Only Brave Tomorrows

Soon after Faith and her father settle in colonial Massachusetts, their primitive community is raided by Indians. Everyone but Faith is killed or taken hostage. Faith leaves the wreckage of the settlement with Zachary, the man who first guided her there. Zachary takes her to Springfield, marries her and leaves immediately to fight in King Philip's War, a confrontation between the Indians and the colonists. As Faith waits for her husband's return, she gives shelter to a shiftless, greedy couple and copes with their demands. She must also come to terms with her feelings for Peter, a young friend of her father's. When Zachary comes home, Faith makes him understand how deeply she has come to care for him. Her experiences alone after the raid are described vividly and form one of the novel's high points; the one-dimensional characters that had cluttered the narrative have all been killed off. The sheer quantity of Faith's adventures is overwhelming: there is material enough for several books here. Still, those readers who are able to focus on the novel's exquisitely evoked sense of time and place should find much to enjoy. Ages 10-14. (Apr.)