Julie Bertagna

"Feel the life around you and inside you." These are one of the many wise phrases from John Muir, and only one of the many treasures this fun story presents.

John Muir was a young boy, who grew up in Scotland. He tended to get distracted, especially by anything outdoors and wild. One day, his father makes an announcement—they're moving to America. As if the ship wasn't enough of an adventure, they also find themselves on an ox cart to Wisconsin. There, he discovers not only more about nature, but also about inventing. But then, this is only the beginning of his many adventures.

Written in graphic novel form, this is a book kids will easily pick up and flip through. The first chapter starts out with a young John Muir leading a very usual life in Scotland. Young readers will immediately sympathize with his days in school and be pulled in thanks to the precarious and funny predicaments he finds himself in. After these first scenes are set, the story grows richer and more entertaining as he continues to America, and the true adventure begins.

The tale surrounds a historical figure many readers haven't heard of before, and even though there are important historical moments and occurrences, none ever come across as boring or 'teachy'. The book makes sure that readers see the fun in life and living, along with the wisdom and knowledge that come with experience, by creating an exciting and enjoyable atmosphere on every page.

The illustrations add the right amount of fun, humor, and excitement. They flow very nicely with the text and are easy to follow. At the beginning of the book, the main figures are quickly introduced along with subtle but humorous quirks. At the end of the book, there's a concise chronology of the highlights from John Muir's life, a glossary for more difficult terms, and a short list of sources where the inspirations for this book came from.

This is a fun book which introduces readers to a very interesting, historical figure and is sure to drive boredom far away.… (more)

I'm torn between 2 and 3 stars for this book. I did like it but there were some major flaws that hindered my enjoyment of the book.

The premise is an interesting one - what if the entire earth were flooded because the polar ice caps melted? The story is an interesting one and the plot moves along pretty nicely.

There were quite a few things I did not like, however. The dialogue was pretty horrible. Lots of gasping and whining and such. Some pretty cheesy exchanges. Also, within the plot there were a lot of unbelievable coincidences. The protagonist whines about how difficult things are and how she doesn't know how she will proceed. Then, voila! Something happens that makes everything ok. There are also a few references made to the fact that there are no women in charge and no women "dreamers." These references to women's rights really felt out of place. That facet of the story was never fleshed out so these mentions seem distracting rather than a real piece of the plot. They were unnecessary. If this was something that the author really wanted to explore she should have made it a larger part of the plot.

Overall, this book was ok. I liked it and really enjoyed parts of it but cannot rate it higher because of the issues stated above. I think most adults reading this would agree with me. However, tweens and young teens may rate this much higher.… (more)