Scott O'Dell's style and narrative technique are very original, and both have drawn high praise as well as criticism from his reviewers. He is a master of understatement. Rarely do his characters express their emotions, although the perceptive reader will find that they may run deep. The love between Bright Morning and Tall Boy is never expressed except for brief comments such as "I stood there and felt like crying," or "My heart hurt for him." Yet although she feels sorry and understands Tall Boy's despair, when her mother taunts her husband and says: "He will soon have to change his name again . . . What do you think it should be? Boy-Who-Sits-at the Fire?

Boy- Who-Sleeps-Stan ding-up? "she comments drily, "I will need to think hard." This seeming stoicism and lack of emotion is derived from older stereotypical pictures of the Indian, but in Scott O'Dell's writing it becomes...