Reviewed from ARC received from Penguin Young Readers Group.Įnter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Highly recommended, this is a dazzling book that will find a place among other great animal stories. This is a world of privilege that is gloriously redrawn mouse sized complete with royalty and romance. From the lavish parties to the lifeboat drills, the mice are involved throughout. Peck has also vividly created the setting of a Victorian ship at sea. Richard Peck, the author of more than thirty novels, has won numerous awards, including a National Humanities Medal, the Edgar Mystery Award. She is an engaging and richly drawn character. : Secrets at Sea (9780307968265) by Peck, Richard and a great selection of similar New, Used and Collectible Books available now at great prices. Peck’s young heroine, Helena, is a mouse burdened with many cares but who also starts to see herself differently as her travels continue. It makes for a delight of a novel that has depth and a lot of heart. In Richard Pecks coming-of-age tale, weve got a horde of mice about to go on a big crazy adventure, and theyre gearing up to meddle in some human affairs along the way. The same sort of tiers that make up the human society are found reflected with the mouse society as well. Just open up a copy of Secrets at Sea, and youll find cute little rodents in every nook and cranny. Peck writes with a sly humor here that takes on the establishment and the constraints of society in the late 1800s. So the family embarks on a trip where they discover the large impact a family of mice can have on their humans. One of her younger sisters is far too attached to one of the human daughters. Her younger brother is always getting into scrapes and needs some direction. Helena hopes that the trip will help with some of the problems she has been fretting about. Do they travel across the dangerous and deadly water with the family or stay behind in an empty house. It is 1887 and the human Cranston family is planning a trip to England to get their eldest daughter wed.

Her parents are both dead as are her older sisters. Helena is the eldest of the Cranston family of mice. A wonderful mix of Upstairs Downstairs and The Borrowers, this is the first animal story from the incredible Peck.

Secrets at Sea by Richard Peck