Book Report

Hatchet

Gary Paulsen

Daniel Nghiem

Language Arts

Period 4

Mr. Curry

One of the characters in this book is Brian. His parents are divorced.He had been keeping a secret from his mom. One day he was biking with his best friend Terry. Brian stopped and saw his mom. He was about to wave toher then he saw her kissing with a man that was not her father. A few dayslater, Brian’s mom divorced from his dad. This summer he got to visit hisdad. Before he went his mom gave him a hatchet.Another character is the pilot. He is important because when Brianwas visiting his father in the Canadian oil fields, he had to go by plane.When he was in the plane over the wilderness, then suddenly the pilot had aheart attack! The pilot put on auto-pilot before his eyes became white.The problem in the story is that when the pilot got a heart attack,Brian did not know what to do. He landed the plane on the lake and he wasinjured really badly. He climbed out of the water and thought about thesecret that he was keeping from his mom before he fell asleep. When hewoke up it was noon.The main problem in the story is that Brian got stuck in the woodsand only left with a hatchet. He needed to learn how to survive in thewilderness. First he needed to build a shelter. He thought that the easiestshelter to build is a lean-to. He built his shelter out of wood. He used hisexperience when he was playing with his friend in the park. He made a lean-to. After he built his shelter he was hungry. He started to look for berry bushes. All of the sudden, he saw all these birds go into a tree with berries in

them. Brian ate the berries that dropped on the floor. He called them gut berries because he they had a tart flavor that made his mouth dries.The climax is Brian in the plane with the pilot dead. You think “Wouldhe make it or not?” In that part of the book when the chapter ends, it wantsyou to keep reading the story to find out if he was going to land the plane or not. The second climax is when he landed the plan and tried to stay alive.You just want to keep reading and find out how could survive in thewilderness. The tornado scene can also become the climax. You want toknow if he survived after the hurricane. In the end he did survive and gotrescue.The solution was the hurricane because it reviled the tail of the plane.That led to Brian getting the survival kit. Brian used the kit to survive in thewilderness and also used the survival transmitter to get rescue. Then hestudied about the animals he encountered.The theme of the story is how to survive in the wilderness. Have a positive attitude for example if you want to survive. Also learn how to keepyour cool for example not to panic when the air plane crashed down to theriver, he was able to get out of the plane while it was under water. Don’t giveup hope for example he used the emergency transmitter to send out signalsso he can be rescued.I would recommend this book to another 6th grader because it’s a pretty good book to share. It is really adventurous and it can teach you aboutmany things. Make fire with a hatchet for one thing and to make a shelter for another. It’s a really good book. Who would ever think that you couldsurvive in the wilderness with only the hatchet?