Yellowstone: The Bears of Caldera

by Chad-Michael Simon

While on vacation in Yellowstone National Park, John, Millicent, and Miriam get trapped in the alternate world of Caldera, where they gain amazing powers and meet telepathic animals. Thrust into the middle of a war, they must defeat Lucifur, a fiendish, red grizzly bear, and solve the mystery of Caldera's past to find their way home.

495 pages, Paperback

Published April 27, 2019

Reviews

[Literary Classics Book Awards & Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

John and his not-so-identical twin sisters are fairly typical siblings. They have a bit of a love-hate relationship. Maybe a bit more hate than love to be fair, but there's love in there somewhere too. John has been struggling with growing pains, the kind that come from being nearly a teenager. And although he would never admit it, he still loves it when his mom reminds him he'll always be her baby. With one foot in his childhood, and one precariously testing the waters of young adulthood, he teeters between both worlds with some trepidation. So when John and his mom go "on a bear hunt," there are no real expectations of finding a bear. But John does indeed find a bear, only this grizzly red beast can talk, and soon the boy finds himself separated from his mom in a land where bears and ants and other creatures can communicate with him telepathically. John wants nothing more than to get back to the other side. But soon, his sisters are whisked away as well and all three siblings find themselves in a land entirely unlike anything they've ever known.

Yellowstone, The Bears of Caldera, by Chad-Michael Simon, is a wildly imaginative tale of three siblings and their adventures on the other side of Yellowstone National Park in a hidden world shrouded in magic and mystery. The three must learn who they can and cannot trust as they work towards a common goal of being reunited with their parents. Yellowstone, The Bears of Caldera, is recommended for home and school libraries and has earned the Literary Classics Seal of Approval.

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful tale of adventure, loyalty and courage for people of all ages. The ambiance of Yellowstone BOC is so similar to the grand adventures of C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. There are darker, bloodier aspects to the book that tips my familiarity with Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials. I can very easily see this story play out in a HBO mini series or as a set of films. The world building is very unique and quite extensive between loteral geography, maps, structures, lakes and ponds and societies of different creatures. The battles are massive and heartbreaking. There is so much potential to the story of Caldera and "the stone."

I found myself smiling at the dialogue and personalities between the animals. The marmots were eager, polite and helpful. The bears were largely battering rams that I interpreted as weapons that could either help a cause or hurt it severely. My favorite characters were the animals... specifically Gabriel the German Shepherd guard dog turned ally, Arthur the French speaking genius airhead tarantula and the pair of bonkers buzzards... I mean vultures.