Seashell Key

Gr 1-3–The first day of summer’s “sparkly sand and salty breezes” are the setting for this inaugural volume of a charming early chapter book series introducing the tropical adventures of a diverse group of youngsters and their families living in Seashell Key. Inventive Mateo emulates his dad by opening his own Sky and Sea shack where he makes kites in unexpected shapes. His deliberative methods are described in short sentences with repetitive components that, coupled with the line breaks, add a poetic tenor present throughout the vignettes. Creative sisters Sasha and Sophia offer readers an opportunity to appreciate both sides of the brain as they go on a beach picnic. Finally, well-read Eli, Ezra, Elana, and their pets host ad hoc and chaotic tours of their lighthouse home. The last chapter brings them all together. Heuer has designed the book in four “acts,” one to highlight each set of characters, and those acts are broken into three chapters each, assuring manageable narrative flow that includes simple, decodable words and introduces longer, repeated vocabulary. Bontigao’s lovely, loose portrayals of the characters and their beloved seaside home highlight most pages and provide some support for inferential narrative information.