Lost in the Sea of Despair. (Lost: Can You Survive?). Tracey Turner. St. Catharines, ON: Crabtree, 2014. 128 pp., pbk. & hc., $11.95 (pbk.), $20.76 (RLB.). ISBN 978-0-7787-0739-4 (pbk.), ISBN 978-0-7787-0731-8 (RLB.). Subject Headings: Sea stories-Fiction. Survival-Fiction. Pacific Ocean-Fiction. Plot-your-own stories. Grades 6-10 / Ages 11-15. Review by Lacey Hall. **** /4

excerpt:

You watch helplessly as the small orange life raft bobs out of sight in the churning waves. You clutch the railing of the yacht as another massive wave crashes over you, wondering how on Earth you’re going to survive….You are lost in the Pacific and completely alone.

Lost in the Sea of Despair is a “choose your own adventure” style novel that allows children to learn as they read. The scene is set for the reader at the beginning – you’re lost at sea on a boat that’s sinking. What do you do? Readers answer this and many more questions throughout the course of the story, each choice leading them on a journey of survival. One wrong choice, and you might not make it out alive; one right choice, and you could be saved.

     Tracey Turner does a great job of incorporating information along each leg of the journey so that the reader can make informed decisions when it comes to such things as whether or not a type of fish is poisonous and where it’s best to build a shelter. What makes a “choose your own adventure” story so much fun is that there are many different scenarios, and so the book is not read once but, instead, many times. Even more so, Lost in the Sea of Despair presents a challenge to its reader in the form of trying to survive, and, as a result, it makes for a great reading experience overall.

Highly Recommended.

Lacey Hall is a recent Bachelor of Arts graduate from the University of the Fraser Valley and currently works as the assistant to the Dean of Arts at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

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