Learning through a Journal: Pirateology by Dugald Steer

Fun fact about me:  I love to scrapbook.  Hmm...random?

No actually it really does relate.  Pirateology by Dugald Steer is a very interactive informational guide about pirates.

The entire premise is about one person who is commissioned to track down one specific pirate Arabella Drummod; as he tracks this female pirate, he includes information about the life of pirates including maps and flip books...see it's basically a pirate scrapbook.

I really enjoyed the twist of being a book about pirates while it also incorporated a story of the search for this particular conniving pirate.

It felt real with the typeface and the pictures that this really was a personal journal by a seafaring man.  A child could easily be convinced to educate themselves with this very interactive and engaging book.  I know I myself learned much about pirates.

However, I could not discern what was fiction and what was true; for example, the additional information about the pirates that was supplemented in helping the man to track down Arabella was clearly based in history, but questions like was Arabella real are left unanswered.

Sadly, because of the nature of the book and how it is set up to appear from cover to cover as Captain William Lubber's journal, there is no room for author's notes or a bibliography.

Very likely, if the author had chosen to include these, the magic would have been lost and a child would have been jerked out of the pirate world into reality.

In the beginning, the publishers included a website; sadly, though the website is no longer available.  Perhaps on the website they had included references and author's notes; however, I cannot be certain.

On the other hand, it was still a most enjoyable and informative read.  I love interactive elements (though sadly because this copy was from the library many of the pullout items were missing), and the material was presented in a creative way.  For this, I would recommend Pirateology.