EMILY WINDSNAP AND THE MONSTER FROM THE DEEP
by Liz Kessler
Candlewick Press
ISBN-10: 0763633011
ISBN-13: 9780763633011
Ages 8-12
224 pages

We first met 12-year-old Emily in THE TAIL OF EMILY WINDSNAP and learned her secret: she's half-mermaid, half-human. Emily, however, never knew this secret herself until she took swimming lessons. Not only does she discover her fishy genes, she also learns that her father, a merman, didn't abandon her as a baby after all. Instead, he was imprisoned by the angry ruler of the oceans, Neptune, who found out about the illegal love affair between her human mother and merman father. At the end of the book, the family is reunited and sent to live in a secret place where humans and merfolk can live together in harmony.

EMILY WINDSNAP AND THE MONSTER FROM THE DEEP begins as Emily and her family are discovering and exploring their beautiful new home, Allpoints Island. Emily couldn't be happier. At last, she can get to know her father and also not feel like a freak about being half-mermaid. But Emily soon realizes that even at Allpoints Island, she's different. None of the other mermaids are half-human. She longs to fit in with the other kids, and in an effort to impress two mermaid girls, Althea and Marina, Emily convinces her best friend Shona to accompany her on a risky adventure. There's a secret spooky lagoon that none of the other mermaid kids ever went into because "they're not brave enough" and have been "told not to go in there so many times." But Emily and Shona are new to the area, and Emily thinks it's the perfect opportunity to show how brave they are.

When Emily and Shona enter the secret lagoon, they don't realize the trouble they're about to cause. They accidentally wake up the Kraken, a mythical monster that is supposed to sleep for 100 years and only be woken up by Neptune himself. If the Kraken is awoken before this time, it will be cranky and cause much destruction. And that's exactly what happens. Now, the monster is on the loose and it's up to Emily to save Allpoints Island!

Not only is Emily dealing with the typical problems of a 12-year-old, she also must save her family and her new home. The book is told in the alternating voices of the heroine, Emily, and her old Brightport adversary, Mandy Rushton. Mandy's family wins a cruise that ends up in the Kraken's path. The alternating voices sometimes takes away from the flow of the novel, however, and slows down the adventure. Still, EMILY WINDSNAP AND THE MONSTER FROM THE DEEP is a fun-filled middle-grade fantasy that will appeal especially to young girls.

   --- Reviewed by Kristi Olson

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