This is Gillian Cross at her best. A wonderful and engaging adventure involving a girl, her elephant, an orphan boy and the man who wants to take the elephant from them. Crossing 2000 miles of 19th century America, this is a grand chase well described.

The book won Whitbread and Smarties awards. The latter involved children voting on the short listed books, so it is clearly a children's favourite. Gillian Cross is a tremendously versatile author, who has written many books that I have liked very much in a variety of very different settings. This one is very much recommended. ( )