THOMAS AND THE SHARK is a practice reader at the First Grade level. It features short sentences, larger text, and Richard Courtney's wonderful drawings. (As versus some of the older Thomas books that have the yucky photos from the TV show.)

Being about Thomas and the crew makes this a wonderful book to motivate fans of the little blue engine to work through the words and sentences, using clues from the drawings, if necessary. (The book can, of course, be enjoyed by fans too young to read.)

The story is about a shark that is going to the Sodor Aquarium. It's car breaks loose... and the question is whether there is anyone that can save the creature!

Many of the crew are in this one. Children will see Salty, Percy, Emily, Cranky, Henry, James (that splendid red engine), Gordon, and surprisingly, those two children fishing down by the bridge. The ones that in a previous book fished out the fish that were in Thomas's boiler. ( )