Captain Abdul's Pirate School
Kindergarten-Grade 3?Maisie Pickles's parents hustle her off to Captain Abdul's Pirate School to toughen her up because she likes writing poems and painting pictures. She learns her lessons so well that when she overhears a plot to kidnap the students and hold them for ransom, she deftly organizes a mutiny. After subduing the teaching staff, the youngsters set sail for the West Indies and live a boisterously adventurous life, stealing from pirates and sending the treasure home. Captain Abdul reckons his school a success to have graduated such a crew, and Maisie herself is free to pursue her artistic interests. McNaughton's bold cartoons are well suited to the subject. His pirates convey just the right robust exaggeration; bold lines express exuberant movement and attitude. The text, written in the form of Maisie's diary, gives the impression of hand lettering on parchment and is spiced with lusty dialogue. The book is rife with broad humor. The student body, while multiethnic, is definitely not P.C. While the characters' stereotypical identities play no real part in the story, librarians should be alerted to the fact that there are visual and verbal jokes and plays on words at the expense of everyone. Chop is a "person of size," Ching Yih has slanted eyes and large white teeth, and Rosemary Lavender is crudely masculine.?Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Greenwich, CTCopyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.