Turtle, Turtle, Watch Out!

From before the time she hatches until she returns to the same beach to lay eggs of her own, a sea turtle is helped to escape from danger many times by different human hands.

PreSchool-Grade 2-Sayre follows in the wake of a female loggerhead from her birth on a Florida beach to the day, many years later, when she returns to the same place to lay her own eggs. The simple text describes how the creature narrowly avoids many of the life-threatening dangers faced by maturing sea turtles in today's world. Often, caring humans assist her; for example, a young boy places mesh around a turtle nest to protect the eggs and a boater removes a plastic bag from the water before it can be mistaken for food. Eye-catching, realistic pastel paintings-most of them covering two pages-show sienna and gold sunsets and sunrises, the blue-green underwater realm, and detailed close-ups of the growing loggerhead and other sea creatures. Children will be drawn to the picture of a sea turtle surrounded by sharks on the cover, and to the catchy refrain, "Turtle, Turtle, watch out!" While books such as Brenda Guiberson's Into the Sea (Holt, 1995), Don Patton's Sea Turtles (Child's World, 1995), and Gail Gibbons's Sea Turtles (Holiday, 1995) stress the negative impact of human interference on the sea turtle's survival, Sayre also emphasizes the results of positive actions. Even libraries that already own those titles will want to add this one to their collections.
Susan Scheps, Shaker Heights Public Library, OH
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A mother sea turtle lays her eggs in the Florida sand, then crawls back into the water. Raccoons begin to dig up the eggs, but a boy scares them off. He then sets off a protected area for them, complete with warning signs. Months later, the eggs hatch and the baby turtles head for the ocean. The story follows one baby turtle that survives, matures, and returns one night to the same Florida beach to lay her own eggs. "And some will make it, with a little luck, and fast-moving flippers, and the help of many hands." The concluding pages note the endangered status of sea turtles and suggest ways in which people, even children, can protect them from harm. Many animal books for young children end with an appended plea for people to protect an endangered species, but none has so memorably dramatized in the book itself how people can help animals in the wild. The simple, direct text reads aloud well, drawing readers into the turtles' story without anthropomorphism. Impressive pastel illustrations, including many dramatic double-page spreads, depict with power and beauty the turtles' world of sand and shore. Carolyn Phelan
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