Just Loved Reading:

Secrets at Sea

Middle Grade Fiction

Peck, Richards. Secrets at Sea. New York: Puffin Books, 2011.

Upstate New York in the late nineteenth century is the background for Secrets at Sea.  The protagonists are a family of mice who leave the comforts of their middle class home and sail across the Atlantic ocean to England.

Helena Cranston is the oldest of her siblings now that their parents and oldest sisters have passed. It isn’t easy being the matriarch of this family. Her sisters, Beatrice and Louise sneak out late at night (Helena thinks they are meeting members of the opposite sex) and their brother, Lamont, plays hooky from school.

The owners of the big house they live in, the Cranstons of Hudson Valley, decide to travel to England to find a husband for their daughter, Olive.

Even though mice are afraid of water, the siblings decide to go with them and hide in one of the Cranstons’ large trunks. Why not? It is the eve of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee.

Once on ship and out of the trunk, siblings discover an aristocratic society of mice. There are as many crooks and crevices in the luxury liner as there were in their Hudson Valley home if not more.They dine in splendor and enjoy high tea. They even meet the Mouse-in-Waiting to Queen Victoria’s daughter, Princess Louise.

As is common with the novels of Richard Peck, one humorous adventure leads to the other including romances for the sisters.

WHY I LOVED READING THIS BOOK:

Only master of fiction for children and Young Adults can write about a family of mice and make it an enjoyable read.  I hate mice but I loved reading about the Cranstons of Hudson Valley.