The Complete Adventures on Nim’s Island
Page 28
Subject: Hi to Fred
Hi Nim
It feels very weird being home. No sea lions, iguanas, crazy adventure girls, cliffs, caves or explosions. But at least I’m not grounded this time.
My mum took me to see Selina Ashburn on the way home. She looks like a ghost but she got so mad when she heard what Lance and Leonora did that she said she didn’t have time to throw up anymore. Luckily she’d saved a piece of the cake L & L made them. She’s sent it to the lab to see if it’s been poisoned. (I BET it has!)
When I told her about the algae she phoned Peter Hunterstone and he got straight into a taxi and came over too. They can’t wait to start testing and experimenting on the sample.
Edmund – missing the island as much as Fred would miss Nim
From: Edmund@kidmail.com
To: Nim@RusoeSanctuaryforRare&EndangeredSpecies.com, Tiffany@kidmail.com, Tris@kidmail.com
Date: Friday, 27 June, 10:18am
Subject: Fossil Pictures
These turned out even better than I expected. It’s sad it’s gone but at least we have proof that it was real.
Edmund
From: Nim@RusoeSanctuaryforRare&EndangeredSpecies. com
To: Edmund@kidmail.com, Tiffany@kidmail.com, Tris@kidmail.com
Date: Friday, 27 June, 11:25am
Subject: Super Algae and Super Friends
Hi everyone,
I’ve never had three emails all at once! Tiffany, I’m really glad your ankle is going to be okay and that you didn’t have to stay in hospital.
Tris, please tell Ollie I loved his picture.
Edmund, those pictures are fantastic! Now we know we’re not crazy. Or maybe a little bit crazy, but at least we didn’t make up the fossil of Chica’s great-great-grandmother.
That’s good Selina and Peter are getting better. I wonder if it really was poison?
The island seems quiet now you’ve gone.
You know when Jack and Ryan took Lance and Leonora off your boat so you could leave? The Coast Guard got here a few hours later and took them away. I wished they didn’t have to be on the island even for that long, but Selkie sat in their tent doorway so they didn’t try to escape.
We went back to the cave yesterday to get more samples of the algae. It’s good there was enough in the drink bottle for you to share. Jack’s started an experiment already and is writing a report of what he’s discovered about the algae so far. He says he’s not too excited yet but I can tell that he is.
But the best news is that Jack says that if this algae is as good as he thinks it is, everyone should come back to finish the experiments together. Except this time Edmund should come with the real Dr Ashburn and Professor Hunterstone. I guess Lance and Leonora will be in jail anyway so we won’t have to worry about them.
And guess what else I found while we were collecting samples: part of Leonora’s amber pendant. It must have been smashed when a rock hit it. But I can’t find the scorpion anywhere.
Your friend
Nim – feeling as happy as Fred eating coconut – or Selkie scaring bad guys
P.S. Or as a scorpion free after thousands of years
P.S.S. Or as a girl with friends
Galileo
What I wish for
Is a fish or
Three or four
Or even six more.
Chica
Chica buries her eggs in the sand
It’s the only time she comes to land.
Then back to the sea she goes
But where she swims to, no one knows.
Author Note
WHEN I WAS eight, I wrote a story about a little girl running away to live on an island. When I became a grown-up author, that became the seed for Nim’s Island. It’s grown into three books and two movies, given me amazing experiences – and connected me to wonderful people all around the world.
Readers encouraged me to write the sequels. A brother and sister in Los Angeles asked their mother – who happened to be a film producer – to make a movie of it. A famous actress wanted to be in the movie because Nim’s Island was the book that started her son reading. So the little story became a big Hollywood movie, and I had the amazing fun of watching it come to life in front of me, in a real rain forest, with real sea lions (with real fishy breath)!
It’s taken me to the red carpet at Hollywood’s most famous cinema, to reading to a crowd under an ancient tree in India, to giving a baby rhinoceros a mudbath at the Australia Zoo …
It’s inspired readers in ways I’d never thought of. A school in Queensland wrote a Nim’s Island cookbook. Girls Scouts in New York created a Nim’s Island badge. Kids in Vancouver marched in the street with banners about how Nim cares for her environment. Schools across the USA and Canada give it to every family in their community to read together.
But what I love best is seeing the drawings, photos or videos of how readers have made the story their own. Or when they write to me, from across Australia or Canada, Lithuania or Turkey, and say, ‘I’m just like Nim.’
Thank you to all the readers who have loved Nim and kept her alive for these past twenty-one years. And never forget that no matter how young or old you are, wonderful things happen when you play with stories.
about the author
WENDY ORR was born in Canada, and grew up in France, Canada and USA. After high school, she studied occupational therapy in England, married an Australian farmer, and moved to Australia. They had a son and daughter, and now live on five acres of bush near the sea.
Her books have won awards in Australia and around the world, and have been translated into twenty-seven languages. When Wendy was nine, she wrote a story about an orphan girl living on an island. Many years later, she remembered the feeling of writing that story, and started writing Nim’s Island. The book became a Hollywood feature film in 2008, a year after Nim at Sea was published. Nim at Sea then became the film Return to Nim’s Island.
Wendy has had many highlights in her writing career, including winning the CBCA Book of the Year and Prime Minister’s Award for Children’s Literature, and walking a red carpet with Jodie Foster, but believes that nothing compares to the thrill of the first vision of a new book.
about the illustrators
KERRY MILLARD grew up in Canada surrounded by animals, including a monkey. She became a vet in Australia, took her crazy dog to a dog training club and drew some cartoons for its newsletter which began her career as an award-winning cartoonist, illustrator, and author. Kerry appears in the movie, Nim’s Island for about 2 seconds. She lives in Tasmania, painting and playing the fiddle.
GEOFF KELLY is a freelance commercial illustrator who works in many different styles and mediums. He has written a number of children’s books and illustrated many more. He lives in Melbourne, Australia.
Selkie
Selkie’s nose is whiskery
Whispery tickly.
When she kisses me
It’s a little bit prickly.
Fred
Fred is spiky
And he likes me.