Independent Reading Response Essay Example

are not held back from trying any means that can guarantee survival. They construct a fire with the helping skills from Julia’s scouting.

The title can be interpreted to mean keeping up the struggle. As Farragut once said to the soldiers, they damn the torpedoes and march full speed ahead. Man has to live and it does not matter how. What is of most importance is staying the course. Doing the little that one can. Set at a time when the world is grappling with the problem of terrorism, the novel encourages young ones to take terrorists head on and never fear them. Whether it be in the air or on the land, nothing is impossible. Julia’s antics to starting a fire and the boys’ audacity to intervene against the terrorist (Gutman 14) as well as Henry’s crash landing ideas that save them all are some of the events that attest to the title.

The conflict takes the shape of a melodrama with the boys being the noble one and the terrorists, the evil. No wonder, they all perish in the hands of very young boys who have sworn to continue breathing in the face of whichever difficulty. As per the moral of the story, continuous efforts in the face of difficult situations is always rewarded. Like the story of the little hummingbird that sought to put out a forest fire, all are encouraged to try and do anything they can in order to help. For instance if the boys sat back and watched then the terrorist could have killed everybody. Also, had Henry not intervened to crash-land the plane, then probably no one could

have survived.