Book Report - Dogsong

In my book report:

I have read a survival book called Dogsong, and I really like survival books because there are many conflicts. Also, I find out how the main character copes with it. I find that these kinds of books are very interesting because I always learn something about survival situations with the main character learning his way through his way as well. Well, the authors name is Gary Paulsen, the author of the Newbery-winning book of the Hatchet and Dogsong. This book is fiction and it is very special.

Anyway, this book took place in a village. In Dogsong, there is a main character. His name is Russel Susskit, a fourteen-year-old Eskimo boy. Russel Susskit had a long journey to the North and he meets many conflicts and he makes new friends on the way to his goal. It all started, when Russel was sent to Oogruks house by his dad to learn something and give caribou eyes to Oogruk because Oogruk thinks it is tasty and yummy. Well, Oogruk is an old man that tells stories sometimes silly, sometimes smart, or sometimes imaginary (sometimes real though). Russel needs to find out what he needs to learn at his house. What was his purpose why he was here and he found out that he has to learn about Oogruks story.

In Oogruks story, he told that in the past they had a song. He said that the song is them, it is in them but now the song is now gone forever. Other people came into their village and took their song away and they told them about hell. First, the villagers started laughing about hell because they didnt know what was hell. So, they told the villagers about hell, that they should stop the songs and dances immediately because the demons from hell would strip their meat off. This was very unfortunate that they gave up the songs; it was Russels quest to find the songs once again. He must travel north and hunt in the old ways not with guns but with bows with arrows, a spear, and other weapons. He will not use snow machines anymore but travel with the dogs and a sled that Oogruk will let him borrow.

So, Russel started practicing hunting the old way with the bow with the arrows and he started to hunt for a bird, it took time because he didnt understand what he was doing wrong. He couldnt get a single bird, later on he found out he needed to use his mind. He needed to attack with his arrow at the birds heart. The next few hours, he caught a deer by doing the same thing by aiming the arrow through its heart. The next day, a real conflict occurred he was practicing how to catch a seal on ice, but it turns out he didnt get any. He got lost in the middle of nowhere, he didnt know where to go. He had Oogruks dogs with him though which was very fortunate for him. He was completely lost though; he didnt know where to go. The dogs were stopping a lot of time but Russel wouldnt listen to them. There was a meaning why they stopped. They were trying to help him. Russel understood, he let the dogs run for him to the village that ended the conflict.

On his journey, going north and leaving Oogruk behind. Russel meets more conflicts, Russels dogs are falling apart, and they are running low on food. The only solution to this mess was Russel had to hunt for meat for them to survive and the fat of the animal to keep warm. Also, let the dogs eat the fat and meat to survive and they can run for him. Russel had to hunt; luckily they have met another deer on their way. Silently, Russel goes and BOOM the deer went slightly on the right than on the left than it starts lying down on the white snow and with the arrow in the deer. He also, caught rabbits, ptarmigan, and some small foxes, which had a sweet rich meat and were easy to catch. In this book I also found out that Eskimo people mostly eat meat, most of the time. There were no plants or fruit that they ever eat; there are no descriptions of that. Probably because it was too cold over there fort the plants to survive.

Further in the book, Russel gets many dreams. For example, the very first dream he found that he was going to face a major conflict. In his dream, he was much older and there was a girl-woman, he wasnt sure what she was. He was very surprise that in his dream, that the man could command his dogs without telling them what to do, they just went where he wanted the to go well in his mind. He had a mustache now and nothing really changed except for that mustache. He believed that he had to fight a big mammoth. Well, fortunately he wins fighting the mammoth and it was very sad to him because the mammoth had to give his life just for him and his family to survive. With all the yellow fat it has and the mountains of meat it is being received to his family or his friends.

The very last important conflict that he had met was that he had met a woman that was pregnant. Well the woman that was pregnant was part of his fourth dream, but the thing was that she was frozen cold. She was on the snow and she was there for almost three hours or more. Well, he helped her by warming her up. He puts a lot of fat on the flames so she could warm up and he understood that when people are frozen cold they would feel pain afterwards. So, there was nothing that he can really do about it, and they will get hungry afterwards so than after so gets the pain he will feed her with some meat. Well, luckily he actually fed the woman that he had just saved so than, afterwards both of the travelers start traveling together and they had a great time at the end of the north.

By: Vincent Truong, 8F