Product Description

A little girl learns that every creature has its own place when she gets a strange gray fish for her birthday.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5339957 in Books
• Published on: 1994-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 1 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Borovsky's ( The Strange Blue Creature ) beguiling, primitive watercolor and gouache art is a fitting counterpart to his droll story about a wide-eyed girl who selects a birthday present from a pet store. Her choice is a small gray fish, which she names Vincent. When it appears that the fishbowl has gotten smaller, Pauline moves Vincent to the sink until that, too, "shrinks." After he outgrows the bathtub, the perpetually smiling pet is put in the backyard pool, where Pauline reads to him and listens to his sad song. Long before Pauline's father spies water spraying out of Vincent's head, readers will have identified this "fish that wasn't" as a whale. Once they learn the truth, Pauline and her father return Vincent to the sea. Walking to school the next day, the lonely girl cries so much that she loses track of where she is going and ends up walking off a pier into the ocean. Guess who comes to her rescue, now singing a happy song? There's no suspense here--just an impressive whale in a tale that's equally amusing and affecting. Ages 4-7.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 2-Although brightly illustrated with childlike figures and pleasing colors, this well-intentioned story suffers from a syrupy, methodical text. After Paulina's pet outgrows his fishbowl and the bathtub, and then begins to spout water, her family realizes that Vincent is a whale, and they return him to the ocean. When Paulina, crying so hard that she fails to notice the end of the pier, falls into the sea, the leviathan rescues her and helps her understand that he belongs in the wild. A book that's pedantic and forced.
Cyrisse Jaffee, formerly at Newton Public Schools, MA
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Ages 4-6. For her birthday present, Paulina chooses a little gray fish, which she takes home from the pet shop to live in the bowl by her bedside. Soon Vincent outgrows the fishbowl, though, and moves to the sink, then to the bathtub, then to the backyard swimming pool. Realizing that Vincent is not a fish after all, but a whale, Paulina's dad takes him to the ocean, where whales undeniably belong. Vincent's happy to be home, but Paulina's so distressed that she cries all day and all night. Crying too hard to see where she's going, she walks off a pier and nearly drowns, but Vincent lovingly saves her. Bright, precise paintings in a naive style focus on the characters' emotions and the visual joke of Vincent's ballooning form. In terms of whale biology, the story's ludicrous. In terms of child appeal, though, that doesn't matter a bit. Preschoolers will enjoy this simple picture book for its heart, its humor, and its happy ending. Carolyn Phelan

Customer Reviews

A whale of a tale!
When Paulina's parents take her to the pet shop for her birthday, she picks out a little gray fish to take home with her. Little do any of them know that this little gray fish is in fact Vincent the baby whale! First he lives in a fishbowl, then in the bathtub, and then in their pool. But when Paulina's father sees Vincent spraying water out of his head, he learns the truth, so Father and Paulina have to bring Vincent home.

Although not the only parent in the book and not the focus of the story - which is mostly about Paulina learning to love and lose Vincent the whale - Father is the one who figures out the truth about Vincent and helps Paulina get him back to the sea. The Fish that Wasn't isn't a book solely about fathers, just one that subtly reminds us of what fathers can do.