Henry & the Buccaneer Bunnies

Written by Carolyn Crimi and Illustrated by John Manders. Carolyn was born and raised in Long Island, New York.  She lives with her husband and pug in New York currently. For more information click here. John Manders studied at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. He is interested in puppetry and learning to speak Italian. To find out more click here.

Genre: Fiction
Theme: Animals/ Adventure/Pirates
Ages: 5-9

Summary: The story begins on a ship called the Salty Carrot sailing the seas.
The ship is captained by a big, bad, mean named Barnacle Black Ear, who is embarrassed by his son Henry who is more interested in reading books then being a pirate. However, his love of books and his library are able to save the day.



Link to Picture

Pre-Reading Activity:  Have students look at the cover and title of the book.  Ask them to share their observations, inferences, and predictions.  Invite students to recall a time when they had learned something useful from school or from reading.  Ask them how it made them feel to know something new and interesting.

Post-Reading Activity:  Have students do a free write about how it would feel to be in Henry's shoes.  They can choose to write about their thoughts and questions for Black Ear.  They can retell the story from a 1st person perspective. Or they may write about a time something similar happened to them.

Reflection: This is a great book about the love of reading.  It is so great that the main character is able to not only save the day but continue to improve their lives because of the knowledge gained from reading.  Such a cute book.