It's been six months since their last adventure aboard the S.S. Excalibur and Philipa and her friend Philip (who happens to be the son of the ship's captain) are both excited to meet the ship's new assistant cruise director, Herby Twining. Herby is a real jokester, the kind of guy who gets a kick out of shaking your hand with a buzzer hidden in his palm. Philip is quite entertained by Herby and appreciates his skills as an amateur magician, but when Philip's expensive and rare parrot, Don Quixote, goes missing and Herby seems like he might be a prime suspect, suddenly Phillip isn't laughing anymore.
Parrots & Pirates (Mystery at Sea)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle.
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Elizabeth Levy has been writing and publishing award winning books for more than thirty years, and in that time she has written more than eighty books, a number that continues to surprise her. She lives in New York City.
Mordicai Gerstein is the author and illustrator of The Man Who Walked Between the Towers, winner of the Caldecott Medal, and has had four books named New York Times Best Illustrated Books of the Year. He lives in Westhampton, Massachusetts.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter One"Secrets!" Squawked the Parrot
"Excuse me, Don Quixote," I said. I stuck my hand into his cage. Feathers were everywhere. I couldn't believe how messy a parrot's cage could get. Don Quixote bent his majestic head with his curved beak toward me. He followed my every move, but he didn't attack me.
"You know Philippa, you're the only one he lets clean his cage, except me," said Philip.
We were in the captain's quarters, and I was helping Philip clean the cage for his parrot. Let me get something straight. I am not Philip's maid, even if he is the captain's son and the royal prince of Borgunlund. But Philip is my best friend, and he has been in a lousy mood--no make that a black mood--ever since we set sail for Parrot Island. So I didn't mind helping him out--especially since I hoped it would give us a chance to talk. A ship isn't a great place for privacy.
"Philip, what's going on?" I asked. "I can tell that you've been upset since the beginning of this cruise."
Philip took a deep breath. He finally looked at me. "How did you know that I was upset?" he asked.
"It wasn't hard," I said.
Philip turned to me. "You know, I'm not used to having a friend who can read my moods. Only my mother used to be able to guess what I was feeling."
"You just haven't seemed your old self," I said to him.
"You're right," said Philip. "You know that Parrot Island used to belong to Borgunlund, but what you don't know is that my mother drowned just off Parrot Island," he said.
"I'm so sorry," I said. "I didn't know that's where she died."
"Don Quixote was with her," said Philip. He reached into the cage, and Don Quixote stepped delicately onto his arm, the way he had been trained. I cleaned the bottom of the cage while Philip stroked his parrot. His voice was soft. "Don Q was a gift to my mother from Parrot Island when she was just my age. Parrots can live a long time, some get to be one hundred. Don Quixote is almost forty years old, and he's still young in parrot years. They are also very loyal. It means a lot to me that Don Quixote trusts you."
I smiled at Don Quixote. "You look very young for your age," I said to him. Don Quixote bobbed his head as if he agreed with me. "Fill up a bath!" he squawked. My last name is Bath. If you say my name fast enough it sounds like 'fill up a bath.' It's even funnier when a parrot squawks it.
"Don Quixote likes you," said Philip. "My mom would have been glad that you're coming with me to Parrot Island."
"I'm surprised your father and you even agreed to come back to Parrot Island," I said. "He's the captain. He could have refused to sail the ship there, or taken a short leave for this leg of the trip."
"Father was thinking of refusing but I want to see it again. I loved it there. My family used to vacation on Parrot Island together all the time. I'm kind of looking forward to going there with you."
Philip walked out onto his balcony. I closed Don Quixote's cage. I looked around Philip's and his father's stateroom. Everywhere you looked there was evidence of his mother's love of parrots. Besides Don Quixote, Philip had inherited his mother's magnificent collection of mechanical parrots.
I joined Philip on the balcony. Only the captain and his family get a suite of rooms with a balcony. My parents work on the ship, too--Mom's a dancer, Dad teaches water sports and karate--but we live below the waterline in a room without a porthole. Still, I love life on board and wouldn't want to live anywhere else. But it was a lot more fun when Philip wasn't so sad.
Philip was staring out at sea. I could see the lights of a small pilot ship, the kind that guide big ships like ours in and out of harbors. It was heading for us.
"Can I tell you a secret?" asked Philip. His voice sounded lighter. Maybe just talking about his mother had eased his mind a little.
"Does anybody ever answer 'no'?" I teased him. "Who doesn't want to know a secret?"
Philip pointed to the pilot boat coming toward us. "There's the secret. We're getting a new assistant cruise director and they sent a special pilot boat with him. Somebody high up in the cruise line insisted he be hired."
This wasn't normal! Usually, the only time the cruise ship would let someone board like this was if they were a VIP, or some celebrity that had missed the sailing deadline. I couldn't remember them ever sending a pilot ship for a new crewmember before.
A ladder was lowered to the pilot ship. A man jumped onto the ladder. He was very agile.
Then something even stranger happened. The man gestured to the crew to lower a hoist, and he pointed to an old trunk!
"That's weird," I said to Philip. "What crewmember would come on late and bring a trunk?"
Philip shrugged. "It's just his luggage."
"Only a captain's son would say that," I said to Philip. "You've seen the room my parents and I live in. A cockroach in a roach motel has more room! Nobody who works on a cruise ship ever comes with a lot of luggage. There's something weird about this dude. Let's go meet him. A mystery may be just what you and I need."
Philip grinned at me. "It's you who can't resist a mystery," he said.
"It's both of us," I said.
We walked back into Philip's cabin. "See you later, Don Quixote," I said as we passed the parrot's cage.
"In a while crocodile," squawked Don Quixote. I laughed. "I taught him that," I said proudly.
"I taught him a new word too," said Philip. "Secrets," said Philip.
"Secrets!" squawked Don Quixote.
"Why did you teach him to say that?" I asked Philip.
"Because I knew you loved secrets," said Philip. "Even though I was in a bad mood, I wanted to have a surprise for you."
I smiled. Sometimes Philip really did surprise me.
"Okay," I said to Don Quixote. "We're going to find out the secret behind that guy with the huge trunk ..."
Don Quixote cocked his head and looked back at me.
"Secrets!" he squawked again.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Parrots and Pirates,
By
This review is from: Parrots & Pirates (Mystery at Sea) (Hardcover)
What a wonderful Christmas season this is with kids and grands running in and out and about and one habit we have is reading to the younger grands at bedtime. The book I started a couple of nights a go is Parrots and Pirates a Mystery at Sea by Elizabeth Levy published by Roaring Book PressThis book is great for children age 4 - 11-ish, depending on their reading skills. The story takes place on a cruise ship with the Captain's son Philip making friends with one of the worker's children, Phillipa. They become fast friends and as Philip has a bright and unusual parrot, Don Quixote, Phillipa befriends the parrot as well. The children see a mysterious new crew member coming about the ship with a huge trunk and they believe that this is more than meets the eye, knowing how small the rooms are on the ship. So they set about to discover is there more to this new cruise director than one might suspect. But it isn't until Phillipa is helping in a magic trick that the real mystery at Sea takes place. She's in a magic trick where she and Don Quixote are to trade places, but when she drops through the trap door and reaches into the cage for Don Quixote to put him in her place and all she finds is a stuffed parrot that the real mystery begins. This was a quick read for us, as my 8 year old grandaughter read this in 2 days and gives it a 2 thumbs up! I received this book free to review and this opinions are mine and my grandchildrens.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
