Discount Price: $8.77
Price fluctuation possible.
How soon does it ship: In stock soon. Order now to get in line. First come, very first served.
Shipping? Absolutely FREE if you qualify for Super Saver Shipping.
Type of bind: Paperback
EAN num: 9780330397155
ISBN number: 033039715X
Label: Macmillan Children's Books
Manufacturer: Macmillan Children's Books
Page Count: 304
Printing Date: May 30, 2008
Publishing house: Macmillan Children's Books
Age index: Young Adult
Sale Popularity Level: 112844
Studio: Macmillan Children's Books
Other books you might be interested in perusing:
Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
It is 1910 and Maia, tragically orphaned at 13, has been sent from England to start a new life with distant relatives in Manaus, hundreds of miles up the Amazon. She is accompanied by an eccentric and mysterious governess who has secret reasons of her own for making the journey. Both soon discover an exotic world bursting with new experiences in this highly colourful, joyous and award-winning adventure.
Amazon.com Review:
Sent in 1910 to live with distant relatives who own a rubber plantation along the Amazon River, English orphan Maia is excited. She believes she is in for brightly colored macaws, enormous butterflies, and 'curtains of sweetly scented orchids trailing from the trees.' Her British classmates warn her of man-eating alligators and wild, murderous Indians. Unfortunately, no one cautions Maia about her nasty, xenophobic cousins, who douse the house in bug spray and forbid her from venturing beyond their coiffed compound. Maia, however, is resourceful enough to find herself smack in the middle of more excitement than she ever imagined, from a mysterious 'Indian' with an inheritance, to an itinerant actor dreading his impending adolescence, to a remarkable journey down the Amazon in search of the legendary giant sloth.
Eva Ibbotson, author of Dial-A- Ghost, Island of the Aunts, and other positively delightful and droll fantasies, won a Gold Award for this book in the 2001 Nestlé Smarties Book Prizes. Likable heroines, loathsome villains, and splendid adventures—-along with Kevin Hawkes's appealing ink illustrations--make Ibbotson's novels a must for every bookshelf. (Ages 9 and older) --Emilie Coulter
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers 
-
Journey to the River Sea is easily Ibbotson's best novel. Unlike her fantasy, which is good but unrealistic, this book is grounded in reality yet still magical. Ibbotson's descriptions are always good and here they are just as revealing without being too long. The plot is engaging and mostly unpredictable. As always, the characters are fresh and lively and each have a quirk that makes you love (or hate) them even more. If you are interested in books like this, I would also reccommend The Green Glass Sea, books by Sharon Creech, the Swallows and Amazons series by Arthur Ransome, and books by Konigsburg.
Rated by buyers 
-
At first, this looks like a fairly predictable orphaned-English-girl-gets-shipped-off-to-live-with-distant-relatives story. Predictably, the family Maia is to live with in Brazil is horrid, and only allowed her to come at all so that they could get the allowance that comes with her. Fortunately, Maia has a very sympathetic, if somewhat mysterious governess who accompanies her to Brazil and in her adventures. It isn't until Maia's been in Brazil for a while that the story begins to come out of its predictable beginnings. There's a missing boy who may or may not actually be missing, and a child actor suddenly looking at the end of his career, and possibly Maia's new family has been living on ill-gotten gains for some time.
This is quite an enjoyable story, with plenty of adventure, and some intrigue mixed in for good measure. The characters are believable and the ending is quite satisfying, with the horrid family getting their comeuppance and Maia and her friends being able to live out their dreams.
Rated by buyers -
Overall, I enjoyed this book despite some long and boring parts involving the characters just talking to each other. Every part seemed to have a certain twist of adventure. The adventures made me never want to put the book down. I was encouraged to read the book until the end.
The story takes place in a small town called Manaue, in Brazil. It is somewhere off the Coast of The Amazon River, in a certain house, owned by one of the author's friends.
The Story is about a young orphan girl named Maia. After her parents were killed in a train accident, she is sent to live with her relatives in the Amazon. She has never met these relatives. Despite being told by her classmates of the dangers in the Amazon, Maia cannot wait to start her long sea voyage. As she boards the ship that will take her to the Amazon, she is completely unaware that she will make friends with new people and the natives of Manaue. She embarks on an adventure that her classmates can never imagine, even in their wildest dreams.
This is an inspiring story about the unbreakable bond between friends. At the same time continuing to follow your dreams no matter how many obstacles you encounter. This is exactly what Maia does to help her friend Finn escape from the crows. {People who are searching for him to drag him back to England in a house named Westwood}. At the same time help her other friend named Clovis a disgraced actor who desperately wants to return to England. Maia helps them in a cunning plan to disguise Clovis as Finn so that Finn could escape while Clovis can return to England. But she also has to avoid her greedy sisters; Gwendolyn and Beatrice who will do anything to get a hold on Finn for the reward money and even the police who are also trying to find him. But somehow Maia baits her sisters and thus the plan will go smoothly-for a while at least.....
---- CV May2007
Rated by buyers -
As a child I read and adored 'A Little Princess' by Frances Hodgson Burnett (also the authoress of Little Lord Fauntleroy) wherein the spunky and resourceful orphan manages to find beauty and pleasure in life in spite of the dreary and nasty folk she is forced to live with and triumphs in the end. However I was never found another book that resonated in quite the same way for me, though goodness knows I searched.
As an adult I stumbled across 'Journey To The River Sea' and found that book. Maia's adventures were a pure pleasure to read and it makes perfect sense to me that her actor friend is practically living out Little Lord Fauntleroy. Eva Ibbotson was channeling the spirit of Frances Hodgson Burnett in this book and I found the same joy in the reading.
Rated by buyers -
Eva Ibbotson sends her threads far and wide, and then draws them together in an almost perfect bundle, meaning she brings a lot of people into the plot, all with their own problems, and intertwines their troubles so there is a place for everyone. There is no one left hanging to worry about at the end of the book. On the otherhand, I find Maia to angelic to be true. She never looses her temper, or gets back at the evil twins. She believes everything told to her without suspicion. Otherwise I have no complaints. The suspense is fun, but not torture, and the plot wont leave any dissapointments.
Find other books like this one:
