Dario and the Whale
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
CCBC Choices 2017
Little Free Library Action Book Club, Young Readers
A lonely boy spending his first summer at Cape Cod and a right whale calf who has migrated to the area with his mother become unlikely friends.
When Dario and his mother move to Cape Cod from Brazil, Dario has a hard time making friends since he doesn't speak English well. But one day Dario meets someone else who has just arrived in New England and he doesn't speak any English at all…because he's a right whale! Day after day Dario and the whale meet at the beach. But what will happen when it's time for the whale to migrate?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Inspired by an encounter with a right whale on a Cape Cod beach, first-time author Malone offers a quiet story about isolation and friendship. Each spring, "Dario and his mother move to the seashore." While the story doesn't get into specifics, details like Dario's green-and-yellow jacket and Portuguese-inflected speech suggest that his mother, a cook, is a migrant worker from Brazil. Dario has trouble befriending other children, and Malone's clipped sentences shift between Dario's story and that of a right whale that has made a similar seasonal journey. Malone's parallel structure and Masseva's naif paintings are equally attentive to the actions of both whale and boy ("When Dario whistles, the whale spouts. Dario waves, the whale breaches"). The fleeting nature of this relationship soon makes itself known ("They migrate.... They leave at the end of May," a girl tells Dario), but the magic of the encounter, the hope of a future meeting, and the possibility of friendship with the girl conclude the story on an uplifting note. Ages 4 8.
