Hi there!
Welcome back to
Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers.
Today, we're diving into a
Kids Fiction title that will have you battening down the hatches and
keeping your shoulder at the ready for your best mate to land. It's
a pirate tale but not in the traditional sense that's fit for the wee
land lubbers as well as the more time tested folks running about this
here part of the blogosphere. Ready to make its acquaintance? Just
say, ARRRRRHH! Ladies and gents, pirates and pir-ettes, today's book
of choice is....
The
Pirate Who's Afraid of Everything
by
Annabeth Bonder-Stone & Connor White
Illustrated by
Anthony Holden
Based on a really funny idea by
Harrison Blanz, Age 9
About the book...
Meet Shivers, the scaredy-est pirate to ever sail the Seven Seas.
Along with his best friend, Margo, and his loyal fishmate
(yes, you read that correctly), Albee, Shivers battles a giant squid,
discovers hidden treasures, and gets pooped on by a pigeon to save
his parents from the clutches of evil. (Yep, that's right: evil!)
You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll never eat snails again. So put on
your pantaloons, batten down the hatches, and join Shivers on his
first (but still very dangerous) adventure.
This was a whale of a tale if ever there was!
Shivers is a land loving pirate, much too scared to venture out on
the high seas, until one very unfortunate day for his family and one
feisty girl named Margo come together to create an adventure of a
lifetime. Nothing like family in peril and the making of a friend to
give you just the right motivation to crawl out of the shell you're
living in, am I right? So naturally, Shivers sets forth with gusto
to save the day....
Umm.
Knock Knock
Who's there?
You
You who?
You weren't apparently listening to me when I originally described
him now, were you?
Shivers is anything but
weigh-the-anchor-let's-get-this-excursion-under-way, but he also
knows that his family's lives are in his hands. What's a scared lad
to do? Seek out the authorities, that's what! Bad news for him,
they seem unmoved; good news for him, Margo (the captain's daughter)
is a little firecracker who's been paying attention every Take You
Child to Work Day (whether actually the holiday or simply a day she
tricked him into THINKING it was). Apart, they are definitely
unusual individuals, but together they are an unstoppable pair. Now,
don't get me wrong, things DO try to stop them many a time so it does
look as if all might not end well (can't confirm if it does or
doesn't...sorry), but they still form a formidable team. The fact
that they also discovered that friendship doesn't spawn from the
likenesses we have with each other, but the differences that make us
who we are is just icing on the cake.
At first I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy this tale as I was
having a hard time connecting with Shivers. I mean really, the kid
is afraid of EVERYTHING! Hard to swallow, especially when he's from
a family of pirates....I mean, I was ready to think “adoption”
might have been the answer. Leave it to the ending to change my
mind. That's right. Right up until about the final fourth of the
book, I was ready to give it a resounding “meh” but then came the
turning point which turned me around. What did the job? Oh, it was
all in unraveling of the situation at hand, though at whose hand and
why it unraveled will have to remain a mystery until you read it for
yourself. Suffice it to say that one should never underestimate the
strength of someone's fear nor a foe based on their size. The latter
of those provided an unexpected laugh out loud moment as well,
leaving me to end the read with a smile upon my face.
Recommended for Middle Grade readers through adults. Fans of the
Wimpy Kid and MacKenzie Blues series will definitely gravitate
towards it for the similarity in formatting (story with lots of
pencil illustrations), though it is certainly not necessary to enjoy
the adventure within.
Special thanks to the team at HarperCollins for the chance to bring
this title to you as well as the review copy. (THANKS!) For more
information on this title as well as their growing catalog, be sure
to stop by their official site, like them on Facebook, or follow
along on Twitter. This title reached its book birthday February
2015, so be on the lookout for it on a bookstore shelf or virtual
retailer of your choosing.
Until next time...happy reading!
2 comments:
Sounds like a fun take on the whole pirate thing. My friend's little boys would love this.
By the way id never eat smails any way. What a fun book for an early spring summer day when the kids are off. Thanks to this fine writer we need more
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