Wolves Chronicles 03 – Nightbirds on Nantucket

Joan Aiken's Nightbirds on Nantucket is a whaling-ship adventure for 9 year olds that begins with a girl waking up after ten months asleep.

What happens

Dido Twite opens her eyes on the frozen deck of the Sarah Casket, somewhere in the Arctic. She's grown six inches. A kind boy called Nate has been feeding her whale oil and molasses from a coffee pot the whole time. And she's half a world from home, with no idea whether her friend Simon survived.

This is the third Wolves Chronicles book, and it doesn't hang about. Captain Casket is a sad, gentle Quaker who's chasing a pink whale nobody else has seen. He has a job for Dido. His daughter Dutiful Penitence has locked herself in a cabin since her mother died, and has been living on beach-plum jelly ever since.

How Dido gets her out is the best bit. She doesn't knock or beg. She climbs round the cabin without touching the floor, eats plum duff very noisily and plays hopscotch on the chart table, all while pretending she hasn't noticed the eye at the crack in the door. Before long a button appears, and the second pudding has gone.

Then there's the veiled lady hiding under the sails in the blubber room, who grabs Dido by the ear and warns her to keep quiet. And the foxy first mate Mr Slighcarp, who'd rather she went overboard. Who is the lady, and who told her Dido was on board?

Dido's talk is a joy. The smoke from the whale pots is "enough to make a bad egg bust out crying and go home to mother". If your reader enjoys a heroine who says exactly what she thinks, they'll love her.

One thing to know going in. This is a real whaling ship, and a whale is killed and cut up on deck in lots of detail. Dido cries herself to sleep from homesickness on the first night. And the ship's cook is described with an old racial term that feels very dated now.

If your reader is upset by animals being hurt, the whaling scenes might be hard going. If they love the sea and don't mind a bit of mess, they'll probably find it fascinating (they'll certainly learn what gurry is).

What to read next

If they want more of Dido's adventures, she's back in England in The Cuckoo Tree, where a carriage with a drunk driver tips over on a dark hill road and she has to go for help on her own.