Where the River Rises

Title: Where the River Rises
Author: Rosie Boom
Series: The Barn Chronicles, book 4
Major Themes: Family Life, Farm Life, New Zealand
Synopsis: Rosie Boom tells the story of her family’s last year living in a barn while they finished building their house.

I read the first three books in the Barn Chronicles to my children two or three years ago, but Where the River Rises had just been published and I didn’t have it yet. We finally got around to reading it just recently. This one is every bit as good as the first three!

The Boom family is working hard to finish their new house as the story begins, and coping with a terrible drought. No rain for six months is causing a lot of problems for the farmers that Dad works with, and soon the Boom’s animals are suffering as well. The hot summer gives plenty of opportunities for having fun outside, camping and swimming in the lake they discover on a neighbor’s land. Milly cares for her chickens and ducks every day, and continues to milk her cow.

After one last winter in the barn, the family is finally able to move into their new, albeit unfinished, house in the spring. What luxury, to live in a house again after nearly four years in the barn! The barn still gets used at times, though; the story about the whipped cream fight is hilarious.

Where the River Rises is a lovely story about a large family who enjoy living, working and playing together. Not exactly a pioneer story, it is still reminiscent, somewhat, of the Little House books.

WARNING: The word “darn” is used in chapters 3, 4, 11, 17, 18, 20, 21, 25, and 30 (pages 34, 41, 90, 122, 127, 135, 150, 159, 189, 237, and 240).