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    Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau
    Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau
    Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau
    Ebook25 pages10 minutes

    Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau

    By Jennifer Berne and Eric Puybaret

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    A colorfully illustrated biography of a little French boy who would become an internationally known oceanographer and champion of the seas.

    Once upon a time in France, a baby was born under the summer sun. His parents named him Jacques. As he grew, Jacques fell in love with the sea. He dreamed of breathing beneath the waves and swimming as gracefully as a fish. In fact, he longed to become a manfish. Jacques Cousteau grew up to become a champion of the seas and one of the best-known oceanographers in the world. In this lovely biography, poetic text and gorgeous paintings come together to create a portrait of Cousteau that is as magical as it is inspiring.

    Praise for Manfish

    “Berne offers a luminous picture-book biography about Jacques Cousteau . . . . Puybaret’s smooth-looking acrylic paintings extend the words’ elegant simplicity and beautifully convey the sense of infinite, underwater space.” —Booklist (starred review)

    “This moving tribute to the great nautical observer and filmmaker is shot through with an authentically childlike sense of adventure and the thrill of discovery . . . . This poetic profile of a doer and a dreamer is certain to inspire fresh interest in discovering, and in caring for, our world’s wonders.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

    “A new generation of children is introduced to the pioneering oceanographer and filmmaker. Beginning with Cousteau’s childhood in France where he marveled at the sea and dreamed of breathing underwater, Berne reveals the unique mix of curiosity, ingenuity, and passion that drove Cousteau to make underwater exploration possible.” —School Library Journal
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOpen Road Integrated Media
    Release dateOct 26, 2012
    ISBN9781452123813
    Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau
    Author

    Jennifer Berne

    Jennifer Berne is an acclaimed children's author whose books include On a Beam of Light, Manfish, On Wings of Words (all Chronicle), and Look Up with Me (Katherine Tegen Books). She has been fascinated by the ocean since her childhood, and this book is based on her countless hours of research about evolution and the undersea world. Jennifer lives in the hills of Columbia County, New York, and spends her summers sailing along the coast of Maine. Visit her website at jenniferberne.com.

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    Reviews for Manfish

    4.5/5

    117 ratings22 reviews

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    • 5/5
      It’s a children’s book and for that purpose, it’s great!
    • 4/5
      This story is about a young boy named Jacques who grew up in France. He was fascinated with water from a young age. He was curious about why things floated and sunk. He wanted to discover a way to breathe underwater. He spent his days playing, creating and experimenting. He also had a fascination with movies and he wanted to understand how film was made. He saved his own money to get a movie camera and he took it apart and put it all back together. He spent his free time writing, directing and staring in home movies. As a young adult Jacques joined the French Navy and documented the places they sailed with his camera. He was given an opportunity to borrow a friends goggles to use in the ocean, from that day his world changed. He had experienced the underwater world and he developed a waterproof camera so he could take pictures of this new world. Jacques and his friend created rubber suits and flipper to help them underwater. Eventually Jacques created a new invention called the aqualung. With this new invention he was able to breathe underwater and explore the depths of the sea. He transformed an old navy ship into an explorer ship and set off to document the underwater world. He filmed his adventures so he could share the beauty of the sea with others. In time he began to notice the harm people were doing to the ocean, so he began to warn them through film.
    • 5/5
      “Manfish” is a biographical picture book of the famous oceanographer, Jaques Costeau. This book speaks of Jaques childhood, how he came to love the ocean, and his successes. This book teaches about loving the sea and taking care of the environment. I very much enjoyed this book for many reasons. One thing that I really loved about this book was the illustrations and the layout of the book. The background of each page is colored in with shades of blue and teal. I felt that these shades of blue and teal added to the aquatic feel of the text. There were also a few pages that folded out vertically, showing the depth of the ocean. Something else that I liked bout this book was how the text was presented on a few pages of the book. The text was written in a wave-like form, alluding to the ocean feel of the book. The last thing that I loved about this book was how the author not only taught about Jaques Costeau but also educated the readers about ideas of aquatic life. The author mentioned Jaques invention of what he called an aqualung (common day oxygen tank). The author made sure to mention to the readers that “aqua” means water to the readers, to avoid confusion.
    • 4/5
      Manfish combines the story of a boy who is intrigued with life underwater who becomes a man who is obsessed with life underwater with beautiful illustrations and a call for action. It would be a great introduction to oceanography and recycling/caring for our world.Manfish lacks descriptions of any of Cousteau's personal conflicts or weaknesses. A man as obsessive as Cousteau I'm sure had some weaknesses; I'm left wondering why Berne chose to leave this out.Still, the overwhelming amount of blue tones in the book brings the reader into the magic of water, and it is difficult to not enjoy the book.
    • 5/5
      This delightful biography about Jacques Cousteau captures the excitement of discovery and adventure that young people often feel when presented with new things in life. This book chronicles how Jacques' love of water and filming turned into a passion once he saw the world underwater. He and his friends invented scuba gear and became intensely interested in preserving the ocean. The pictures are simple, clean, and interesting of the ocean world. The writing style is fluid and lyrical. This book would be great to read aloud to children. The author entreats the audience in the end to take care of the world and its resources and encourages youngsters to discover their own worlds.
    • 4/5
      The soft blue-tones give an underwater feel to this gentle biography. The picture book links Jacques Cousteau's childhood interests with his ultimate life’s work. Cousteau was multitalented, with friends he invented the aqualung and underwater cameras. He made numerous movies about the ocean and was a war hero. Manfish would be useful for lessons about biography or conservation. An interesting twist would be to use this book in the fifth grade study of explorers showing students that exploration is not something that only happened 400 years ago.
    • 5/5
      This picture book biography of one of the 20th century's most successful explorers, poetically and artistically tells the story of of Cousteau's journey from inquisitive child to television star. Berne shows Cousteau's constant inquisitiveness about the world around him , coupled with his drive to learn and understand and a relentless pursuit of his dreams. This is a man who was constantly plotting to make the impossible possible, like staying under water for more than just the length of a single breath or showing the rest of the world exactly what he and his underwater team were able to sea in the deepest seas.THe vivd and dramatic artwork closely match the storytelling to create a gripping account of one mans' adventure and contribution to the world of science and the imagination.
    • 4/5
      I picked this one up because I really enjoyed the cover illustration. Also, I have a weird fascination with Jacques Cousteau. The illustrations are what make this story worth your time. Very muted and soft-focusey. Some were done in a sequential style, like a film strip. In the story, you find out about what drove Jacques Cousteau to explore the oceans and seas of the world; you also learn about his inventions that facilitated his explorations. I enjoyed the book a lot.
    • 5/5
      Gorgeous, short but sweet book that highlights Jacques Cousteau's life. The language is simple and perfect for appealing to kids. I really love that it tries to get children involved in protecting our environment by linking it to Cousteau's message, especially on the final page of the story.The main thing I wanted to mention is that I originally read the ebook version of this since it was available right away from my library. It was... nice but I knew I was missing something. So I ended up getting the physical book version and whoa! What a huge difference. The illustrations really come to life and you're able to emerse yourself in them. This is one of those cases where the ebook can never do this kind of physical book justice, and I feel that that may be the case for many children's books. I absolutely fell in love with the illustrations here. Get yourself the real book version of this - you won't be disappointed.
    • 4/5
      This is a biography of Jaques Cousteau, one of the world's greatest oceanographers. Since he was a young boy he loved the ocean. All he wanted was to swim and breathe underwater. Eventually his drems came true and he did get the chance to breathe underwater with the help of an oyxgen tank. He studied the sea and fell in love with it even more. He also discovered how much we were polluting the ocean by dumping hazrdous chemicals into it that were hurting ocean life and habitats. He writes his own books about things that he has observed underwater and ways for us to be more aware of what we are doing that effects the ocean. I liked this book very much. The illustartions were nice and I thought the story of Jaques Cousteau's life was interesting.
    • 3/5
      Chickadee nominee 2009-2010. I thought it was a bit wordy.
    • 5/5
      This has become one of my favorite books. While the topic is dear to my heart, I absolutely love the illustrations with no other explanation of why than that they are just my style. I love the color usage of both the images and the text. I like the simplistic shapes and forms of the people and background images. I like the use of page formats. I just adore it. This is another book to use when talking about science and reaching goals.
    • 5/5
      Jaques Cousteau always dreamed of being able to swim in the sea with out have to come up for air. He invented the Aqua Lung to help him do so. He explored the sea and filmed what he saw to shown other people. He then starts to seen something sad happen. The fish are beginning to die because of the chemicals and garbage that is being dumped in the water.
    • 4/5
      Manfish is a story based on the life of Jacques Cousteau. He is an inventor that wanted to learn as much as he could about the life that he was living. He developed a passion for filming. He would film everything around him whether it was his family or just the nature around him. In his early 20's he went diving for the first time with a pair of goggles. After he had a taste for the ocean, he decided that he wanted to invent a way that he could stay underwater longer. At this time he created the aqualung. With the aqualung he had the ability to go underwater and film all of the life that no one had ever seen before. He used these films to create a save the ocean campaign. In the classroom I would use this as a read aloud during an ocean section or a section about global preservation. Genre: Informational, Non-fiction, Biography
    • 4/5
      Really gorgeous paintings illustrate this picture book biography of Jacques Cousteau. As Jacques discovers the sea, the reader sees all the wonderful plants and animals, too. As he dives deeper and deeper, we're treated to vertical spreads and unfolding pages that really capture the underwater wonderland that he explored. A short author's note gives a little information about the author's inspiration and some ideas for further exploring the world of Jacques Cousteau.Hand this one to aspiring marine biologists and fans of picture book biographies like Surfer of the Century by Ellie Crow and Richard Waldrep.
    • 4/5
      Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau is written by Jennifer Berne and illustrated by Eric Puybaret. It tells the life of underwater explorer Jacques Cousteau from his childhood love of facisnation, the invention of the aqualung, and career spent discovering life underwater and advocating for better care of the oceans. This book is beautifully illustrated with such deep and vivid colors. I think that I would use this book to begin discussing different types of explorers (not just land explorers like Lewis and Clark or Columbus) and also different inventors. I think this book would be appropriate for students in grades 1-4.
    • 5/5
      Manfish is subtitled "A Story of Jacques Cousteau." This picture book biography focuses on his younger years, especially his childhood, and less on the time after he became famous. The writing is poetic at times and the illustrations are gorgeous. ALL of the illustrations in this book are double-page spreads, some turned vertically to emphasize the depth of the ocean.
    • 5/5
      This is a softly and beautifully illustrated picture book biography of Jacques Cousteau. The illustrations were painted in acrylic on linen, and they are as soothing as the ocean life which they depict. Blues, greens, grays and shimmering silver take center stage in this short, but informative book. In illustrations showing human and marine life, marine life has an equal or greater presence - just as Cousteau would have liked.The narrative is simple, yet compelling, detailing his first use of his invention, the "aqualung," Berne writes, "Below the surface, Jacques swam and glided and dove. He did flips and somersaults. He stood upside down on one finger, and laughed bubbles into the sea. Jacques could breathe beneath the water! Now he could swim across miles of ocean, his body feeling what only scales had felt, his eyes seeing what only fish had seen."What a legacy! A great book!
    • 4/5
      One thing I liked the most about this book was the way it was written. This is definitely the most fun educational biography picture book that I have ever read. For instance, when the book reads, "Jacques dreamed that someday it would be you, exploring worlds never seen....Worlds that are now yours. To discover. To care for. And to love." It is being poetic and simple throughout the book and makes it easy for kids to read and absorb. The facts in this book are easily understood because of the way the author made the text. The pictures in this book were fun and imaginative, too. I appreciated the realistic 2-D pictures that carried lots of dark colors, but made them pop. Like when the book has a fold out section and Jacques is swimming down the pieces of the fold out. The dark blue background and the colors of all of the things he saw was awesome.
    • 5/5
      Awesome informative book about scientist, inventor, explorer, Jacques Cousteau. Beautiful double page spread illustrations tell the story of Cousteau and his love of the ocean. Loved it!
    • 4/5
      This picture book biography paints a colorful and fun picture of the life of explorer Jacques Cousteau. It captures that sense of wonder and mystery that comes with the exploration of something new, which is a feeling most children will be able to relate to very well. This book could be useful in a lesson on explorers, or lessons on the ocean and marine life.
    • 4/5
      This narrative would be very beneficial to the classroom. Through reading about Jacques Cousteau, students could take note of his wonder and awe of his surrounding. They could also take note of his experiments and inventions that were results of him exploring and problem solving. This book could also be a mentor text for NGSS 5-ESS3-1, and students could see how Cousteau used movies to protect the environment.

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    Manfish - Jennifer Berne

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