Where The Red Fern Grows Summary

The book Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls is about a boy named Billy and his adventure with Old Dan and Little Ann. With the help of his mentor, his grandfather, Billy works hard to earn enough money to buy himself two raccoon hunting hounds. Billy trains his hounds until they can catch their first raccoon. Even though it takes longer than Billy would liked, it was all worth it in the end. Every night Billy goes out hunting with his two hounds. Billy faces many conflicts with his dogs but once Old Dan and Little Ann gain enough experience, Billy enters a hunting contest. Even though the contest is full of professional hunters, Billy is determined. He faces many tests during the contest but overcomes all odds and wins the contest. Not long after the contest is over, the trio encounters another test- a mountain lion. Old Dan dies the next day due to his injuries and Little Ann not long after. Distraught, Billy does not recover until, he goes out to visit the graves of his two dogs, and sees a red fern. He and his family are in awe at the bush because according to Indian legends, only angels can plant a red fern.

I enjoyed reading about the companionship between Billy and his dogs. I also think that Rawls did a fantastic job describing Billy’s emotions and how excited he was to get the dogs. The connection I made with the book and the characters really tied the whole book together and allowed me to savor and appreciate the book more. Although, Where the Red Fern Grows was an emotion grabbing book, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. I found that the book was predictable and slightly boring. I found that this book was hard to focus on and read for long amounts of time even though it should have been a quick read due to it’s size. I would recommend Where the Red Fern Grows to people who like reading about the adventurous companionship between