The illustrations are just gorgeous, also ranging from daft to dark and beyond. There are some lovely interactions between boy and bear and it will be interesting to see which appeal most to the children and which to their parents.
It's about friendship and trials but also simply about indulging your imagination. But I will say the ending is just perfect.Ī Boy and a Bear in a Boat is a joy to read: slightly surreal, funny, a little bit scary. You might wonder if the boy ever makes it over to the other side, if the bear ever takes another passenger on the return journey, and even what happens to The Very Last Sandwich. But there's also a burgeoning friendship borne from adversity which leads, eventually, to peace and tranquility. So there's some anxiety and some sulking and some crossness. Our little boy - we never know his name - suffers the worst calamity imaginable to a child: he becomes stranded far from home and family while it becomes increasingly obvious that the bear, the authority figure, is as lost as he is. This set up reminds you of the Life of Pi, right? And I guess, in terms of imagination, it is a little bit like that. Faced with turbulent stormy seas, a terrifying sea monster and the rank remains of The Very Last Sandwich, the odds soon become pitted against our unlikely heroes. But then their boat encounters "unforeseeable anomalies". They are only travelling a short distance and it really shouldn't take too long.
Shortlisted for the Costa Children's book Award 2012Ī boy and a bear go to sea, equipped with a suitcase, a comic book and ukulele. Shortlisted for the CILIP Carnegie Medal 2013 Longlisted for the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal 2013 Summary: Sweet fable about friendship and trials with some lovely interactions between boy and bear and absolutely gorgeous illustrations.
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