Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson
The Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson is our class book for year 8, so if a teacher is reading this, maybe it might help you decide.
Maia has lived in boarding school since the death of her parents. But now her guardian has found family in the Amazon that are willing to take her in. But perhaps their intentions are not fully good as they have a sum deposited into their bank account for looking after Maia.
Her cousins the twins who live there are horrid and care for only themselves; their father is obsessed with people’s dead eyes and their mum is terrified of anything small that moves. But Maia manages to befriend the servants under such conditions and they introduce her to Finn.
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Journey to the River Sea
by Eva Ibbotson
But Finn has a history – he is wanted back in England as he is the heir to a large estate. Maia helps him by bringing in her friend Clovis whom she met on the boat coming down as it was in the early 1900′s, and she was missing England. But the twins who are forever mean, are also forever watchful.
This book didn’t really have much of a fast tempo, I find that most of this author’s books doesn’t really have a fast tempo. There was lots of suspense that made you want to read more and more, but the way that it was written drew it out so much. I also found in parts that it dragged on and on, with whole chapters that could be wiped out, but the sad thing is, without those parts the book wouldn’t flow so well in the storyline.
I also found that one or two of the main characters, I couldn’t really connect with them, I don’t really know why, I think it was the way that they were written or something but I didn’t feel what they felt. I think that they have a lot of personality and traits, but its like the author soon ran out of inspiration so the remaining characters were a little flat.
I also felt that there was potential for the story to be a bit of a mild romance novel, but the author didn’t expand on that element, which I felt was a shame as it would have made the book a little more dramatic with an added extra flare.
The storyline was something new as it was based on ordinary human adventures, not about people who have powers or vampires which are stories that spring up a lot these days. The vocabulary was mildly hard. I also thought that the author had done a little back ground research on the location to make it sound real and convincing, with a few native words about the Indian language and flowers from the Amazon. Some of the description was really vivid and detailed as well.
I would recommend this book to kids over the age of 11 as some of the words might be a little discombobulating. I think maybe the max age limit would be about 14, because it might be a bit of an easy read to some avid readers.
People who like mystery or suspenseful books, where important questions take a long time to be answered, will find this is the book for them. Boys and girls can both read this as I know boys that have read Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson and enjoyed it a lot.
