About the Author

Rights: World
0-86327-644-X
€13.95 pb
Age 5+

The Long March
Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick

Reading Association of Ireland, Special Merit Award

IBBY Honours List

Bisto Book of the Year Merit Award

“This is an important story sensitively told. It will have resonances for a wide audience; it is a book to share. Highly recommended.”
- Children’s Books Ireland

“A beautifully illustrated story.”
- Books Ireland

“[This] simple but powerful tale achieves perfection with the superb pencil drawings which adorn each spread. Executed with a soft, almost sfumato effect, they create an atmosphere both moving and sensitive. This is very much a book to treasure.”
- Sunday Tribune

It is 1847. Choona is a young Choctaw. Word has reached his tribe that there is a famine in Ireland. From what little they have, the Choctaws collect $170 to help the starving Irish. Choona must decide for himself whether to answer the cry for help. The Long March is also the amazing story of the Choctaw’s journey to the New Lands in the West.

Author Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick travelled from Ireland to Oklahoma to research this true story. The result is a stunning portrait of Choctaw arts and culture, as well as a universal tale of a boy who must overcome bitterness and sorrow as he struggles to become an adult with adult tribe values.