One Smart Fish

by Christopher Wormell

Long ago in the deep ocean, there lived...one smart fish! He wasn't the biggest and he wasn't the boldest, but he was the cleverest. What this smart fish wanted more than anything else was to walk upon the land. But everyone knows that fish can't walk...can they?

Genres: Picture Books, Animals, Childrens

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Christopher Wormell is an English printmaker, principally known for his illustrated books.

Reviews

[Romain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un livre sur l’évolution destiné aux plus jeunes, bonne ou mauvaise idée ? De prime abord, ça semble quand même un tout petit peu ambitieux de faire comprendre à nos enfants que ce sont les poissons qui sont “sortis de l’eau” et sont à l’origine des autres espèces dont la notre. Même pour un adulte, c’est déjà très difficile à imaginer, alors pour un enfant – je sais qu’ils ont de l’imagination et qu’ils inventent toujours des histoires, mais bon là quand même. Faisons un effort et imaginons, c’est peut-être possible, mais alors il faut vraiment que ce poisson, celui qui est sorti de l’eau le premier, soit très doué. Tellement doué qu’il doit au minimum savoir jouer à un jeu compliqué comme les échecs et puis faire ses lacets aussi.

L’idée est plutôt bonne, elle permet de sensibiliser les plus jeunes à la théorie de l’évolution même s’ils doivent trouver cette histoire bien saugrenue. Encore un exemple pour lequel la réalité dépasse la fiction – pourtant il y en a des histoires farfelues dans la littérature jeunesse. Les dessins des fonds marins sont impeccables, ils représentent de nombreux poissons aux formes variées et aux couleurs chatoyantes. Certaines planches sont vraiment somptueuses. Je pense que ce sont elles qui font tant aimer ce livre à ma fille – voir un poisson avec des baskets c’est pas mal aussi. En le rapportant à la bibliothèque, elle s’est mise à dire quelque chose que je ne comprenais pas. En tournant la tête vers le livre et à son grand étonnement, c’est la bibliothécaire qui a compris. Elle disait “un poisson très doué”. Elle semblait triste de s’en séparer alors nous l’avons repris.

Également publié sur mon blog.

[Nola Lorraine · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has a strong evolutionary message, so whether you like it or not probably depends on your views. I'm not a big fan of evolution, so I admit up front that I may be biased. Still, I don't think it's a particularly good evolution story either. It's about a smart fish who wished he could walk on land. He makes himself a set of feet and does walk on land, but he gets lonely and decides to go back to his friends in the ocean. A few million years later, other fish crawl out of the sea and grow feet so that they become reptiles. Just two pages later, the author says "And that, eventually, is how you and I got here" and there's an arrow pointing to some cave people in amongst a myriad of animals. I'm sorry, but I just don't like it. The illustrations are good, but I don't like the message.

[Reema Sahay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Since my 6 year old was showing interest in the concept of evolution, I thought I'll get a simple book for him at first. So, I got this one. It shows that in the beginning there were a whole lot of amazing fish in the ocean. There were all kinds of fish but one was extremely smart (smarter than the rest of them put together). He wanted to walk on land. So he created feet for himself and ventured into land; but he felt lonely, so went back into the ocean to his friends. Millions of years later, some fish grew feet and became reptiles. The book ends with a page spread that shows evolution from fish to human beings with a whole lot of animals in between. The book ends with the fact that the fish started changing and they went through a lot of changes over millions of years and that's how we came into existence eventually.
This book gives a very basic introduction about what evolution is but for a 6 year old, it fails to offer a lot of answers. My son asked me where is the evolution of human beings etc. I told him it has not been covered. He asked me what about where the fish came from, which eventually led our discussion to the Big Bang theory and so on and so forth. He asked me to get a bigger book which has everything. I said it will be difficult to understand. He said you are there to explain, right?
Coming back to this book, it is probably more suitable for younger kids like 4-5 year olds. A 6.5 year old needs more answers!

[Jenna Mills · Rating 3 out of 5]

Torn between strange and great! Love the image at the end.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of two books I found aimed at explaining evolution to the preschool age group. This one has pretty pictures and a nice message that what you do is more important than what you look like, but the evolution stuff seems tacked on as an afterthought to the fictional story. It's cute but what my almost 3yo got out of it was that there was a fish who for some unfathomable reason, made some fake legs. She was much more intrigued by the more detailed non-fiction text Our Family Tree: An Evolution Story by Lisa Westberg Peters.

[Dee-Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

The is a good simple book that depicts the theory of evolution. The pictures of the fish are appealing to my kids and they liked the strange fish the best. There are a lot of fish in this book, which adds to its appeal. I don't get it however, how come the fish can breathe air when they walk out of water.

[The Styling Librarian · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed every piece of this book. Even when I started out thinking it was a non-fiction book, why? Because I was pulled in… I love that this book is really all about evolution and while I completed reading it I wondered to myself, “wonder if this is banned anywhere?” My son loved this book. Read it to himself, read it to me with powerful voice, fun, fascinating book.

[crashqueen73 · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ugh! Dreadful.

I loathed this book. It was awful. It had a stupid, almost incomprehensible story line about a fish that decides it wants to walk. So it makes some legs and heads out to land only to realise it wasn't really for him. But some nonsense about it being the first creature of evolution.

Ridiculous.

Totally unappealing to me and totally over Miss Four's head.

[Angela Randall]

See pictures of the pages of Chris Wormell's books in this article.

[Kadri · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very cute. ♥

Just think if that fish had dreamed of wings first...