Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)

I don't have kids, but every so often, I am tempted by a children's book, and this year, I found myself fascinated by one special book, Flotsam, by David Wiesner (New York: Clarion Books, 2006). This book uses incredibly detailed watercolor paintings to depict the delightful story of a young boy who is hanging out on the New Jersey shore. The boy discovers an underwater camera and develops the film, and the resulting pictures send the child on an amazing journey through a fantastical undersea world.

The story begins with the protagonist, a scientifically-minded young boy, busily examining seashore life with a magnifying glass. The nearby microscope and the magnifying glass hint at the change of scene that will carry the story. While the boy is sitting on the shore, a wave washes ashore, depositing a Melville underwater camera onto the beach. The boy finds the camera, takes it to a one hour photomat to develop the film and then the story becomes truly delightful.

There is no narrative text anywhere in the book; it is comprised only of finely rendered watercolors, and the images tell the story. Starting with the cover (pictured above; do lay the dust jacket flat to fully appreciate this picture), the art is wonderful; incredibly detailed and wonderfully colorful. The title page is a with detailed watercolor showing the collection of flotsam found on the shore. There are pictures of a school bright red fishes including one intricately designed mechanical wind-up fish; an octopus family gathered around a parent which is reading a book to them, lamps ablaze with the light of deep-sea glow-in-the dark fishes; a hot air balloon that looks like a pufferfish; a village of snailshells perched on the back of a sea turtle (pictured, below); oceanic islands sitting atop giant seastars. Then the protagonist finds a snapshot of a girl holding the photo of a boy, who is also holding a photo of another boy. As the images in the photos grow progressively smaller, the protagonist uses his magnifying glass to view the children in the pictures and then he uses his microscope. These images are essentially a trip back through time, ending with a black-and-white image of a boy standing on a sea shore at the turn of the 20th century. Each image is detailed enough to inspire its own story.

After the protagonist sees this complete chain of children, he then snaps a picture of himself holding the picture of the girl before he throws the camera back into the ocean. The animals of the sea take over from there and fill the rest of the film with more fantastical pictures of their lives. The last image of the book shows a girl, sitting on a sandy beach with palm trees in the background, reaching for the camera.

This book is recommended for children between the ages of 5 and 8 years old, although adults will also enjoy it. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then this book is truly worth the many hours of wonder and enjoyment that it will inspire.

David Weisner has received the Caldecott Medal twice (for Tuesday and The Three Pigs) and two Caldecott Honors (for Sector 7 and Free Fall). A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, he lives near Philadelphia with his wife, Kim Kahng and their children, Kevin and Jaime. They spend their summer vacations at the Jersey Shore.

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