LitPick Review
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The Mystery of the Lost Map by Jim Rhoden is a cute story about the Randall family’s adventure of a lifetime looking for buried treasure. Brothers Cowboy Little and Cowboy Small live on the Circle R Ranch in the Wild West, so they get to spend their free time looking for old Indian arrowheads, exploring, fishing, and even camping overnight on their own sometimes. They love taking their horses Ned and Ted, dogs Red and Fred, fleas Itch and Scratch, and a couple of cattle named Brawny Bull and Helen Heifer when they go. One day, they accidentally find saddlebags with coins and other special items in them.
As they’re headed home to tell their family about it, they are forced to outsmart a bunch of bandits called the Whiskey Still Gang who insist the saddlebags belong to them. When they’re back at the ranch, everyone’s excited to hear what happened. Their family works together and brainstorms ideas about how to find out where the rest of the loot might be. With the eventual help of a retired Ranger, a Hopi Indian chief, and even the Governor of the territory, they sort out their clues and decide who will travel with the boys on the expeditions that should finish unraveling the mystery. Since the Whiskey Still Gang members also seem to be exactly where they need to be to keep causing trouble, the book winds up being a wonderful mix of mystery, adventure, and comedy that will surely appeal to all ages.
Opinion:
If you don’t have much time but still want to read a great story, then The Mystery of the Lost Map is just the book for you! It’s only 92 pages and has colorful pictures at the beginning of each chapter that hint at the action that’s coming up next. I liked how the pictures help readers feel like they are literally experiencing the Wild West along with the characters. The simple way the book’s written would be easy for 4-10-year-olds to follow, and words they may not understand such as fig’ur, passel, or vittles are explained in a short glossary at the end. The Southwestern twang in the dialogue makes the book fun to read, and it would be extra entertaining if it could be read out loud with a different voice used for each character. I think many of us have grown up thinking about the Wild West as a place for shoot-outs, robberies, and battles between cowboys and Indians, so I think the best part of this story is how it shows off how people in a family, community, and even from a different culture can work together politely and respectfully to figure out a problem so that the whole community can benefit from the situation.
