Booktalking Colorado - Full Booktalk Record

Booktalking Colorado Full Record:

	Title:	The Dark Horse
	Author:	Sedgwick, Marcus
	Date Published:	2003
	Genre:	Fantasy
	Grade Level:	6 - 8
	Booktalker:	Sam Marsh

Notes:
Arthurian times

Booktalk:
Mouse found the box. Washed up in the black sand after the storm. Half a day from home. A plain wooden box, of a deep, rich red wood with black in places, and a shine that reflected the light from the sky. It was different . . . from somewhere else. Her head began to swim and she staggered. "Mouse?" Sigurd inquired. "No," she said, "No, it's gone now." They agreed to take it back to the village rather than try to open it. Neither of them noticed the man lying amongst the rocks just twenty paces away. Mouse had come from a cave of the wolves. Apparently she could remember nothing before that time. Gradually, she had been accepted into the tribe and was adopted by Olaf. She became as a sister to Sigurd. But, Mouse was strange. She could feel things that no one else could. She could know of things that no one else would. She could talk to the wolves and dogs. She could leave her body and see from that of another animal. She was treated by most as strange and, potentially, dangerous. When nobody else, not even the Wise woman, Gudrun, could find a way to even force open the box, it was given to Mouse with the command to open it. When she put her trembling hand on top of it, it swung smoothly open to reveal . . . nothing. At least nothing that anyone could see. But, Mouse knew there was something in the box, something that tried to take hold of her. Something powerful. Something unseen pulling at her mind. And when Horn, the Lawmaker, drew his sword, Cold Lightning, and brought it down on the box . . . the sword broke in two, one part flying across the pit to cut Gudrun. But, there was not the slightest mark on the box. Only when Horn he slammed the lid shut, did the power of the box release its attack on a shaken Mouse.