In Acts of Courage, Connie Brummel Crook dramatizes the life of one of Canada's most enduring heroines, Laura Secord. From young Laura Ingersoll's early days in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, amidst the turmoil that followed the American Revolutionary War, the story outlines her father's difficult decision to move his family to Upper Canada. Laura's subsequent meeting and courtship with James Secord is described against the backdrop of homesteading in the Niagara Peninsula and of enduring the imminent threat of American invasion. These first sections of the book provide the background for Laura's courageous rescue of her husband from the battlefield at Queenston Heights, and her even more amazing trek to warn Col. FitzGibbon of the American's secret plans to attack the British outpost at Beaver Dams. Laura's extraordinary life, peopled with characters like Joseph Brant and Col. Fitzgibbon, is given even more poignancy and interest by the author's inventive and surprising characterization of the young FitzGibbon, by her acute eye for historical detail, and through her insights into the character of a young woman whose acts of courage have captured the imagination of generations of young Canadians.

 

This book is the winner of numerous awards. It was recognised in the YA category by the Word Guild Award. It was recognised in the Historical Fiction category by the Word Guild Award. It also was recognised by the Resource Links the Year's Best.

This book has been graded for interest at 10-12 years.

There are 272 pages in this book. This book was published 2012 by Pajama Press .

Connie Brummel Crook is a historian, former teacher and the author of more than a dozen historical books for children that often focus on the history of Upper Canada. Meyers' Rebellion was a Geoffrey Bilson Fiction Award finalist; her picture book Maple Moon was a Storytelling World Honour Title winner; and her most recent novel, Acts of Courage: Laura Secord and the War of 1812, was shortlisted in two categories for the Word Guild Awards. Connie lives in Peterborough, Ontario.