I'm stretching pretty far back here for Retro Fridays this week. I think I was eleven or twelve when I read The Road to Damietta for the first time. I was in the middle of a serious Scott O'Dell binge and had just moved back to the States after living in Italy for a few years. So it had the added attraction of taking place in that country I loved at a time when I was having a fair bit of trouble transitioning back to the American culture and pace of living. I'd already burned through Sarah Bishop , Island of the Blue Dolphins , The Serpent Never Sleeps , The Spanish Smile , and Streams to the River, River to the Sea by the time I came across a copy of The Road to Damietta in a narrow, dusty bookstore in West Yellowstone. My copy had the cover you see above on the left. I have always liked it. Though the French cover in the middle is also quite nice. I have to be honest and say that the current cover on the right kind of scares the crap out of me. Don't think I woul...