends the 3 younger children. The mother tells stories and the boy longs to be able to read. Eventually S...more
I've been reading a lot of young adult books recently so that I can teach them to my students or simply recommend them as good reading. Sounder is a book that I remember loving as a kid. I actually think it made me cry when I read it in 6th grade (or whenever I did actually read it).
The story line is fairly simple, the characters are pretty interesting, and it is set in an interesting historical period. The protagonist is a young black teenager whose family is a sharecropping family. It is a go...more
The story line is fairly simple, the characters are pretty interesting, and it is set in an interesting historical period. The protagonist is a young black teenager whose family is a sharecropping family. It is a go...more
I was very pleasantly surprised by this book (not that the story itself strikes a pleasant tone). In many years I would have quickly agreed that this is the best choice for the Newbery Medal, but for 1970, I would actually give the award to John D. Fitzgerald's "More Adventures of the Great Brain".
William H. Armstrong writes with quiet sincerity, and a truthfulness in detail that cannot be exceeded. What I liked best of all about this book is that young readers are so often told that no matte...more
William H. Armstrong writes with quiet sincerity, and a truthfulness in detail that cannot be exceeded. What I liked best of all about this book is that young readers are so often told that no matte...more
Why is it that any book with a dog in it always is sad? Look at the evidence, Old Yeller, Where the Red Fern Grows, The Art of Racing in the Rain and Marley and Me are just a few I can think of? Animals and dogs in particular tend to pull at the heart strings of the average human, I think. The author, William Armstrong used the term human animal, which I found particularly pertinent. You don't necessarily have such an attachment to a cow or goat, but the way a dog looks or acts just oozes feelin...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
So, coming into Sounder, I was expecting a happy story about a little boy and his hunting dog who frolic and whoop around the countryside together (think Where the Red Fern Grows). Wrong!
The Story.
Life was happy for the boy. His lithe coon dog, Sounder was out gamboling in the fields and his mother was just cutting into a savory, mouth-watering ham. The boy could remember having ham only once before, and that was over a year ago! But now, with the smells floatin’ around in the air, the boy can a...more
The Story.
Life was happy for the boy. His lithe coon dog, Sounder was out gamboling in the fields and his mother was just cutting into a savory, mouth-watering ham. The boy could remember having ham only once before, and that was over a year ago! But now, with the smells floatin’ around in the air, the boy can a...more
So far it's horribly depressing... :p
Update: If you are clinically depressed or think you may be clinically depressed, do not read this book. If you are interested in becoming clinically depressed, feel free to read it!
This is one of the most bleak "children's" books I've ever read. Starting w/ the father in the story stealing a ham to feed his family, if there's a bad thing that could happen to him and his dog and family, it does. I realize that people of their station in that time period didn...more
Update: If you are clinically depressed or think you may be clinically depressed, do not read this book. If you are interested in becoming clinically depressed, feel free to read it!
This is one of the most bleak "children's" books I've ever read. Starting w/ the father in the story stealing a ham to feed his family, if there's a bad thing that could happen to him and his dog and family, it does. I realize that people of their station in that time period didn...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
I decided to read the book “Sounder” written by William H. Armstrong because I saw that on the cover it had a John-Newberry medal on it. To me that indicated that it must have to be a worthy story for it to get an award. This story takes place in the 19-century, and is about the son of a sharecropper, his African- American family, and their loyal dog named Sounder. Unfortunately, the sharecropper was taken away by the officers and is forced to do labor because he was caught stealing a ham to fed...more
Apr 24, 2012
Rachel
rated it
1 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
read-outloud-with-kids
Blah - can that be my review?
Okay, I know that this is a Newberry, but I can't hide the fact that none of us enjoyed this book. It was dull, boring, and uneventful. Every night the kids would say, "we don't like this book. It's sad, it's boring. Why don't they name the characters?" Every night I would say, "I think it's just about to get better." By Chapter 5 I was frustrated and had given up on something interesting happening. We read it just to finish it, but none of us wanted to or enjoyed it...more
Okay, I know that this is a Newberry, but I can't hide the fact that none of us enjoyed this book. It was dull, boring, and uneventful. Every night the kids would say, "we don't like this book. It's sad, it's boring. Why don't they name the characters?" Every night I would say, "I think it's just about to get better." By Chapter 5 I was frustrated and had given up on something interesting happening. We read it just to finish it, but none of us wanted to or enjoyed it...more
The author of this book is William H. Armstrong ( Fun fact: William also writes study tips and other fiction dog books such as "Old Yeller" and "Saunge Sam".) The illustrator of this book is James Berkes. The genre of this book is realistic fiction because it was based on a true story. ( fun fact: The author of this book was not the one who experienced the story it was his teacher"s story.) The sub-genre of this book is realistic. The narrator of this book is the author this is because the point...more
Sep 06, 2009
Ali
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
summer-reading-books-2009
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
1970 Newbery Medal Winner
A heart-rending story of the life of a black sharecropping family in the south. None of the characters are ever given names, which helps the reader put him or herself in their shoes. It focuses on a boy whose father steals a ham to feed his family. The father is arrested and sentenced to hard labor. Their dog, Sounder, tries to follow the cart in which the father is taken away, and gets half of his face blasted off, barely surviving. Later as the father returns crippled...more
A heart-rending story of the life of a black sharecropping family in the south. None of the characters are ever given names, which helps the reader put him or herself in their shoes. It focuses on a boy whose father steals a ham to feed his family. The father is arrested and sentenced to hard labor. Their dog, Sounder, tries to follow the cart in which the father is taken away, and gets half of his face blasted off, barely surviving. Later as the father returns crippled...more
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William H. Armstrong (September 14, 1911 near Lexington, Virginia - April 11, 1999 in Kent, Connecticut) was an American children's author and educator, best known for his 1969 Newbery Medal-winning novel, Sounder.
More about William H. Armstrong...
William H. Armstrong (September 14, 1911 near Lexington, Virginia - April 11, 1999 in Kent, Connecticut) was an American children's author and educator, best known for his 1969 Newbery Medal-winning novel, Sounder.
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