Book Review: SeaBean by Sarah Holding

 

Book: SeaBean (Book 1 of the SeaBean Trilogy)

Author: Sarah Holding

No. of Pages: 158

Genre: Fiction, Fantasy and Sci-Fi   

Publisher: Medina Publishing Ltd.

 

The publisher wrote to me with a book review request via LinkedIn and it sounded interesting. So here I am … reading a book written for children. And I enjoyed it actually.

SeaBean is an interesting sci-fi story that also educated young readers (kids) about environment and nature and the damage some of us are causing to it and what can be done about it.

The book starts out in an interesting manner and builds some sci-fi suspense as the background. It then changes gears, and you find reading the ‘blog’ of a young school-going girl who is innocently writing about her life on an island.

And then the story proceeds with a large cube arriving on the island which our little girl gets access to. The cube turns out to be a new hi-tech teaching aid/tool (that’s what the new teacher says) which takes the students across geographies to New York City, Amazon forests, Hong Kong and Australia. And the children encounter some interesting adventures and even pick up some interesting pets along.

The book is written for children and hence the writing is simple and filled with things and event which will create a sense of ‘wonder’ in children. Even I enjoyed it. There is innocence in the story-telling through the children (who are key characters) and their journey of learning is well articulated.

The book educates children in environmental issues and it does it in a very enjoyable manner while telling an interesting story. Not just children, it entertains the elders and educates them too.

Sarah Holding has started off on a very nice story with a educational theme and I look forward to the future episodes of this book. This is set to be a trilogy and I hope I get a chance to read and review the other 2 parts too – SeaWAR and SeaRISE.   

One of the marketing ‘gimmicks’ for the publicity of this book is the unique heat-sensitive thermochromic book cover which remains dark normally but reveals a picture behind the darkness when warmed by the touch of the hand. That surely makes it interesting and pretty unique.

Ratings on Book Review Parameters:

Cover Design: 4.5 / 5

Writing Style: 4.0 / 5

Characters:     4.0 / 5

Story / Plot:     4.0 / 5

Climax:            4.0 / 5

Overall:           4.0 / 5