The Three Pirates

Griffin Pirate Stories #1

by Sheila K. McCullagh

Genres: Pirates

8 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1972

About the author

Sheila K. McCullagh had her first work pulished in the 1950s and then went on to write a number of children's books including the Puddle lane and the Buccaneers series.

Reviews

[Emily]

I had a squeal of delight moment when I was browsing the other listings of the seller of a book on eBay that I'm considering buying, and saw an entry in the pirate series by Sheila K. McCullagh. At last I have identified the pirate series of easy readers that helped make me the literate person I am today! The excitement is not so much because I want to seek out these books and reread them -- indeed I wouldn't be able to say now whether these books were actually "good." The concept, as best as I can recall it seems a little odd. Pirates in this world are classified by color and identified by the color of the clothes they wear. Blue and Green pirates are friendly and kind. Red pirates have fierce tempers, but are good at heart. Pirates who wear black clothing are wicked. (This system reminds me in retrospect of Anne McCaffrey's dragons). The series mostly follows the adventures of a green and blue pirate who are friends, and dream of one day discovering a mythical island, which I see from reading the author's title list is called Acrooacree, but which I somehow remembered as "Conkruery." They do say memories can be notoriously unreliable. Anyway, as previously mentioned, I don't particularly want to reread these books, but just knowing that I could if I made the effort somehow makes the memories of reading the books aloud to my mother while she played solitaire on the living room floor in our house in another country that I will probably never revisit that much more real. The books belonged to my school, and we were allowed to take them home to practice reading. I remember when I triumphantly brought home Acrooacree, and my mother commented "Oh, so they finally made it" and I felt a sense of satisfaction that she realized how important that was. Having identified this series after all these years feels like I've brought a precious relic up to the surface from a shipwreck.