It would be easy for the reviewer to compare ["Zia"] to the earlier ["Island of the Blue Dolphins"] and bemoan the fact that sequels are risky. But the truth is that "Zia" is a completely fresh creation, rich in character and action. The ending of the story, in which Karana gives her niece the courage to leave the Mission and rediscover her tribal heritage, is both surprising and correct—as it always is in good fiction. Once again Scott O'Dell has used history as the mainspring for revealing the truth about human beings: their passion, their grief.
Barbara Wersba, in a review of "Zia," in The New York Times Book Review, May 2, 1976, p. 38.
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