I Survived the San Francisco Earthquake, 1906

Lauren Tarshis's I Survived the San Francisco Earthquake, 1906 is a breathless real-life disaster story for 9 year olds about a newsboy who's trying to win back his stolen gold when the ground starts to move.

What happens

Leo Ross is eleven and he looks after himself. His papa died of a fever a few months ago, so Leo sells newspapers on a street corner and sleeps in a tiny basement room.

What he does have is a gold nugget. His grandpop found it in the gold rush and his papa carried it everywhere. Leo would rather sell his heart.

Then the two nastiest thieves in the neighbourhood take it off him in an alley.

Leo's plan to get it back is brilliant and completely daft. He'll creep into their hideout before dawn with flour on his face and a candle under his chin, and pretend to be the ghost of a murdered man. (His grandpop once scared off a grizzly with a rattlesnake's rattle, so why not?)

It's all going wrong when the whole building starts to shake.

Then there's Morris. He's a younger boy from Leo's boarding house who's always at the public library and has a fact for everything. Leo thinks he's a pest. Who else would sit in the middle of an earthquake explaining why the dogs were howling?

Morris never shuts up, and he keeps turning up exactly when he's needed.

The story starts with the bricks already falling and then goes back a day, so your reader knows what's coming the whole time Leo is tiptoeing about in the dark. Grandpop's adventures are tucked inside like extra stories.

It's worth knowing how rough it gets. Leo is properly beaten up early on, with his face shoved into a wall and blood pouring from his nose.

After the quake there are people lying in the street who aren't moving. There's a horrible moment when he thinks he's found a friend's head on the ground (he hasn't, the boy is stuck in a hole). And the fires that follow can't be put out.

A child who worries about fire, or about being left on their own, might find it hard going. If yours likes a brave kid and a clever plan, it's a cracker. This is book five of I Survived, and it stands on its own.

What to read next

For another city on fire, try I Survived the Great Chicago Fire, 1871. Oscar has lost his papa too, and his papa's sheriff's badge is stolen almost as soon as he steps off the train.