Across Five Aprils: Summary









Across Five Aprils is a Historical Fiction book about a remarkable boy named Jethro Creighton, who strongly matures during the Civil war when his teacher and his brother leave for the war. Jethro has to learn to do things on his own because he doesn’t have any strong influences nearby. When the book begins, Jethro starts out as a nine year old who still acts like a child. During the war he is much more anxious and fearful because of all of the tragic events that he faced during the war. In the end of the book, after having to face all of the tragedies of war, he is 13 years old and is much more gentle with people and acts more like an adult rather than a child. His father becomes quite sick and he has to become the man of the house because his 18 year old brother is out fighting for the North. His family is thought of as traitors by a lot of people because of the fact that his brother, Bill is fighting for the opposite side. Jethro has to learn how to control himself when people talk badly about Bill. In the end, when the war is over and his family is back together, Jethro has learned a lot about the value of family.

This book is set in the city of Newton, Illinois where slavery is not depended on. It starts off during mid-April of 1861 and ends in 1866 after the Civil war ends. In these five years there are many events that take place that are true in history. There are also many made up characters and events that still could’ve happened in the Civil war era. Across Five April’s helps readers gain knowledge about the tragic events that happened during the Civil war and helps them understand what families had to go through during this era.

00000000Irene Hunt, the author of Across Five Aprils wrote most of the events in this story based off of letters, records and stories told by her grandfather who lived during the Civil war. The way that the book is written highly suggests that the author took a high dislike to the Civil war. Even though Hunt wasn’t alive during this era, it seems that her bias is that the war was a waste of time. She seemed to feel that it tore way too many families apart and should not have been an event that occurred. She wrote this book to show how terrible the war was and how many lives were affected during it. Across Five April’s was mainly written to teach readers about family values and that if you stick with your family and friends in a time of tragedy, you can get through it more easily than being alone.