Cover Image: The Great Wheel Adventure

The Great Wheel Adventure

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Member Reviews

If you are planning a trip to Seattle with the family you might share this book with your children so they will know what to look for and be familiar with some of the places they will see.
Gabe and his family explore the city of Seattle. The Giant Wheel at the Seattle waterfront caught Gabe's attention when his family didn't know what or where to go first. So they ride the Wheel so they can see all of Seattle from the top. From the wheel they saw the Aquarium. That looks like a good place to check out. There are all the sealife from the waters around Seattle at the Aquarium. They also see all the ferries crossing back and forth. The Seattle Seahawks stadium is also seen and they flashback to watching some of the games. At the top they see the snow topped Mount Rainier. The as they start down they see the Mariners baseball stadium. And finally they see the iconic Space Needle. When they finish the ride they take a walk over to Pike Street Market to find all kinds of fresh fruits, vegetables, and seafood. The book highlights all the fun things that can be found in Seattle.

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This is a sweet love letter to Seattle. Framed as a trip around an observation wheel (that I now cannot wait to ride!), a young boy tells his sister about all of the sights they see and includes imaginative stories of himself having adventures in each place.

The illustrations are appealing and lively, which will definitely engage kids' attention. This would make a nice book either to prepare for a trip to Seattle or as a souvenir of a visit. Additionally, it would be a lot more fun than a dry non-fiction book if an older student was doing research for a geography or social studies project.

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review!

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Not exactly an adventure, and barely a narrative, this book is still not that unpleasant. It features a lad with his family on the exclusive blacked-out, see-through-bottomed gondola on the Seattle Big Wheel. Every sight and location the wheel's ride shows them the lad gets to spout off to his little sister about what his imagination gives him – an underwater paddle with the wildlife in the aquarium, a superb performance at the ball game, an adventure in the mountains, and so on. A factoid on each spread for each location is fine, but for me the kid spoke in such a poetic, high-falutin' dramatic manner he was in no way realistic. This then is an extended tourist advert for that area of the city, and while it looks wonderful, and it would certainly entertain, it has to be thought of as an extended postcard someone else has filled in for you. It shows pride in its city, and that's fine – but this has a very insular appeal as a result.

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