Books with author Will Hobbs

"Gold!" Jason shouted at the top of his lungs. "Read all about it! Gold discovered in Alaska!"Within hours of hearing the thrilling news, fifteen-year-old Jason Hawthorn jumps a train for Seattle, stow away on a ship bound for the goldfields, and joins thousands of fellow prospectors attempting the difficult journey to the Klondike. The Dead Horse Trail, the infamous Chilkott Pass, and a five-hundred-mile trip by canoe down the Yukon River lie ahead. With help from a young writer named Jack London, Jason and his dog face moose, bears, and the terrors of a subartic winter in this bone-chilling survival story. 00-01 Tayshas High School Reading List, 01-02 Young Hoosier Book Award Masterlist (Gr 4-6), 01-02 Young Hoosier Book Award Masterlist (Gr 6-8), 01-02 William Allen White Children's Book Award Masterlist, and 01 Heartland Award for Excellence in YA Lit Finalist Notable Children's Trade Books in the Field of Social Studies 2000, National Council for SS & Child. Book Council, 2000 Best Books for Young Adults (ALA), and 2000 Quick Picks for Young Adults (Recomm. Books for Reluctant Young Readers)

In this riveting, action-packed novel from award-winning author Will Hobbs, a teenage boy hoping to help his loved ones must fight for his life as he makes the dangerous journey across the Mexican border into the United States. This middle grade novel is an excellent choice for tween readers in grades 5 to 6, especially during homeschooling. It’s a fun way to keep your child entertained and engaged while not in the classroom. When falling crop prices threaten his family with starvation, fifteen-year-old Victor Flores heads north in an attempt to "cross the wire" from Mexico into America so he can find work and help ease the finances at home.But with no coyote money to pay the smugglers who sneak illegal workers across the border, Victor struggles to survive as he jumps trains, stows away on trucks, and hikes grueling miles through the Arizona desert.Victor's passage is fraught with freezing cold, scorching heat, hunger, and dead ends. It's a gauntlet run by many attempting to cross the border, but few make it. Through Victor's desperate perseverance, Will Hobbs brings to life a story that is true for many, polarizing for some, but life-changing for all who read it.Acclaim for Crossing the Wire includes the following: New York Public Library Books for the Teen Age, Junior Library Guild Selection, Americas Awards Commended Title, Heartland Award, Southwest Book Award, and Notable Books for Global Society.

A Dramatic Tale of Grizzlies and Gold Fourteen-year-old Cloyd Atcitty has been skipping school for years. He's run away from a group home for Native American boys, and is now being sent to work for Walter Landis, an old rancher on an isolated Colorado farm. In a cave above the ranch, Cloyd finds a turquoise carving of a bear. Knowing that his people, the Utes, have a special relationship with bears, he keeps the small stone, hoping it will bring him strength. A terrible blow-up with Walter ends in near disaster, but the old man offers Cloyd one last chance: they'll ride together into the mountains to reopen Walter's abandoned gold mine. Among the high peaks that harbor Colorado's last grizzlies, Cloyd's courage and loyalty will be tested to the limit.

Heart-stopping adventure on the wild side of Seattle!How do you rescue a coyote trapped in the elevator of a downtown office building? How do you save an injured seal at the bottom of a cliff with the tide coming in? Fourteen-year-old Shannon and her younger brother, Cody, are about to find out as they spend a summer of breathless, sometimes reckless, often hilarious adventure visiting their uncle Neal at a wildlife center called Jackie's Wild Seattle. When Uncle Neal is injured, it's up to Shannon, Cody, and Sage, the rescue dog, to keep the circle of healing unbroken.

A Summer To RememberFourteen-year-old Clay Lancaster has been dreaming for years of the adventure he calls The Big Wander -- a summer in the Southwest with his older brother, Mike, searching for their uncle Clay. When Mike decides to return home to Seattle and the girlfriend he left behind, Clay chooses to stay on and continue the search on his own. Following a tip about his uncle, he heads out into the most remote canyons of the Navajo reservation, with only a burro and a dog named Curly for company. Clay loses his heart to the vast, rugged land -- and to an adventurous girl with a long, dark braid -- but finds his uncle in big trouble. Can Clay pull off a risky plan to save his uncle -- and the wild horses Uncle Clay has put his own life in jeopardy to protect?

A meteorite is hurtling toward the Black Hills of South Dakota. . . . Brady Steele's love for all things extreme is given a boost when a fireball crashes through the roof of his house. It turns out that Brady's space rock is one of the rarest meteorites ever found. In fact, a professor from a nearby museum wants to study it in search of extraterrestrial bacteria, hoping to discover the first proof of life beyond Earth.During a wild week of extreme bicycling, fishing, and caving, Brady discovers he's able to do strange and wonderful feats that shouldn't be possible. At the same time, he's developing some frightening symptoms. Could he be infected with long-dormant microbes from space? Is his meteorite a prize . . . or a menace?

Andy is in aworld of trouble.On the last day of a sea kayaking trip in southeast Alaska, fourteen-year-old Andy Galloway paddles away from his group to visit the nearby site where his archaeologist father died trying to solve the mystery of the first Americans. A sudden, violent storm blows Andy's kayak off course and washes him ashore on Admiralty Island, an immense wilderness known as the Fortress of the Bears. Struggling to survive, Andy encounters a dog running with wolves and then a man toting a stone-tipped spear. The wild man vanishes into the forest, but the dog reappears and leads Andy to a cave filled with Stone Age tools and weapons. Running for his life, Andy retreats deep into the cave, where danger, suspense, and discovery await.

The great race across Alaska!As Dawson City goes up in flames, Jason Hawthorn itches to join the new rush for gold in Nome, 1,700 miles away. He and his brothers have been cheated out of their sawmill, so when a $20,000 prize is announced for the winner of a race to Nome, Jason enters. His partner in the canoe is Jamie Dunavant, the adventurous girl he loves. Will they make it to the finish line, despite the hazards of the Yukon River, two dangerous rivals, and the terrors of the open sea?

Just fourteen, Rick Walder is alone, on the run, and desperate. Stowing away in the back of a truck, he suddenly finds himself at a dead end, out in the middle of nowhere. The Maze. In this surreal landscape of stark redrock spires and deep sandstone canyons, Rick stumbles into the remote camp of Lon Perigrino, a bird biologist who is realeasing fledgling California condors back into the wild. Intriqued by the endangered condors and the strange bearded man dedicated to saving them, Rick decides to stay on. When two men with a vicious dog drive up in a battered old Humvee, Rick discovers that Lon and his birds are in grave danger. Will he be able to save them? In a heart-stopping adventure infused with the spirit of the Icarus myth and a boy's dreams of flight, Will Hobbs brings readers a unique tale of identity, personal growth, and friendship. 01 Blue Spruce Award Masterlist (YA Cat.), 01 AZ Young Reader Award Masterlist (Teen Bks cat.), 00-01 Sunshine State Young Reader's Award Masterlist (Gr. 6-8), 00-01 Black-Eyed Susan Award Masterlist, 00-01 Minnesota's Maud Hart Lovelace Book Award Masterlist, 00-01 South Carolina Book Award Nomination Masterlist (Grds 6-9), 00-01 Lone Star Reading List, 00-01 Utah Book Award (Gr. 7-12), 01 Washington State Evergreen YA Book Award Masterlist, 00-01 Young Hoosier Book Award Masterlist (Gr. 6-8), and 01 Rebecca Caudill Young Readers' Book Award Nominee Masterlist

Raised in the island world of southeast Alaska, sixteen-year-old Robbie Daniels jumps at the chance to work as a deckhand on a salmon troller captained by legendary fisherman Tor Torsen. Catching king salmon from dawn till dusk, Robbie is living his dream -- until he discovers his mysterious captain's dark secret. Tor is illegally searching the coastline for historic metal plaques buried by early Russian explorers. When Robbie learns the value of these hidden treasures, he fears he may know too much tosurvive. Tor's wrath and a violent storm at sea put Robbie's courage and wits to the ultimate test.

In this fast-paced adventure story set in the Canadian arctic, fifteen-year-old Inuit hunter Nick Thrasher comes face-to-face with a fearsome creature on a routine caribou hunt gone wrong. Part grizzly, part polar bear, this environmental mutant has been pegged the “grolar bear” by wildlife experts. Nick may have escaped this time, but it won’t be his last encounter.Then Nick’s estranged half-brother, Ryan, offers to take him on a rafting trip down a remote part of the Firth River. But when disaster strikes, the two narrowly evade death. They’re left stranded without supplies—and then the grolar bear appears. Will Hobbs brings his singular style to this suspenseful story about two brothers fighting for survival against the unpredictable—and sometimes deadly—whims of nature.