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In the final years of the nineteenth century, the engineer of the mighty locomotive depends on the fireman to stoke the furnace that runs the engine and supplies steam to the whistle. Sim Webb is proud to be Casey Jones's fireman--because Casey is the best engineer on the Illinois Central, and his is the biggest whistle. But one day Casey and Sim meet a sinister red-headed gentleman who offers Casey an even bigger whistle, an unearthly whistle that Sim knows should not be blown. Can Sim stop Casey from dooming not only the train, but the entire world?
The marvelous text of two-time Newbery Honor winner Nancy Farmer, and astonishingly vivid art of James Bernardin bring a thrilling part of American history and folklore to fire-breathing, steam-belching life. It's a story that will blaze across the reader's imagination and will not soon be forgotten
Even though the railroad fireman senses danger ahead, he follows his engineer's command to increase the train's power so that the mysterious whistle blows.
After receiving her B.A. degree from Oregon's Reed College 1963, Farmer enlisted in the Peace Corps in India where she served from 1963 to 1965. From 1969 to 1971, she found herself immersed in the study of chemistry at Merritt College in Oakland, California and later at the University of California at Berkeley from 1969 to 1971. However, her wanderlust eventually took her to Africa, where she labored as a lab technician in Zimbabwe from 1975 to 1978. There, she met Harold, her husband-to-be, who was an English teacher at the University; after a weeklong courtship, they were engaged. Happily married ever since, they have a son, Daniel.
On how she decided to become a writer, Farmer explained in an interview with the Educational Paperback Association, "When Daniel was four, while I was reading a novel, the feeling came over me that I could create the same kind of thing. I sat down almost in a trance and produced a short story. It wasn't good, but it was fun. I was forty years old." She continues, "Since that time I have been absolutely possessed with the desire to write. I can't explain it, only that everything up to then was a preparation for my real vocation."
Her first book, Do You Know Me?, an adventure for young people set in Zimbabwe, was soon to follow this epiphany. The book was well-received by kids and critics alike, and Publishers Weekly praised Farmer for providing "a most interesting window on a culture seldom seen in children's books."
Her follow-up, The Ear, the Eye and the Arm, was named an Newbery Award Honor Book in 1995, and also honored as a Notable Book and a Best Book for Young Adults by the American Library Association, and an Honor Book by the Golden Kite Awards, awarded by the Society of Children's Writers and Illustrators. Most recently, The House of the Scorpion won the 2002 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.
Overview
In the final years of the nineteenth century, the engineer of the mighty locomotive depends on the fireman to stoke the furnace that runs the engine and supplies steam to the whistle. Sim Webb is proud to be Casey Jones's fireman--because Casey is the best engineer on the Illinois Central, and his is the biggest whistle. But one day Casey and Sim meet a sinister red-headed gentleman who ...