The Seven Seas

K-Gr 3—A rabbit with wanderlust starts to daydream as soon as his teacher announces that the class will study the Black and Red Seas. Instead of attending to the real geography lesson, he imagines fantasy seas of different colors ("The Brown Sea's made of chocolate," "The Pink Sea has flamingos and cotton candy clouds," "The Green Sea has a rocky reef,/where caterpillars crawl,/and near your toes the broccoli grows/until it's twelve feet tall." Each of the make-believe bodies of water is presented with Jackson's rhyming couplets and Slavin's and Melo's whimsical creatures who surf, scuba dive, sunbathe, and paddle on imaginary oceans and beaches. Only when the teacher rolls up the world map does the rabbit snap out of his reverie and focus on the real task of understanding the seven seas that were identified back in the Middle Ages. This transition from sheer fantasy to real information is a bit awkward. However, the geography and science content in the back is valuable, and this title will be a hit where the format of blending fiction and nonfiction is popular.—Gloria Koster, West School, New Canaan, CT