Lost Farm Camp

Fourteen-year-old Swickey knows the woods better than the lessons her father tries to teach her. In this Maine novel, old Avery and his daughter share a remote camp, where a bear raiding their butter supply becomes an immediate problem. Her eagerness to handle a rifle sits beside her frustration with counting and reading. Their exchanges, written in local speech, show both her fierce confidence and his concern for her future.

Beyond the cabin, valuable land brings a different kind of contest. David discusses a mineral discovery on Avery's property and plans to develop it, while a rival presses for possession. His recovery from illness threatens to slow those plans, and letters connect him with events at Lost Farm. Henry Herbert Knibbs combines woodland adventure with family affection, schooling, and business pressure. Readers interested in logging country and the tensions between practical knowledge and formal education will find those concerns woven into the action.