WORD LISTS

"Hatchet," by Gary Paulsen, Chapters 10 –15

Mon Apr 06 08:47:02 EDT 2020
By Mrs. Watson
The sole survivor of a plane crash in the Canadian wilderness, thirteen-year-old Brian Robeson will need resourcefulness, courage, and strength in order to stay alive.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–4, Chapters 5–8, Chapters 9–12, Chapters 13–16, Chapters 17–Epilogue

Here is a link to our lists for The Voyage of the Frog by Gary Paulsen.
ignite
Clearly there had to be something for the sparks to ignite, some kind of tinder or kindling—but what?
tinder
Clearly there had to be something for the sparks to ignite, some kind of tinder or kindling—but what?
kindling
Clearly there had to be something for the sparks to ignite, some kind of tinder or kindling—but what?
exasperation
He settled back on his haunches in exasperation, looking at the pitiful clump of grass and twigs.
clump
He settled back on his haunches in exasperation, looking at the pitiful clump of grass and twigs.
limp
He put the hatchet back in his belt and went out of the shelter, limping on his sore leg.
register
Not twenty feet to his right, leaning out over the water were birches and he stood looking at them for a full half-minute before they registered on his mind.
tendril
He moved to the trees. Where the bark was peeling from the trunks it lifted in tiny tendrils, almost fluffs.
pluck
Brian plucked some of them loose, rolled them in his fingers.
flammable
They seemed flammable, dry and nearly powdery.
painstaking
It was painstaking work, slow work, and he stayed with it for over two hours.
smolder
A cloud of sparks rained down, most of them missing the nest, but some, perhaps thirty or so, hit in the depression and of those six or seven found fuel and grew, smoldered and caused the bark to take on the red glow.
quantity
It wasn’t quantity, there were plenty of sparks, but they needed more.
gratify
Working as fast as he could he carefully placed the dried grass and wood pieces he had tried at first on top of the bark and was gratified to see them take.
squat
These he threw in the shelter, went back for more, threw those in, and squatted to break and feed the hungry flames.
stock
And so he sat through a long part of the day, keeping the flames even, eating from his stock of raspberries, leaving to drink from the lake when he was thirsty.
eddy
When he was in the shade of the trees breaking limbs the mosquitos swarmed on him, as usual, but when he came to the fire, or just near the shelter where the smoke eddied and swirled, the insects were gone.
interval
He had to be sure to try and sleep in short intervals so he could keep die fire going, and he tried to think of a way to regulate his sleep but it made him sleepy to think about it and he was just going under again when he heard the sound outside.
dormant
The hunger, always there, had been somewhat controlled and dormant when there was nothing to eat but with the eggs came the scream to eat.
fussy
As his stomach moved toward his backbone he became less and less fussy.
native
Some natives in the world ate grasshoppers and ants and if they could do that he could get a raw egg down.
convulse
His throat tried to throw it back up, his whole body seemed to convulse with it, but his stomach took it, held it, and demanded more.
staggering
He had decided to always have enough on hand for three days and after spending one night with the fire for a friend he knew what a staggering amount of wood it would take.
assume
There was no pain there so he assumed that had taken care of itself.
comprise
He moved to the top of the rock ridge that comprised the bluff over his shelter and was pleased to find a large, flat stone area.
initially
Initially he had thought of making a signal fire every day but he couldn’t—he would never be able to keep the wood supply going.
overlook
At the last trip to the top of the stone bluff with wood he stopped, sat on the point overlooking the lake, and rested.
gnarled
At the other end of the bottom of the L there was another large rock sticking out over the water and on top of the rock a snaggly pine had somehow found food and grown, bent and gnarled.
emerge
It emerged a split part of a second later.
lure
He had no hooks or string but if he could somehow lure them into the shallows—and make a spear, a small fish spear—he might be able to strike fast enough to get one.
taper
Then, propping the hatchet in a crack in the rock wall, he had pulled the head of his spear against it, carving a thin piece off each time, until the thick end tapered down to a needle point.
effective
It was crude, but it looked effective and seemed to have good balance when he stood outside the shelter and hefted the spear.
motive
He needed something to spring the spear forward, some way to make it move faster than the fish—some motive force.
primitive
Maybe that was how it really happened, way back when—some primitive man tried to spear fish and it didn’t work and he “invented” the bow and arrow.
swivel
He put all of his life into his legs, jumped logs and moved through brush like a light ghost, swiveling and running, his lungs filling and blowing and now the sound was louder, coming in his direction.

Word List Actions:

Create a new Word List