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Kaya's Hero: A Story of Giving (American Girl: Kaya #3) by Janet Beeler Shaw

 

Summary (from the publisher): Kaya is in awe of a young warrior woman named Swan Circling, who's so fearless, she doesn't even flinch when a runaway horse gallops straight at her! Swan Circling goes with the men into battle, bringing them fresh horses and tending to the wounded. If I were as strong as Swan Circling, Kaya thinks, I'd find a way to get my sister back. Swan Circling has heard the children calling Kaya "Magpie," the nickname she got for being irresponsible. Although Kaya has made mistakes, she wants very badly to be friends with Swan Circling. Will Swan Circling want to be friends with her?

Review: I never read the Kaya books growing up but have been enjoying reading them with my three children. In this third book, Kaya forms a friendship with a young warrior woman named Swan Circling. She admires and looks up to Swan Circling and hopes to be as strong as her. It's also wintertime in this book, which means much time is spent inside the village shelters doing quiet tasks like sewing and telling stories to entertain each other. 

The nature of this, which mostly includes indoor story time and quiet activities meant that much of this wasn't as thrilling as other American Girl books. However, this book has a significant traumatic event (that does happen off page) that I found incredibly tragic!! These books do not shy away from hard topics, including death, so if that might be a trigger for young readers, best to stay away from this one. The loss here felt senseless and particularly shocking in its suddenness. 

I did really love learning more about life in Kaya's village in this book. There is a baby in this story, and my kids were fascinated by baby care, including learning that they used the fluff from cottontails to pack the baby's diaper. I also loved the peak into the past section that described how Kaya and her family would have lived seasonally the way they do in the book and would have spent much time indoors doing mending and quiet tasks in the winter, just like the characters in this story. 

Stars: 3

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