Synopsis
YOU are aboard the Titanic, the world's largest ocean liner. The ship is sinking, and the ocean water is freezing. Will you survive? In this interactive nonfiction adventure, only YOU can CHOOSE which path to take through history, the choices you make could lead to survival or death! With full-color illustrations, action-packed text, and more than 15 endings, this YOU CHOOSE book is a truly dynamic reading experience!Editorials
Children's Literature
The story is certainly not new to children’s literature, but the format of the “You Choose Books” series is more unusual. The cover advertises “3 Story Paths, 35 Choices, 15 Endings.” The initial choice is to travel in first class with the rich, in third class with the poor, or as a crewmember. After that, readers move through the book based on their decisions in given situations--stay awake to socialize or retire early, try to help others or hurry to escape. They may end up as a rich male passenger who perishes, a poor female passenger who lives, or …? Although there is a table of contents, readers navigate the book by jumping to different portions of the story as indicated at the bottom of the book’s pages. The various storylines, based on primary sources such as survivor accounts and hearing transcripts, seem to hold together. Photographs and drawings accompany the text, and the work as a whole is certainly effective in creating a first-person appreciation for the events of the early morning hours of April 15, 1912. Additional materials following the text include prompts for writing, a bibliography, a reading list, a glossary, a timeline, and an index. This would be a great resource not only to accompany the study of this historical event but as an introduction to the use of primary sources in research-based writing. Reviewer: Paula McMillen, Ph.D.School Library Journal
Gr 3-6
These adventures abound with historical facts as readers decide which way the story will progress. In Pirates , options include joining the dreaded Blackbeard or being marooned on a desert island. In Titanic , however, no matter which route is chosen, the ship still sinks, though in some cases "you" are saved, whereas in others, you die. The language used throughout each book will be clear to readers as young as third grade, but even sixth graders will be taken in by the interactive format. Pirates is peppered with myriad color drawings; Titanic displays mostly period photographs. In both texts, a final chapter, outside the interactive section, offers further historical details.
—Anne Chapman CallaghanCopyright 2006 Reed Business Information.