The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour or, The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain

George A. WarrenProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.7
Word count
369K words
Chapters
37

Tags

English Originals Children's Literature TeamworkSuspense ExplorationHeroismWilderness ChaseCourage and GrowthCuriosityGrowing UpPopular NarrativeBoyhood AdventureYouth Reading

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour; or, The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain by WarrenAuthor: Warren, George A.,Language: English, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Apr 4, 2007

Editor's review

The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour; or, The Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain is a boys' scouting adventure novel by George A. Warren, a typical example of early twentieth-century American juvenile series fiction. Taking the scouts' tour as its thread, the story revolves around "the Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain" and blends outdoor marching, comradeship, and suspenseful puzzle-solving in a brisk, short-chaptered style with a distinctly period flavor of adventure. Its value lies chiefly as a genre specimen: it shows how early boys' adventure fiction organized suspense, shaped a juvenile ensemble, and embedded discipline, courage, and team spirit in the plot. As a public-domain Project Gutenberg eBook, it suits English light reading and readers interested in scouting culture and early juvenile literature. Note that its period attitudes and expressions differ from today's, so it is best read with a sense of genre history rather than with expectations of modern depth.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. Read chapter by chapter, list the clues to "the Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain" separately, and guess as you go
  2. Watch how the scouts divide tasks and cooperate, and see how genre fiction builds a team ensemble
  3. In extensive reading, don't look up every word; grasp the adventure mainline first, then revisit period usage
  4. After finishing, compare it with contemporary juvenile adventure stories to see how suspense and values differ

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37

FAQ

Is this book part of a series? Judging by "Banner Boy Scouts" in the title, it is one of a series of adventure stories featuring the same boys' scout troop. Each volume usually centers on a separate incident; this one focuses on a tour and "the Mystery of Rattlesnake Mountain," and can be read on its own without losing the main thread.
Is it suitable for children, and how difficult is the language? The text was written for young readers of its day: sentences are short and the adventure thread is clear, making the English moderately easy, though it contains some period expressions and outdoor terms. Children with basic English reading ability can read it with guidance; younger readers may do better with a translation or shared reading.
Is the suspense strong? The suspense serves the adventure, creating mystery and the drive to explore rather than a tight chain of deduction. Read it as a boys' group-adventure story and focus on the march, cooperation, and puzzle-solving, rather than expecting the twists and logical closure of modern detective fiction.

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About the author

George A. Warren Author

George A. Warren is a collective pseudonym used by the Stratemeyer Syndicate in the United States. Works under this name were published by Cupples & Leon, including the Rifle Boys series of 1909–1910 and the Banner Boy Scouts series of 1912–1916. The pen name combines the names of George Washington and General Warren of the Battle of Bunker Hill. The six titles held in the collection all belong to the Banner Boy Scouts series, which follows scouting adventures involving tours, snowbound skating, afloat journeys and aviation, with elements of mystery and puzzle-solving. The actual texts were written by ghostwriters following Stratemeyer outlines, and public information about the individual behind the name is limited.