This award-winning contemporary classic is the survival story with
which all others are compared--and a page-turning, heart-stopping
adventure, recipient of the Newbery Honor. Hatchet has also been
nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great
American Read.
Thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson, haunted by his secret knowledge of his
mother's infidelity, is traveling by single-engine plane to visit his
father for the first time since the divorce. When the plane crashes,
killing the pilot, the sole survivor is Brian. He is alone in the
Canadian wilderness with nothing but his clothing, a tattered
windbreaker, and the hatchet his mother had given him as a present.
At first consumed by despair and self-pity, Brian slowly learns survival
skills--how to make a shelter for himself, how to hunt and fish and
forage for food, how to make a fire--and even finds the courage to start
over from scratch when a tornado ravages his campsite. When Brian is
finally rescued after fifty-four days in the wild, he emerges from his
ordeal with new patience and maturity, and a greater understanding of
himself and his parents.