The Warriors

By Joseph Bruchac

When twelve-year-old Jake Forrest's mother gets a job in a new city, everything changes. He has to move away from the Iroquois reservation he's lived on his entire life—away from his aunt and uncle, and away from the friends he plays lacrosse with. The lacrosse coach and players at his new school in Washington, D.C., believe that winning is everything, and they don't know anything about the ways of his people. As Jake struggles to find a place where he truly belongs, tragedy strikes and he must find out who he really is. Can he find courage to face the warrior within—the warrior who values peace and leads other to more noble pursuits than outscoring the opposition?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lerner Publishing
• Release date: Aug 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9781467732130

Joseph Bruchac

Joseph Bruchac is the author of Skeleton Man, The Return of Skeleton Man, Bearwalker, The Dark Pond, and Whisper in the Dark, as well as numerous other critically acclaimed novels, poems, and stories, many drawing on his Abenaki heritage. Mr. Bruchac and his wife, Carol, live in upstate New York, in the same house where he was raised by his grandparents. You can visit him online at www.josephbruchac.com.

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C H A P T E R   O N E

IN THE BOX

"JAKE LOOKED UP at the sun in the afternoon sky. It shone right in his face this final quarter of the game, but he didn’t mind.

Elder Brother, he said in a soft voice, using the old Iroquois name for the sun, He Who Loves to Watch the People Play, I thank you for looking at me.

The sun was not the only one looking at Jake and the other teenage lacrosse players. Hundreds of Iroquois people had gathered around the wooden walls of the reservation’s new box lacrosse field. It wasn’t just the population of the rez. Lined up beyond the field were the cars, vans, and pick-ups that had brought the Tuscarora team and its crowd of fans. Whether it was an adult or junior league game, like the one Jake was playing, boxla drew everyone in like noisy bees around a hive.

Today the buzz was especially intense. Both teams facing off had gone unbeaten until this final game of their summer season. Today’s game would settle who was the best team: the Tuskies or Jake’s team, the Junior Warriors.

Almost all of Jake’s close relatives were in the crowd. He lifted his head to look over at them. His aunt and uncle, his younger cousins. They were there. But she wasn’t. Grampa Sky was, though. Like always, his grandfather knew when Jake was looking at him. Grampa Sky lifted his hand and put it against his chest, making the gesture Jake knew was just for him.

Jake thought for a minute about the stories Grampa Sky told him about how it was before Europeans came. Back then, lacrosse was played without walls or boundaries on the fields. Back then, just about everyone, young or old, would have had a lacrosse stick in his hands, playing one village against the other. Now, though, this favorite Iroquois game was played on a field closed in by wooden walls like those of the Canadian indoor rinks, where box lacrosse had first been played in the 1920s during the hockey off-season.

Jake shook his head. It was good to remember the stories, but right now he had to keep his mind on the game. He looked quickly around the field, checking the positions of the other six men on his team, especially Frank Tarbell and Rick Jamieson. It was easy to pick Frank out, off to his left, even without seeing the number on his jersey. In August, Frank had dyed his normally jet-black hair bright red. From under his helmet, Frank’s ponytail hung down his back like a crimson flag. Rick was just as easy to spot. His long, lean arms and legs made him stand out like a heron in a pond.

First Frank, then Rick, raised a hand to wave in Jake’s direction. Jake raised a hand back to them. He knew they would try to get the ball to him for one last shot.

Jake pulled in his chin and pushed out his lower lip. Anyone who knew him knew what that meant. His father had called it Jake’s buffalo look. Nothing was going to push him back. Two minutes to go. The Junior Warriors were behind by one score. Seven to six. Crunch time.

Thirty yards downfield the player opposite Frank scooped up the ball without breaking stride. Driving hard, he planted his left foot and then rolled his right leg back, using his body as a shield. It was the kind of change-of-direction dodge a lax kid did twenty times every day in drills. Frank should have had no trouble with it. But his foot caught on a loose piece of turf. He stumbled and lost the ball. It bounced once and then the Tuscarora boy with the number ten on his jersey caught it in the mesh pocket of his lacrosse stick.

Now Rick was the defenseman in front of Ten. He swung his long stick across one-handed. The wrap check failed as Ten lowered his own stick, ducked under, and whipped a perfect sidearm pass. The lacrosse ball flew as fast as a diving hawk across the field.

It was such a good pass that the Tuscarora midfielder, number seven, smiled as he got ready to catch it. Jake and his teammates had nicknamed this player Sunscreen. That was the way it went in an Iroquois lacrosse game, always teasing the other players, talking good-natured trash at them. Tuscaroras tended to be lighter-skinned than other Iroquois people, so their game names reflected it. Ten was Freckles. Eleven was Beachboy.

Jake saw Sunscreen’s smile. It was the same smile that Jake had noticed on the midfielder’s face when he’d scored the goal that put the Warriors down by one point. Jake knew what Sunscreen was thinking: that there was no way Jake could get to that pass before he did. In his own mind, Sunscreen was already twenty yards up the field, dodging defenders, set for the overhand shot that would ice the Tuskies’ victory.

Jake lowered his stick and let his shoulders slump as if he were giving up, knowing that Sunscreen would see him. It was one of the tricks Uncle Irwin had taught him. You win with your mind as much as you win with your body, Jake. Never let the other side know what you are really thinking.

The ball thumped into the pocket of Sunscreen’s stick. He lowered it into the box, then pivoted to go around Jake. But Jake wasn’t there. Just as the ball had reached the Tuscarora player, Jake had raced behind him. With a perfect poke check, Jake thrust his stick against Sunscreen’s gloved lower hand. The ball popped out of the webbing, and Jake snagged it in midair.

Jake whipped past one midfielder, then bull-dodged between two defenders. The goalie was waiting in a crouch, his webbed stick looking as wide as a fish net. He was set to block the overhand shot most midfielders would have tried.

Jake was not most midfielders. He was Eddie Forrest’s son. As he reached the edge of the crease and he saw the goalie start to follow him across, Jake suddenly planted his left foot, whipped the stick up, and shot the ball backhanded over his left shoulder. It bounced past the goalie’s feet and into the net, just a heartbeat before the sound of the referee’s whistle ending the game. Seven–seven. A tie.

A shout went up from the crowd on both sides of the field, the same way it almost always did at the end of a game between Indians. It didn’t matter

Reviews for The Warriors

[fatlamb · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Grades: 5-8Book is for young adult boys in the middle school setting, not a book I would recommend for girls.This book deals with issues that many young boys deal with while growing up and trying to find themselves; family traditions, self-doubt, pity, identity, confidence, coming into adolescence, relocating, and trying to fit in.Through out the book there is a strong presence in Iroquois traditions, sayings, and beliefs. Jake Forrest a young boy who has grown up his whole life on the reservation is moving to Maryland to be with his mom. He is giving up his way of life, what he knows, and what he loves (lacrosse, his Grandpa Sky, Uncle Irwin, friends, his beliefs, and his Iroquois ways). His mom (Molly Forrest) has sacrificed a lot; she has become a successful Indian lawyer in Maryland and believes the best thing for Jake is to go to school at a prestigious prep school. Jake quickly finds himself in a different world outside the reservation, he is not happy, not sad, but just not interested until he begins to go to school, a school rich in history and pride in lacrosse. Jake does his best and he does a great job to adapt and accommodate to his new surroundings. Jake realizes he is finding hard to still believe his Iroquois ways and to assimilate. Jake has a problem with his lacrosse coach, Coach Scott. His coach talks badly of the game he loves and shows no respect to the game he loves and to his people. A horrible event happens to Coach Scott in the end that makes Jake realize what he must do. The book deals with many issues with how little you know about people and their beliefs, how people are viewed just based on appearance. This is a story of a journey of a young boy becoming a young adult. He uses his Iroquois sayings that he had learned from a young boy to become a confident young adult.Rating (2) stars.Very little of interest if you had no interest in lacrosse. Book was centered way too much on lacrosse. The book does not appeal to young adult female readers of any sorts. There are great lessons in the book but the story was slow to develop and no suspense. The story lacked movement and feelings, in the end it did not have that great of an impact.

[abigailadams26 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

When Jake Forrest leaves his Iroquois reservation to live with his lawyer mother in Maryland, he finds himself enrolled at an exclusive Washington D.C.-area prep school where lacrosse is the obsession. Considered sacred by his people, Jake is dismayed at some of his teacher's misrepresentations of the game's history, and of his people's culture in general. When that teacher, who is also the coach, is injured, Jake sees his opportunity to teach his teammates, and his entire school, what the game is really all about...Warriors is yet another Joseph Bruchac title that succeeds on a number of different levels. An engaging sports novel for middle-grade readers, featuring a likable protagonist whose basic storyline - kid moves to new town, has to make friends and try to fit in at new school - should appeal to a broad readership, it also offers en enlightening glimpse of a people and culture with which many young Americans may be unfamiliar. Although I generally don't read a great deal of sports fiction (for children or adults), I found that I enjoyed this brief novel, and was moved by Bruchac's portrayal of the spiritual aspects of lacrosse.

[nmkimdykstra · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Your personal response to the book:Out of the three Bruchac books I read for my author study, this is definitely the one I enjoyed the most. I really appreciated how Jake and his mom both highly valued their Native American heritage and were not willing to compromise that. I also thought that compared to the other Bruchac books I read, this one moved along at a better pace. Curricular connections (how you might use it with students in a classroom or school library) or programming connections (how you might use this book in a public library setting).This would be a good book to have out with a display of sports books at a public library. At the school library I work in, we sometimes try to get kids to read books out of particular genres, and sometimes we specify sports stories...this would be a good one for that. This could also go along with a unit on the Native Americans of the Northeastern United States.

[jennybeast · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Things I loved about this book:
the shortness of the book does not detract from the power of the message -- the intense alienation that Jake feels in his new boarding school, despite the welcoming message from the majority of the students -- how weird it feels to be valued for what he views as an indigenous skill in a sacred game (Lacrosse) when the meaning of the game is warped by an outside culture. Jake's thoughtful response to violence, and his willingness to explain the deeper meaning of the game to the school when he offers it as a healing ceremony. The harsh realities that many kids from impoverished communities face -- their family lives broken up by the need for their talented parents to bring back honor and resources to the community. Many of Bruchac's contemporary characters are impacted by that scenario, and he never glosses over how high that cost is.

[jothebookgirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The thing that stood out to me in this book is that people are vastly different,yet so much the same.

[sulick1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book was a pleasant surprise to read. It combined multicultural awareness with sports and the experience of transitioning to a new school. The character development helped reader’s have a window into the main character, Jake, and how he handled moving to a new school and integrating himself with a completely different culture. This book would appeal to anyone in a similar situation in which they are experiencing the culture shock of moving and having to attend a new school. The author also streamlines different symbols and themes throughout the text that help the readers understand the values of tradition, humility, and friendship. For example, one morning Jake is discovered doing his morning rituals by his roommate, who is from West Africa. Kofi comforts Jake by saying “This pouch contains things that protect me when I am far from home. Every now and then, when no one else can see, I hold it up so it, too, can bathe in the light of the African sun… So, Jake, it seems that we are brothers” This connection made by two roommates translates into a much deeper friendship as readers see the mutual respect Jake and Kofi have for one another and the appreciation of the other as if it were their own traditions. This theme is also furthered at the end of the book when Jake’s lacrosse team plays a game in honor of their coach who had been shot. Their entire school came together in unison to honor a great leader and contributor to their school and nothing mattered except supporting each other. Through these connections Jake makes at his new school, he learns that home is always in the heart and not necessarily where you were born. The main messages of this book are to embrace diversity, inclusion, and to always be true to your background.