The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile is written by Margaret Wise Brown, illustrated by Henry Fisher and published by Parragon Books.
Margaret Wise Brown was an american writer in the early early to mid 1900s who wrote a large number of children's poems and short stories. The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile is one of her poems that has been given a new lease of life in this bright and colourful illustrated book. The poem certainly reads like a traditional poem and has that rhythmic sound to it which reminds me just a touch of some Edward Lear poetry and I think that having a book dedicated to it with such fun pictures is a great way of introducing a classic poetry style to children.
The poem features a family who go fishing, looking for the fish with the deep sea smile. I'm not quite sure what their end goal was but yes, the do eventually find said fish after quite a lot of searching. The fish smiles... then jumps back in again. Good on the fish, I say!
Each page is packed full of brightly coloured smiling fish of all shapes and sizes. There are bubbles and waves and lots of different shades of beautiful deep blue of the ocean. The bright rays of the sun are also a common theme throughout the book. The illustrations certainly 'make' this story which could be quite dry otherwise. For me, I found the rhyme a little bit predictable (mile and smile feature quite a lot, the whole way through) and I also found that the verses had been split over pages in some cases so the first couple of times I read The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile to my girls, I stuttered a bit with the rhyme.
After a couple of reads though, I really got into the rhyme and enjoyed reading poetry to my girls - it made me want to do it more often!
You can follow Parragon Books on twitter and as @parragonbooks on instagram and pinterest.
Margaret Wise Brown was an american writer in the early early to mid 1900s who wrote a large number of children's poems and short stories. The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile is one of her poems that has been given a new lease of life in this bright and colourful illustrated book. The poem certainly reads like a traditional poem and has that rhythmic sound to it which reminds me just a touch of some Edward Lear poetry and I think that having a book dedicated to it with such fun pictures is a great way of introducing a classic poetry style to children.
The poem features a family who go fishing, looking for the fish with the deep sea smile. I'm not quite sure what their end goal was but yes, the do eventually find said fish after quite a lot of searching. The fish smiles... then jumps back in again. Good on the fish, I say!
Each page is packed full of brightly coloured smiling fish of all shapes and sizes. There are bubbles and waves and lots of different shades of beautiful deep blue of the ocean. The bright rays of the sun are also a common theme throughout the book. The illustrations certainly 'make' this story which could be quite dry otherwise. For me, I found the rhyme a little bit predictable (mile and smile feature quite a lot, the whole way through) and I also found that the verses had been split over pages in some cases so the first couple of times I read The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile to my girls, I stuttered a bit with the rhyme.
After a couple of reads though, I really got into the rhyme and enjoyed reading poetry to my girls - it made me want to do it more often!
You can follow Parragon Books on twitter and as @parragonbooks on instagram and pinterest.
