Looking For Atlantis
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- £7.99
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- £7.99
Publisher Description
Grandfather left his grandson a seafarer’s chest, a parrot called Titanic and a dream – the dream of looking for Atlantis.
“Atlantis is right here all around you,” Grandfather said, “you have to learn how to look for it.” So when Grandfather dies, the boy starts looking: in the chest, on shelves, in books, under the stairs.
Colin Thompson’s dazzingly detailed pictures richly illustrate the boy’s magical journey of discovery.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Thompson's ( The Paper Bag Prince ) haunting picture book is both serious and witty. The deceptively simple story opens with the death of the young narrator's grandfather, a raffish sailor. Responding to the death, Titanic the parrot says, ``Hello, sailor,'' a contrary comment that sets up the narrator's contrarily successful search for mythical Atlantis. It is all around, Grandfather has said: ``You have to learn how to look for it.'' Look the boy does, through a dense, Escher-like world where everyday objects (walls, books, cellars) yield a treasure trove of apparently infinite (and often hilarious) surprises. The boy's quest begins through a little door at the bottom of Grandfather's trunk; the story line follows the classic hero cycle, with its obligatory dark night of the soul and ultimate emergence into self-discovery. Thompson's hero has added the power of imagination to the straightforward ability to see, and the author/artist accordingly glosses his tale with immensely satisfying art--intricate, colorful, joyous. Does the boy find Atlantis? Asked literally, the question is beside the point; in a mythic sense, however, it is the point, and one exceptionally well made. All ages.
