Sunsets Of The West

by Tony Johnston, Ted Lewin (Illustrator)

When Pa decides to leave New Hampshire for a new life in the west, the family packs up and gets on the move, but their journey becomes more treacherous than they had expected and they have to stay united to make the trip successful.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Picture Books

40 pages, Hardcover

First published June 10, 2002

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Tony Johnston has written many acclaimed books for young people. She and her husband lived in Mexico for fifteen years, where they raised their children. She now lives in San Marino, California.

Reviews

[Martha]

The illustrations in this book are beautiful. they are full color illustrations with lifelike water colors that beautifully paint a picture of what it is that's happening and how it all looks, making it look realistic. This story itself is realistic, it tells that story of a family from New Hampshire on their way to the American west and the struggles they go through. It's a pioneer family that share their feelings, hopes and dreams as they leave to start over somewhere else and go through so much and lost valuables along the way. I believe that this book should be shared more with 4th or 5th graders and could help to teach them more about history, they would benefit greatly.

[Megan]

This book would be good to acompany a unit on the West, settlers, and Native Americans. It followed the perspective of a family and their thoughts, hopes, and dreams. It did not glamorize the trip. Instead, it told of losing animals, people, and their prized posssesions along the way. I think this would be a good piece of literature to include in a unit. Our fifth grade study this topic in Kentucky, and I think they would benefit.

[Finny]

Finny says: If they lost everything then why couldn't they cry? [Book says they had no tears left; Finny thought that meant they didn't want to cry, but if you lost everything, surely you would want to cry. I explained that the phrase meant they had cried so much and were so sad that they couldn't even cry anymore.]

[Cynthia]

This picture book is about the journey of a pioneer family traveling west.

[Marcie]

Ted Lewin's paintings are magnificent (particularly the double spread of buffalo). Tony Johnson has language that makes her historical fiction lovely to read aloud.

[Matthew]

This book was like reading the video game Oregon Trail for me. One was very reminiscent of the other. The illustrations were beautiful and the text was very nice as well.

[Lindsay Sorensen]

Love the illustrations.

[Mely]

The writing style was a little plain. But I loved how much historical information was included in this book. Very much like the Oregon Trail game I played as a child. This would be a perfect companion book for children who are studying early frontier/ pioneer life.

[Melissa]

Lincoln picked this from his school library mainly based on the cover.
But a decent read.

[Christina Bell]

illustrations tell the hard but beautiful story of moving out west. The text does not shy from the brutal truth of the wagon trains. There were deaths, encounters with Indians, hunger, and often great lose. But for those who didn't quit and didn't stop, like the family in this story, they saw the west. The smelled the sweet pine trees and made it their home.