School Library Journal Review

PreS-Gr 2-A child narrates her experiences with a friendly sea serpent in this quietly quirky book. The creature drops out of the bathtub faucet while the girl is bathing and the two immediately begin playing and splashing. She puts him in the aquarium next to her bed and, as they converse, she discovers how he ended up in her bathtub and that he longs to return to the sea. She is determined to take him back, but the next day it's too rainy to go out. After a few more days of precipitation, the serpent, who has grown too big for the tub, points out, "the rain isn't any wetter than the ocean," and they decide to make the trek. At the shore, the serpent is reluctant to leave his friend, but she gently assures him that his new adventures in the ocean will be spectacular. The lovely watercolor illustrations are lush with vivid blues and greens, and the bathtub and underwater scenes are full of movement and life. The impressionistic paintings allow readers to fill in details. The text flows well and highlights the strong bond between the child and the serpent, a bond that will hold even when they are oceans apart. A great choice for one-on-one sharing, and as a bedtime story.-Wendy Woodfill, Hennepin County Library, Minnetonka, MN (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.