Wood, D. (2008). Into The Volcano. N.p.: The Blue Sky Press.
The illustrations of this book are well crafted. The pictures are honestly a lot more interesting than what the characters are actually saying. In fact, the story itself might be more interesting without any pictures at all. The illustrations are appealing to children perhaps ages 7-11 years old. The characters represented are not diverse, they are mostly all white on page 1 with Sumo and his brother looking native"ish". As far as high quality goes, I wouldn't rate it high quality because the story is neither much of a learning experience and it does not depict young children in a good standpoint, and it does not have a good representation of adults either. The pictures are all very Eurocentric.
The story line is appealing to some children, mostly boys, and it seems to be a bit dark in some points. Dark in the fact that many bad things happen to the boys, there are pictures of scary skeltons, demon-like people, and creepy scenes in general. I would not consider it high quality because it is very limited as to what type of children the books interests. High quality literature should have some type of appeal to everyone, in some sort of fashion. If it cannot appeal to anyone in any area, then I would assume it to be a dud.
The story follows a good story line and there is much suspense and wondering what will happen next. I would say that the author did a good job writing the story because it's hard to predict what will happen to the boys. The story is interesting because it shows people's thoughts and not just the words that they are speaking. Overall, I just don't think it is a very high quality read, although the pictures are interesting and the story is good, it doesn't fit into a high quality literature.
Literary Elements:
Setting: Island, stranded, far away
Mood: Scary, Suspicious, Dangerous
Characters: Unintelligent, Daring, Brave, Slightly-Caring, Self-centered
Lexile Level: GN240L
Age Range: 7-11
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