Hatchet

by Gary Paulsen

Get Hatchet by Gary Paulsen book and CD click here

Brian Robeson is stranded and alone in the Canadian wilderness after the pilot of the single-engine Cessna plane in which he is traveling suffers a fatal heart attack. Brian is forced to try to land the plane, but ends up crash-landing the plane into the trees and sliding down into the water. He just manages to escape as the plane sinks in a remote lake.

Brian figures out how to make fire. He forces himself to eat whatever food he can find, such as turtle eggs, fish, berries, fruit, some rabbits, and even a couple of birds. He deals with a porcupine, bear, skunk, moose, and a tornado. He eventually becomes quite a craftsman, crafting a bow, arrows, and a spear. He also fashions a shelter out of the underside of a rock overhang. During the story, he struggles with memories of home, and the bittersweet memory of his mother, who Brian has discovered was cheating on his father.

When a tornado hits the woods and lake, it draws the plane wreckage toward the shore of the lake. Brian makes a raft from a few broken off tree tops to get to the plane. When Brian is working his way into the plane, he drops his hatchet in the water. He realizes how critical the hatchet is for his survival. After diving twice, he retrieves the hatchet and narrowly avoids drowning. Inside the plane, he finds a survival pack, which has an emergency transmitter, many packs of food, a first aid kit, and an AR-7 (.22 survival rifle). Brian activates the transmitter, but not knowing how to work it, he thinks it is broken. As he is eating the food packs, a fur trader arrives in a water plane some time after because he caught the transmiter’s signal. Finally, after reaching his father, he is no closer to being able to tell him about the mother’s affair than at the novel’s beginning