Henry Thoreau was a thinker first of all. He wanted to be a writer also as was his mentor, Ralph Waldo Emerson. In order to transform himself into a writer, he moved to Walden Pond to live in the woods (for 2 years). There he studied his thoughts and the world around him while living simply and wrote Walden; or, Life in the Woods and A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers about his trip with his brother, John. His books did not sell well at the time because his thoughts were considered too inflamatory then. (The author points out that 50 years before Thoreau's time he would have been in the stocks for missing church on Sunday.) Now, however, his works are considered great American literature and his concepts are known to have impacted both how we see the environment and how we respond to our government. Thoreau also wrote an essay based on 2 lectures he gave regarding his arrest for refusing to pay a tax. That essay, Resistance to Civil Government, has played an important role in civil rights in our country and other parts of the world.

The publisher regards this book as a fictional account. Judging by the authors' note I would say it is a very close depiction. The authors used words from Thoreau's writings to construct dialogue for the story. They also read several biographies to form an idea of his personality and behavior. The book is enjoyable and informative and has a bibliography for more in depth reading.
related-naturalists, writers, Transcendentalism, slavery, civil disobedience
RL=6th-8th