When his family's nemesis, the evil trapper George Burton, suddenly reappears after a long absence, young Ben MacDonald runs off in fright and soon finds himself being whisked down the Red River in a rowboat without any oars. His father and brother, finding Ben gone and convinced that Burton has gotten him, set off on a desperate search. Meanwhile, Ben drifts into Lake Winnipeg and the home of the Cree tribe, whom he has been brought up to fear.

A looong-awaited sequel to [Incident at Hawk's Hill], I didn't enjoy it quite so much as I recall enjoying the first, but they're written for a younger audience (probably middle school-ish) and I'm somewhat older now than I was in 1970 or so when I read the first one.

The book provides an interesting look at family life on the Manitoba frontier in the 1870s, but even more, it provides a considered look at some of the issues of lifestyle and cultural differences between the frontier settlers, largely of white European extraction, and the local Metis population, who were descended from local indigenous peoples mixed with much earlier French fur-trapper influence. The biggest difference lay in the attitudes toward nature...whether to respect and honor the natural world, taking only what we need and fully utilizing what we take or whether to take whatever we want with a view to subjugating the natural world to our whim of the moment. An issue we're still grappling with today, and a worthwhile read for any young person interested in environmental issues. Although the second does stand on its own, I'd strongly recommend reading the two books in order. You'll get much more out of the second one if you've read the first already.