O'Dell's tale of a young boy's abrupt passage into adulthood follows a familiar and elemental pattern: a youth defies his elders and embarks on a dangerous quest that climaxes in an encounter with a supernatural being. The protagonist eventually gains a material prize as well as a vital understanding of life's hardships, and comes to realize that evil wears many faces.

In drawing upon this timeless theme of passage into adulthood, The Black Pearl stresses ideas that apply to young people of any era or culture: that gaining maturity is necessarily an ordeal; that growing up involves conflict with parents; and, most important, that human beings are part of a vast world of natural forces, few of which they understand.

O'Dell's protagonist, Ramon Salazar, is a boy whose impatience with childhood leads him into trouble and, at the same time, speeds his maturation.

Certainly, Ramon is...