Kensuke's Kingdom

by Michael Morpurgo

Overview

A spellbinding tale of survival and self-discovery from award-winning author Michael Morpurgo, who is poised for breakthrough U.S. success.

When Michael's father loses his job, he buys a boat and convinces Michael and his mother to sail around the world. It's an ideal trip - even Michael's sheepdog can come along. It starts out as the perfect family adventure - until Michael is swept overboard. He's washed up on an island, where he struggles to survive. Then he discovers that he's not alone. His fellow-castaway, Kensuke, is wary of him. But when Michael's life is threatened, Kensuke slowly lets the boy into his world. The two develop a close understanding in this remote place, but the question of rescue continues to divide them.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780439591812
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	06/01/2004
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.25(w) x 7.63(h) x (d)
Age Range:	9 - 12 Years

About the Author

Michael Morpurgo, former Children's Laureate of Britain, is the author of War Horse, called "Superb" by the New York Times Book Review, and now a major motion picture. His other prize-winning books include Kensuke's Kingdom, Private Peaceful, and The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips. Michael lives in England, with his wife, Clare. Together, they founded the charity Farms for City Children, which gives children from urban areas an opportunity to spend a week working on a farm. Learn more at michaelmorpurgo.org.

Table of Contents

1.	Peggy Sue	1
2.	Water, water everywhere	18
3.	Ship's log	25
4.	Gibbons and ghosts	42
5.	I, Kensuke	66
6.	Abunai!	82
7.	All that silence said	96
8.	Everyone dead in Nagasaki	115
9.	The night of the turtles	129
10.	Killer men come	144
	Postscript	162
	Glossary	164

Editorial Reviews

More adventure than ordeal, this survival tale will fit the bill for thoughtful readers discomfited by extreme violence or gross details. To Michael, the round-the-world sail he's taking with his parents aboard the 42-foot Peggy Sue is great fun, until the moment he and his dog Stella Artois are washed overboard. Michael comes to on a small island, inhabited by gibbons, a colony of orangutans-and Kensuke, a Japanese naval doctor stranded there more than 40 years before. The plot centers around Michael's emotional ups and down as he battles loneliness and mosquitoes, then grows closer to his rescuer, who supplies him with food and water, but makes him stay on one end of the island, at least until he's stung by a jellyfish, and needs nursing back to health. Kensuke has built a small, beautiful world for himself that he teaches Michael to see, and to paint, in exchange for English lessons and news of the outside. When Michael's steadfast parents arrive, after nearly a year's searching, to carry him and Stella away, Kensuke opts to stay behind-but it's plain that his spirit and simplicity have worked profound changes on his young charge. A prizewinning import: sensitive, perceptive, and well-told. (Fiction. 10-12)

Kirkus Reviews