Rhyolite: The True Story of a Ghost Town

by Diane Siebert

Book Overview

Long ago, in a proud desert town named Rhyolite, businesses thrived and children played and people had dreams that were big and grand. But Rhyolite survived only a few years before those dreams were... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Library Binding
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0618096736
• ISBN13: 9780618096732
• Release Date: January 2003
• Publisher: Clarion Books
• Length: 32 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 9.6" x 11.3"
• Age Range: 4 to 7 years
• Grade Range: Preschool to Grade 2

Customer Reviews

A jewel of a book

After I stood and read this book in the Visitor Center at Furnace Creek (Death Valley), I knew I had to go out to Rhyolite and see the ghost town. The exceptional woodcuts by David Frampton evoke the beginning of the 20th century in a Nevada boom town; the coyotes, emblematic of the natural world that cannot be kept at bay by this unnatural town, weave in and out of the story like the haunting refrain of a ballad. Unlike another reviewer, I found the couplets charming, witty, and not tedious at all. The internal rhymes, alliteration and striking similies (rooms/...like open, sunlit tombs) made the story exceedingly memorable.

An Interesting Addition

This is an interesting, well written, rhyming story about the formation and demise of a town in Neveda in 1904 in response to a gold rush. The woodcut illustrations are beautiful. It is a useful book to teach a child about the concept of a ghost town, something my six year old son, who has been raised on the East Coast and Midwest, had no idea existed.