A.J. Ward

A.J. Ward
Borderlands
Peter Carter
Western
Challenge
229

1. Right now in the book Borderlands the main character Ben and the rest of his cattle herding group have just arrived in the city of Abilene. In the beginning of the book Ben and his brother Bo were forced to leave their hometown of Clement by Tyler the preacher. Ben and Bo joined a man named Jim Dutton and Dutton, Ben, Bo, and roughly 100 other men had to transport 2,000 cattle from southern Texas to Kansas. They had an eventful trip, running into Indians of all kinds, but they finally made it. Now Ben and Bo are just beginning to explore Abilene.

2. So far I do not really like this book. It is very slow and I can't really relate to anything the narrator is saying or doing. The main character, Ben, is just very boring. He does ever not have any particularly interesting ideas or emotions. I feel like the author Peter Carter is a good story, because I like the general storyline (two orphans kids forced to become cowboys) but I think Peter Carter does a really poor job of giving the narrator any personality at all.

3. So far a theme is maturity. Ben is fourteen years old and he just spent the last six weeks with a bunch of cowboy-like adults. Ben really needs to mature in order to be helpful and earn his dollar a day. Also he is only spending time with these mature people and that seems like it has rubbed off on Ben.

4. My favorite character is Bo. He is always nice to Ben even though Ben is extremely boring, and it would definitely be a burden to have to bring your younger brother everywhere with you. Bo was responsible for getting himself and Ben the job in the first place. I also feel bad for Bo and that although the loss of his mother is the beginning pf the book upset him deeply he still was able to rise up and kind of become Ben's parent. This is why Bo is my favorite character.

5. My least favorite character us Dutton. Dutton is hard to work for and mean. Many times during the journey he risked men's lives for the sake of his cattle, by crossing dangerous rivers, and keeping all the men moving through viscous storms. Also Dutton is greedy. He refuses to pay Ben his dollar a day because of his age, even though he did just as much work as everybody else. The two boys will not be able to live off just Bo's payment.

6. I am not very sure what is going to happen in this book. It is moving so slowly it could be another 100 pages before they do anything even worth talking about. I guess I predict that Ben and Bo will have a good time in Abilene but slowly, their money will run out. Then they will both have to find new jobs. It could even possibly be on another cattle transport, but they would have to get themselves back to Texas first.