The Boxcar Children Graphic Novels: Blue Bay Mystery

Title: The Boxcar Children Graphic Novels: Blue Bay Mystery
Author (Created by): Gertude Chandler Warner
Illustrator: Mike Dubisch
Genre: Graphic Novel (popular fiction)

Summary
The graphic novel Blue Bay Mystery is an adaptation of Gertrude Chandler Warner’s 1940’s series “The Boxcar Children.” At the beginning of Blue Bay Mystery, Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny’s wealthy grandfather arranges to take them on a trip to a deserted South Seas Island. Lars, a sailor and the children’s old friend Mike Wood also came along for the adventure. Lars, was Grandfather’s friend who had once been stranded on this exotic island once before.
After a safe trip to the island, the Alden kids had fun swimming, hiking, catching food, and just exploring the island. Everything was fun and games until the kids found a shipwrecked boat on the island. If that was not enough, they also found a myna bird with some cryptic messages. After finding the shipwrecked boat and the myna bird, the kids started to wonder whether this island was really deserted after all. The kids kept on finding more and more clues that made them think that there was another person on the island. One day, the kids decided to climb up the mountain, Henry went up first and then everyone else followed. The kids discovered a random stump up on the mountain that had to have been placed there by someone. Henry stood up on the stump and looked into the cave. The cave looked just like the old boxcar they had lived in before and it even had a pink cup like his in it. This was a big clue that someone was on the island. Benny then decided he was going to climb back down the mountain. When he got back down to the ground, he saw something moving in the trees and he decided to follow it. All of a sudden the ground collapsed and Benny fell down into a trap. He looked up from the bottom of the hole to see if anyone was there to help him, to his surprise he saw a young boy waiting there to help him out. The young boy introduced himself as Peter. He explained everything to the children of how his ship went down, why he did not call out to them, and that he had missed his family and wanted to go home to them. After Peter finished his story, the kids helped him clean up, gave him a haircut, new cloths, and some food to eat. Grandfather then talked to Peter and told him that they would do their best to find his parents, but if they could not find his parents he was welcomed to live with them. While on their way back to San Francisco, Grandfather received a message that Peter’s parents were alive and that they would pick him up in San Francisco. After dropping Peter off in San Francisco, the Aldens and Mike flew home. Another adventure had gone by, and the Aldens’ had solved another mystery.

Classroom Connection
Graphic novels often attract kids and motivate them to read. One way teachers could use graphic novels in the classroom is to help students understand how to use context clues to improve their reading. The pictures provide context clues that help students understand the meaning of the written text. If students are having trouble with a word or just comprehending the sentence in general, they can look at the pictures and start to get an idea of what the narrative could actually be about. When children begin to understand the narrative, they are more likely to continue reading and possibly begin to enjoy reading.