Darwin’s Dragons

Lindsay Galvin's Darwin's Dragons is a shipwreck adventure for 11 year olds about the boy who worked for Charles Darwin, and the creatures he finds on an island in the Galapagos.

What happens

Syms Covington is ship's fiddler and cabin boy on the Beagle. For the last two and a half years he's also been Mr Darwin's assistant. The book opens with the two of them riding giant tortoises for a lark!

Then a storm blows in. Mr Darwin tips out of the rowboat, Syms leaps into the sea after him, and a huge wave tears them apart.

Syms washes up alone. One boot, no food, no water and no idea which island he's on. All he has is his da's old fiddle, Scratch, which floats back to him in its wax-sealed case.

And something enormous is up in the sky. It has claws as long as his arm, wings like the Beagle's sails and a tail like a snake. It snatches him up and drops him in the sea, again and again.

A living fossil? A monster? Syms honestly doesn't know. Then a much smaller creature turns up in the night, green and copper-eyed, with a spiky ridge right down its back...

Syms is telling you all this himself, and it's very easy to be on his side. He talks to his fiddle (and in his head, the fiddle answers back). He keeps hearing his da telling him to "stay bricky". His old sailor slang is half the fun.

There's real history underneath the fantasy too. Tortoise shells, marine iguanas, Captain Fitzroy and a young Mr Darwin who goes green in every swell.

A quick heads-up on the scarier bits. Syms nearly drowns more than once. A centipede bite leaves him shaking with fever and dreaming about his da, who died of a winter cough when Syms was six. It's tense and sad in places, but never gory.

If your reader loves survival stories and animals that shouldn't exist, this is a brilliant pick. It'll suit a child who's into nature and science too.

What to read next

If they fall for Lindsay Galvin's mix of history and sea creatures, My Friend the Octopus is a great next read. Vinnie is whisked away from her mother's hat shop in the middle of the night and ends up at a seaside aquarium.