From Publishers Weekly Soon after Faith and her father settle in colonial Massachusetts， their primitive community is raided by Indians. Everyone but Faith is killed or taken hostage. Faith leaves the wreckage of the settlement with Zachary， the man who first guided her there. Zachary takes her to Springfield， marries her and leaves immediately to fight in King Philip's War， a confrontation between the Indians and the colonists. As Faith waits for her husband's return， she gives shelter to a shiftless， greedy couple and copes with their demands. She must also come to terms with her feelings for Peter， a young friend of her father's. When Zachary comes home， Faith makes him understand how deeply she has come to care for him. Her experiences alone after the raid are described vividly and form one of the novel's high points; the one-dimensional characters that had cluttered the narrative have all been killed off. The sheer quantity of Faith's adventures is overwhelming: there is material enough for several books here. Still， those readers who are able to focus on the novel's exquisitely evoked sense of time and place should find much to enjoy. Ages 10-14. Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information， Inc. From School Library Journal Grade 5-9-- A predictable historical romance set around 1675 in the Puritan Massachusetts Colony， this is the tale of Faith Ralston， a 15-year-old girl raised to be a lady in England， who finds herself in the New World facing many hardships for which she is unprepared. Along with her Bible-spouting father; Peter， a young awkward boy from the ship; and two guides， Sergeant Stedman and Ralph Keene， Faith sets off from Boston harbor on foot to their new farm land. Besides the discomforts of travel， they face a journey through hostile Indian territory. While Faith is in the woods gathering nuts， the settlement is attacked by Indians， and Faith returns to find her father and Ralph savagely murdered. She is rescued by Sergeant Stedman and marries him before he leaves for the Indian Wars. While the Sergeant is gone， the girl comes to appreciate her husband more and more. The book does provide an interesting， easy-to-read picture of everyday life in the early Puritan colonies， but none of the characters is well-rounded. Although Luhrmann is fair in presenting both good and bad characters among the Puritans， she does little to dispel the image of the Indian as ruthless savage. The descriptions of the Indian attacks are particularly gory. This historical fiction may be read because of the light romance; however most libraries would be better off with an extra copy of Speare's The Witch of Blackbird Pond (Houghton， 1958). --Yvonne A. Frey， Peoria Public Library， Ill.Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information， Inc. See all Editorial Reviews