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The Explorer by Katherine Rundell


I've been reading this book with a student this term.  I chose it for him after the good reviews I had seen about it.  He's not a reader and has Autism so most of the book was read to him but he listened well and we enjoyed the story together, doing written work based on it as we went.

The story line is great, really exciting stuff of about 9-12 years old.

Four children are returning from the Amazon when their plane crashes into the jungle killing the pilot.  Their only way to help themselves is to find a way of escape. The story follows the children as they fight for survival, firstly on their own and later in the book after meeting "The Explorer", it is an adventure story with danger around every corner.  We loved some of the things they got up to (the bees, the raft ride) and really enjoyed the whole book.
The characters were likeable, Fred, Con and Lila were really relatable, we could image children that age being exactly as they were described, Max however we found rather annoying, and at one point my student suggested leaving him behind or eating him!

As they get further into the jungle you wonder how on earth they will escape but all becomes clear the deeper they get and the further you get into the book.

We found the ending a bit of a let down, the children obviously escape but there was no real mention of what happened on that journey and when they returned home there was no indication as to whether their families had made any attempt to search or look for them. We felt that this could have made a good book better. I know as a part I'd be frantic, but the families were hardly mentioned.

We'd give this book 4 out of five stars. We enjoyed it and will definitely be looking at more of Katherine Rundell's book for future work.
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