The Thursday Murder Club meets Adventures on Trains in this absolutely brilliant new middle grade mystery series from author Emma Swan and illustrator Katie Saunders. I first spotted Cruise Ship Kid on the Usborne New Books Showcase a few weeks ago. I was completely charmed by both the premise of the story and by the author herself so I was thrilled when a copy dropped through my door. Life on a cruise ship, a high-stakes mystery, new friends and stops in fascinating locations around the Mediterranean make this book unputdownable.
Ten (and a quarter)-year-old Silver is the daughter of the Deputy Cruise Director on the Polentia. This means she lives on the ship year round. Based on the author’s own experiences as a cruise ship kid, readers are treated to inside knowledge about what it’s really like to live on a ship. There’s homeschooling, an expecation to behave well at all times and having to say the passengers are always right but there’s also a huge amount of freedom and the most incredible life experiences. Silver tries her best to behave – most of the time – but sometimes, when Mum isn’t looking, she lets adventure take over.
One of the biggest challenges of living on a ship is making friends her own age. Most of the time, the ship is full of adults. Silver spends a lot of time with “The Gang” – a group of elderly passengers who take back-to-back cruises and pretty much live at sea. This hilarious group of age 80+ passengers have known Silver since she was 3 years old and always look out for her. It’s when the “summer cruise kids” come on-board that Silver finds things difficult. She gets nervous about speaking to them and just doesn’t fit in. Mum says she’s “unique” but Silver knows that really means “weird”. What Silver doesn’t realise is that she’s actually really good at making friends. She befriends the reader through questions, quizzes, spaces to doodle and her heart-felt honesty. Silver’s “in-between-the-ears” voice lets readers in on her hopes, fears and genuinely kind nature.
This summer, Silver is determined to try to socialise and make a BFF (best friend forever). In the process, she starts to feel like she just isn’t good enough. She wants to change so many things about herself – her accent, her clothes, her entire personality – just to please Yana and the other kids on-board. When two diamond watches go missing, Silver thinks this is her chance to look cool. She and Yana become detectives and try to discover who stole the watches. When some of her adult friends come under scrutiny, Silver knows she has to find out the truth – even if it means doing things she’s not supposed to do.
Cruise Ship Kid: Thief at Sea is a fun mystery with a thread of real warmth running through it. Silver learns a hard lesson about trying to impress a new friend and being true to herself. She must learn to value who she is and find confidence in the life she’s built for herself on the ship. No short-term friend is worth risking her relationships with her Mum, the ship’s crew and The Gang.
I can’t wait to find out what Silver and The Gang get up to next. I hope there are many books in this fantastic series.
Thank you to Usborne and Fritha Lindqvist for an early copy of this brilliant book!
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