Interrupted Journey: Saving Endangered Sea Turtles - Hardcover

Lasky, Kathryn

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0763606359 ISBN 13: 9780763606350

Publisher: Candlewick, 2001

Synopsis

A portion of the proceeds from sales of this book goes to the
New England Aquarium.

All sea turtles are threatened or endangered. The Kemp’s ridley turtles are the most endangered of all—fewer than eight thousand on the whole planet. Limp and frozen, a Kemp’s ridley washes up on Cape Cod. When a boy named Max finds him, the turtle appears to be dead. But maybe not. Award-winning author Kathryn Lasky and photographer Christopher G. Knight take young readers on a riveting tour that begins on the icy shores of Cape Cod, where expert teams attempt to revive the Kemp’s ridley, and ends on the warm beaches of the Gulf of Mexico, where this rare breed is born and may return to lay eggs of its own.

About this title

About the Author

Kathryn Lasky and Christopher G. Knight have created many books for children, including THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ROOF IN THE WORLD, MONARCHS, and SUGARING TIME, a Newbery Honor Book. About working on INTERRUPTED JOURNEY, they say, "It was a real eye opener for us to see how many people care about sea turtles and how an international rescue effort has evolved. It is so heartening to see people of all ages come together in this way."

From Booklist

Gr. 3-6. There's a sense of wonder in the simple words and the huge, thrilling color pictures in this photo-essay about a vanishing species, the Kemp's ridley turtle. The astonishing, true nature story begins with one injured juvenile sea turtle and its rescue; then the book moves out to the general facts about the endangered animal: its life cycle; the hazards, natural and human, it faces; and the miracle of its survival through an active international effort. A young boy, Max, and his mother find the two-or-three-year-old turtle washed up on a beach in Cape Cod. Hatched from an egg laid on a beach in the Gulf of Mexico, it has been swept off its course, its journey interrupted. Is it alive or dead? They take it to the New England Aquarium where vets and volunteers place it in Intensive Care. Then five months later it's flown to the Turtle Hospital in the Florida Keys, where it's tagged (so it can be tracked) and released again into the ocean. As in Monarchs (1993), Lasky and photographer Christopher Knight show the miracle of the small creatures that survive solitary from birth: "There is no one to teach them anything. They live alone and they live by instinct." The beautiful photos include close-ups of one turtle and the people caring for it as well as dazzling panoramas of its ocean path. The climax is the release, the thrill of seeing it swim free, the hope that that it will live to lay its own eggs on the beach where it hatched. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Candlewick
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0763606359
• ISBN 13: 9780763606350
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 48