Paterson, K.
(1987). Bridge to Terabithia. New
York: Harper Trophy by Harper & Row Publishers, Inc.
I have listed this book with my Challenged Book List. (Death)
Exposition: Jesse
Aarons lives with his family of 4 sisters and his parents on a small farm
outside of town with no neighbors nearby until the Burke family moves in the
house down the road. Leslie Burke is a
girl and at their first meeting Jesse doesn’t seem to like her.
Conflict: Leslie wins
the race that Jesse was determined to win.
He tries to hate her but she wins him over by sheer determination. The
pair is picked on by the older, bigger kids and try to stick together. After
school one day, they cross a dry creek bed on a rope to investigate what was on
the other side. It becomes their new
kingdom, “Terabithia” where Jesse and Leslie become the rulers. Almost everything in the kingdom is formed in
Leslie’s mind. Every day after school
they swing into their own little world where they are in charge and they can
leave the outside world and all their troubles behind.
Rising Action: The story begins to build when many days of
rain fills the creek to overflowing.
Leslie is not afraid to go across on the rope but Jesse is
terrified. He decides not to go one Saturday
morning and when his teacher, Miss Edmonds, calls to ask if he can go to the
Smithsonian Museum. He asks his sleeping
mother if he can go and she agrees. He
has a wonderful time seeing the exhibits and returns home to find that his
family has been frantically searching for him all day.
Falling Action: Leslie
went to “Terabithia” without him and fell into the creek and drowned. He can’t comprehend that she is gone and
doesn’t believe it either. His parents
go to visit the Burke family with all of their relatives there and he crumbles,
yelling and screaming at them that she isn’t dead. He feels so bad that he left her behind when
he could have asked her to go along.
Resolution: Leslie’s family decides to move away because of
her death. They do not blame Jesse for
anything that happened to Leslie but Jesse feels he must apologize to them for
not being there for her. They are grateful for his friendship to her because
she didn’t make friends easily. He then allows
his sister, May Belle, to go to “Terabithia” with him.
Bridge to Terabithia
is a John Newbery Medal winner and has also been on the most challenged book
list.
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