Despite the fact that Emily Windsnap has lived her life on a boat, she’s never actually gone into the water. Nothing could be more of a shock than what happens the very first time she tries to swim. But with her newly discovered talents, Emily finds a best friend at last, and hopefully will be able to solve the mystery of what happened to her father.
This book was a huge hit with my third grade girls. The first of a short series it has just the right mix of fantasy and usual friendship/family themes. I can’t say I was as captivated as my students were, but the book did get more interesting as it headed towards the adventure part. This is most likely to appeal to third and fourth grade readers.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – Emily’s mother wears a t-shirt with “BABE” in sparkly letters on the front. She’s bought Emily the same shirt. Sometimes sirens run away with the people they are supposed to be luring. Illegal marriages between merfolk and humans are mentioned. Neptune has lots of wives and hundreds of children. A man uses a series of euphemisms to mean that a man got a woman pregnant and left her.
Profanity – “dingbat,” “heck,”
Death, Violence and Gore – Mermaids cause shipwrecks.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – Someone is drugging someone else so that they lose their memory.
Frightening or Intense Things – There’s a very creepy man who is friendly with her mother. Emily feels very uncomfortable when he is around. Emily visits a prison. She and her mother are put on trial.
