The Year of Fire

Jean Free, a library consultant, is a retired public-school teacher and
librarian in Whitby, Ontario.

It’s maple syrup time and a young girl visits her grandfather’s
sugarbush. He reminisces about a great forest fire in 1919, which burned
for a year, and tells how his family and neighbors fought it with a
bucket brigade before the schoolhouse and a nearby home were destroyed.

This mythical story reads with simple elegance, perfectly complemented
by the stunning interpretive paintings of award-winning illustrator Ian
Wallace. The story is filled with language to stimulate the senses: the
crackle of the forest fire; the smell of thick, heavy smoke and boiling
sap; the taste of lunch in the woods. Its five chapters and beautiful
double-page illustrations will capture the imagination of primary-grade
children as they visualize early pioneer life and see the ruined forest
that renews itself until “no one knew about the fire except for a few
grandfathers.”

The Year of the Fire is truly a book for adults and children alike to
treasure.