The Secret Life of Blueback Tim Winton’s narrative ‘Blueback’ is set in Longboat Bay, Robbers Head. Here in the bay it is clean and healthy and it has a lot of unique fish life. Longboat Bay is always sunny and it is a place where people can fish and swim. In this story the protagonist Abel, is a passionate boy who loves the ocean. His brave mother Dora raised him by herself. Other characters that appear are: Abel’s father who was a pearl diver who died from a tiger shark; Blueback the big, old groper; Stella, Abel’s wife and marine biologist, and Dora the 3 year old girl of Abel and Stella. At the beginning, Abel and Dora are catching abalone.They live a simple life near the ocean. They grow their own plants and animals, and rely on the ocean for food. Abel was in the water catching abalone, when a lurking shadow grabbed him by the arm. Firstly he thought it was a shark but he went back into the water to discover that it was a blue groper. Abel and the supposed shark started to develop a strong connection with each other. Soon after, a reef stripper named Costello entered Robbers Head and decided to spear fish but he collected fish over the legal limit. The ocean then became sick from something toxic, and so Abel and Dora tried to save the ocean. The strong message from this narrative is to never pollute in the ocean because it causes the fish to die. We should also treat fish fairly as humans. Therefore we should protect the ocean. I recommend this book to students in grades 5-8 because the emotive vocabulary makes you feel like you are in the book. They might also have a connection with the book because they might have experienced some of the activities, such as fishing, swimming and swimming with fish.

The Secret Life of Blueback Tim Winton’s narrative ‘Blueback’ is set in Longboat Bay, Robbers Head. Here in the bay it is clean and healthy and it has a lot of unique fish life. Longboat Bay is always sunny and it is a place where people can fish and swim. In this story the protagonist Abel, is a passionate boy who loves the ocean. His brave mother Dora raised him by herself. Other characters that appear are: Abel’s father who was a pearl diver who died from a tiger shark; Blueback the big, old groper; Stella, Abel’s wife and marine biologist, and Dora the 3 year old girl of Abel and Stella. At the beginning, Abel and Dora are catching abalone.They live a simple life near the ocean. They grow their own plants and animals, and rely on the ocean for food. Abel was in the water catching abalone, when a lurking shadow grabbed him by the arm. Firstly he thought it was a shark but he went back into the water to discover that it was a blue groper. Abel and the supposed shark started to develop a strong connection with each other. Soon after, a reef stripper named Costello entered Robbers Head and decided to spear fish but he collected fish over the legal limit. The ocean then became sick from something toxic, and so Abel and Dora tried to save the ocean. The strong message from this narrative is to never pollute in the ocean because it causes the fish to die. We should also treat fish fairly as humans. Therefore we should protect the ocean. I recommend this book to students in grades 5-8 because the emotive vocabulary makes you feel like you are in the book. They might also have a connection with the book because they might have experienced some of the activities, such as fishing, swimming and swimming with fish.