Kurtz, Chris. 
ADVENTURES OF A SOUTH POLE PIG
New York : Harcourt Children's Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013
IL 3-6, RL 4.2
ISBN 0547634552

(3 booktalks)

Booktalk #1

Flora, a young pig who has been brought up on a farm raising sled dogs, sees nothing but adventure in her future. Her chance comes when she is packed into the ship’s cargo to join the sled dogs on an amazing Antarctica adventure.  As Flora befriends Aleric the cabin boy, Oscar the sled dog and Sophia the cat, she dreams of life as the head sled pig.

After all, what other purpose would a pig have on a ship?    (New Hampshire Great Stone Face Book Award nominee, 2015)

Booktalk #2

Flora the pig is bored living in a pig pen with her mother and brothers and wants to see and do and adventure. When she sees the farmer training his dogs to be sled dogs she decides that is the life for her and she begins to train every day. Soon, she is delighted to learn that she is going to accompany the men and the dogs on an adventure to the South Pole. But Flora’s understanding of the reason she has been selected is quite different from the reality. What will the fate of this eager pig be?    (Vermont Dorothy Canfield Fisher award, 2015)

Booktalk #3

Flora, one of eight young piglets, yearns for adventure as she laments “a heart born for adventure and hooves stuck in a pen.” Unlike her seven brothers, this little pig isn’t satisfied lapping up milk and rolling over to sleep on a full tummy.  Flora’s dream is to become a sled pig like the sled dogs on her farm. She eventually finds herself on a ship bound for Antarctica, her dream destination. Little does Flora know, the cook has other ideas, calling her his “little ham bone”. When the ship hits an iceberg and sinks, it is Flora’s brave refrain of “don’t give up,” as she courageously becomes a life saver, that shifts the outcome from complete disaster. This plucky pig shows bravery and determination even as conditions deteriorate. How long will the crew survive waiting for a rescue? Will Flora’s impossible dream of becoming a sled dog in the South Pole ever come true? Read on.  (Pennsylvania Young Reader's Choice Award, 2015)