My Side of the Mountain, On the Far Side of the Mountain, and Frightful's Mountain

Mountain #1-3

by Jean Craighead George

A highly acclaimed story of Sam Gribley, a nature-loving boy who grows tired of city life and runs away to live off the land. My Side of the Mountain was written in 1959, followed with On the Far Side of the Mountain in 1990. The last book in the series was published in 1999, forty years after the first book.

Genres: Fiction, Young Adult, Classics, Childrens, Adventure, Survival, Animals

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Jean Craighead George wrote over eighty popular books for young adults, including the Newbery Medal-winning Julie of the Wolves and the Newbery Honor book My Side of the Mountain. Most of her books deal with topics related to the environment and the natural world. While she mostly wrote children's fiction, she also wrote at least two guides to cooking with wild foods, and an autobiography, Journey Inward.

The mother of three children, (Twig C. George, Craig, and T. Luke George) Jean George was a grandmother who joyfully read to her grandchildren since the time they were born. Over the years Jean George kept one hundred and seventy-three pets, not including dogs and cats, in her home in Chappaqua, New York. "Most of these wild animals depart in autumn when the sun changes their behaviour and they feel the urge to migrate or go off alone. While they are with us, however, they become characters in my books, articles, and stories."

Reviews

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I first read this book as a teenager and dreamt about going and living in a hollowed out tree myself in the mountains. As a youth it seemed so romantic. Now my teenage kids read it and it is a favorite of theirs.

[Axel_8D1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book because it tells you how to survive in a forest, and It tells you a story about a boy who I think was lost in a forest, so then he made a house in a tree, and made clothes out of leather. For my opinion when I read this book I felt cozy for no reason.

[Isaac Moss · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was amazing, I love how a boy learns how to survive in the woods, he shows great courage, and it even teaches you a few things about the woods, I must say if I was him I would not do it.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

My Side of the Mountain was an excellent book. I felt like I could relate to it so much. It’s about a boy who runs away from home and goes to live in the Catskill Mountains. He has heard stories of an old family member who used to live in these mountains. My favorite character is Sam Gribley, the boy who has run away. I feel like I am him in real life, I want to run away and live in the mountains somewhere. I don’t have a least favorite character, but I do have another favorite, Frightful. Frightful is a falcon that Sam took from a nest and raised himself. Sam has taught her to hunt for smaller animals, such as rabbits, squirrels, birds, even some snakes.
I could never stop reading this book. Every line on every page kept me reading. I would recommend this book to people who love the wilderness, and an adventure. I wish they would make a movie for this movie. I think I would play the part of Sam Gribley, the wilderness boy. I just feel like I relate to him so much. Everything he does I would do, hunt, fish, build a house out of a tree. Jean Craighead has truly written the perfect. If you haven’t read this book, I strongly recommend you do. You will be entertained throughout the whole book. The story only gets better in the sequel. Sam’s sister joins him and something happens to his beloved falcon. The trilogy is more about frightful perspective on the mountain. How she has to hunt for Sam and live with him. I think it was a good idea to have the last book more about frightful, you learn more about her. It was great book and I recommend it for all.

[Andy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read the book “My Side of the Mountain” by Jean Craighead George. I did not like this book at all. I thought that it was really boring and that not much happened in the whole 177 pages of this book. I felt like the author just got bored with this book half way through and just wanted to finish this book.

“My Side of the Mountain” starts off as him just surviving in the wilderness with his pet falcon named Fightfull. Then one day he notices that he is running out of food. This gives him the idea to go to town and buy some food. When he is in town he makes some friends and his friends tell there friends about him and then the word gets out that there is a boy living in the wilderness all by himself. That gets all over the news and his parents end up seeing it on the news. His parents go to rescue him and bring him but he does not want to go home. He ends up getting his parents to let him stay in the wilderness. His parents build him a cabin in the woods and they let him be free.

I would not recommend this book to anyone. I very much didn’t like this book. I would only have someone read this book if they have to do a report on Jean Craighead George.

[Amanda Schell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adored this story! I was really able to relate with the character

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was obsessed with this author/series as a child, and it holds up for the most part. The first book is spectacular (5 stars), the other two less so (2-3 stars). Now that I'm an adult, Sam's attitude towards Frightful bothered me a bit-- he sees her as a possession as much as he does a friend. Still dreaming of living in a hollowed out tree in the woods, eating roots and berries and making friends with woodland creatures...

[Barb Purvis · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars for the first book and 2.5-3 stars for the others. As a child this seemed so doable and real… love the nostalgia of going back there in my mind for a while.

[Ethan Mason]

Imagine- Leaving your home for an entire year, to live off the land. In the realistic fiction book, My Side of The Mountain, by Jean Craighead George, that's exactly what the main character Sam Gribley does.

Sam is a 12 year old teenage boy from New York City. His father had always told him about his grandfathers land, and Sam knew it was time to go find it, and leave the loud, packed, and stressful city. Over his year long journey, Sam encounters many different struggles, and other things in the wilderness, and meets several new people along the way. I believe Sams message was always live life to the fullest, but to a certain extent. (Page ix in Author's Preference)"I packed my suitcase and told my mother I was going to run away form home. As I envisioned it, I would live by a waterfall in the woods and catch fish on hooks made from forks of tree limbs as I has been taught by my father."

I would recommend this book to anyone in a teenage age group, is very adventurous, and likes extremely realistic fiction. I give this book an overall rating of 4.5 stars out of 5 because it could include a bit more detail and description in some parts, but otherwise it was a significant novel.

[Alex R]

This book was great. There I said it. This book really just kept me busy over the past couple of weeks. It is a great Survival book and gets the reader quikly. From Blizzards to Storms, this is one of the best books I have ever read.

Sam Gribley lives in New York, a shy boy but adventurous. He hates the city, it's just not him, so he escapes to the Catskill Mountains, the start to his adventure. He soon learns how to find shelter, make fire, and catch fish to cook them over the fire. Soon he finds these crazy huge trees and comes up with an idea. I'm going to carve out and light the inside of this tree on fire and carve it out like the Indians did. He goes to the Library, finds out how to do it and he makes a perfect little House.

So many cool things happen in this book, like he meets a hawk and trains it and calls it Frightful because it almost killed him. He meets new people along the way and becomes the best survivor anyone has ever seen. I hope alot of people decide to read the book because it is amazing.

[claudia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A childhood Fav. Totally wanted to be Sam. Wanted to live in a tree.... not now though—-I like my little house, bed, oven and running water!
As an adult.... kept wondering where in the heck are his parents?! In spite of absent parents, I still loved this book.

[Camilla · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVED IT! NO SWEARS AND ITS AWESOME! A MUST READ! Makes me wanna run away but i wont cause i love my dog to much lol

[Jen Geigle Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting look at how it is to live in the mountains. Among other things.

[Kinzlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love it I wached the movie and I liked but ending was only ok becuse his family came and lived with him

[Annika · Rating 4 out of 5]

"My Side of the Mountain" by Jean Craighead George, is an extraordinary book about a young man, Sam Gribley, who leaves his cramped family home in New York City, to survive off of the family land in the Catskill Mountains. The book itself is written as if it is Sam's journal and is in first person point of view,and is a record of all of the things that Sam goes through as a result of surviving off of the land.

This story if one of my personal favorites due to the fact that it is about survival and nature, not from an adults point of view, but from a young person's point of view; apart from that it is an easy read that also contains really detailed drawings which are actually Sam's "diagrams" of what he is doing or seeing. One thing that I also find very interesting about the book is the fact that it creates a very beautiful relationship between Sam and his little companion, Frightful, a falcon that he took from a nest and raised from a young chic. This relationship is one of the most important aspects of the story because it is a driving force behind Sam's success and ability to survive through the difficulties of living off of the land. This also leads into one of my favorite parts of the book.

There are two different parts in the book that I absolutely love, one of them being how Sam ends up with a falcon companion. I won't go into much detail, however I will say this, I enjoyed how it wasn't something randomly put into the book and actually was linked into the story, and I also found the way that he went about retrieving Frightful very funny and unique. My second favorite part of this narrative is the end and the twist that occurs, which happens to be a very sweet heart-warming addition to the story. I love how the author made sure there were no loose ends in the story by the way he connected everything at the end. It was one of those "Awwww!" moments that put a smile on my face.

One thing that I wish would have been different is if the author made the transitions between one event to another a little smoother. I understand that the book is written as a series of journal entries, however, in between some of the events that take place there seems to be an almost abrupt pause that some what bothered me. Other than that, this was an amazing book that really captured my attention and made it nearly impossible to put down.

[TJ Beaver · Rating 5 out of 5]

My Side of the Mountain is a great historical fiction book. This book is about a young boy named Sam who hates his life in New York City and decides to come out to the Catskill Mountains and lives there. He chooses a big tree to live in and finds a little bird and trains her to hunt for him. Sam has to live off the gird, fend for himself, and survive. My favorite part of this book is when Sam gets his bird Frightful who was living in a nest as a little baby. Sam finds her as a baby and takes her back to train. This is my favorite part because I liked hearing about how cute frightful was as a baby. The author wrote this book because she loved how to describe being free. This was a truly free feeling book.

I connected with Sam because there are some things I don't like in my life but unlike Sam I could never run away. I learned that worrying about things will never be any fun unless you try it, just like Sam tried so many different things and survived. For example Sam watches the animals to see what they eat so he knows what is edible. I would recommend this book to anybody who loves books because it is a short read but a great story. Overall I loved this book because it showed me the freeness to have fun.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favorite books as a kid was My Side of the Mountain and I just recently became aware of the fact that it had been turned into a trilogy. So I reread My Side of the Mountain and read Far Side of the Mountain and Frightful's Mountain.

I'm happy that a reread My Side because there were big chunks of the plot that I had forgotten about and would have been lost if I had just jumped into Far Side. I still loved My Side, really enjoyed Far Side, but didn't like Frightful's Mountain at all. The second book in this series is about Sam's life with his sister who has joined him on the mountain and about poaching. It held my interest and enjoyed learning more of their survival skills. The third book was from Frightful's perspective and I just don't enjoy hearing an animal's perspective....I think it's cheesy. Plus there was an environmental agenda throughout the whole book that I felt was shoved down my throat. My suggestion if you want to read all three is to read the first two and then read just the last few chapters of Frightful's Mountain so you can see how everything ends.

[Christians · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like this book because it tells you on how to survive in the wild and it tell you how to make tools and I like how he lives in a hemlock tree that he dug out to live in. But i like how he tried and looked so long for his family lost long farm/land and on that way he find a baby eagle and raises it to become his pet and his bird named frightful helps him hunt and his bird catches rats and other types of animals. But that's all I'll tell you because you will need to read it for yourself. But I would rate this book from 1 to 5 a 5 because it's interesting to learn to surviv how to make tools and how to gather food. So I would recommend this book to people who love books that people survive in and for people who like to make tools that are from the outdoors and for the people who like how people survive out threw things. So that's my rating of the book. Hope you like it yourself

[Boozy · Rating 5 out of 5]

seriously one the greatest books I've ever read. When I look back at events in my life that shaped who I am today, reading this as a child was a defining moment. As I'm rereading this, Sam has been dusting himself off, reawakening from the recesses of my memory, intermixed with those memories are parts of my childhood, back when the world was a new exciting place, my parents were my heroes and they would right any wrong. Once I finish this, I know I will be reading it to my nephews and nieces, I trust it will spark that quest for knowledge and adventure that it did in me and countless other children.

[Tessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've only read My Side of the Mountain but my son read all three of these books and my daughter listened to them on cd. They absolutely loved them and went around talking about birds and outdoor survival and traps and poachers and trees and other interesting stuff. DD says that she liked how Sam learned how to do all kinds of cool stuff on his own and how his dad kept thinking he would come back down the mountain to get help but Sam never did.

[Suzka · Rating 4 out of 5]

I want to live in a hollow hemlock tree! Would I want to wear rabbit fur underwear, though?

This was fun. G loved it. He loved Frightful, the hawk, and the whole notion of living in the wild.

The one piece I can't buy into is that Sam figures out you need 32 cups of maple sap to boil down to one cup of syrup. He doesn't have the capacity to reduce that much of any liquid in one of his leaf-saucepans. I AM A BUZZKILL, I REALIZE.

[Shayne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great young boy/adventure book. I gave it four stars because at the end it was very abrupt. The last sentence was " And then it was the end." What.. you can't do that! But other than that is was very interesting to see the dynamics of the family and how they supported the boy in his adventure.

[Alex Fargis]

My favorite character in this book is the boy because of how well he thinks about things and lives on his own. I loved this book with all of the adventure incorporated with it. I think this book is kind of similar to the book "Hatchet" about a boy who lived in a forest in Alaska after a plane crash. I would recommend this book to adventurous and outdoorsy people.

[Morgan Robinson]

A littel boy is tired of his parent;s. So he goes to the wood's to live in a tree, He studies how to keep warm in the winter, and how to say cool in the summer, then he finds a falcon it get shot, he is sad, but it live's yay.

[Shay Karlen · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is very boring because this book is about one thing and does not stop. The story takes place in one place and stays there, and the kid survives in the wilderness and is very boring. It needed more action,I don't recommend this to anyone.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Recently read these three books again for the first time since I was first introduced to them back in 3rd grade!!!!

Loved them just as much as I did when I first got hooked way back when I was a young boy! :)

[Krista the Krazy Kataloguer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this as a teenager and was fascinated with the idea of living alone in a hollow tree eating flat "bread" made from crushed nuts. I wanted to try it myself, but never did.

[Lydia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a wonderful book for those who are coming of age. I wouldn't recommend it for everyone but it gives great direction to anyone who is lost.

[Gisselle Alfaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the first one I want to see if the others are as good

[Sue · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not that good unless you want to learn how to live off the land