Tuesday 26 March 2013

OJ's Book Review - Why the Whales Came

Yes; a bit random but I've just read it and have only posted one thing this month. So here we go!

Why the Whales Came is a Morpurgo book that came out in 1985. It was lent to me by a friend so I read it. While reading I came to the conclusion that this book should not be called Why the Whales Came because the entire story has nothing to do with whales until the very end; so the title is almost like a spoiler for a twist ending. A better title would be The Birdman because that is what the book centres on really - this apparently crazy old man who is maybe related to a witch. Two children start talking too him through shell messages and that begins the story. As I've probably mentioned before Michael Morpurgo is very good at describing things, some scenes you can see in your mind like a photo. The story too was well executed. Very good mystery and it kept leaving you asking questions in your mind. It also built a little bit of fear at the beginning to the children's safety when they got near this Birdman guy and then as nearly all Morpurgo books do it ties in with the war and that becomes a main plot line. So Why the Whales Came was a very good book and do recommend it to all ages; just don't expect everything to be about whales.

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