3.5***

This book is suitable for middle-school children, though it deals with some very interesting issues. Mila is a young girl found living alone on an atoll off the coast of Florida. Apparently, she had survived a boat capsizing when just a toddler and was saved by (and “raised by”) a pod a dolphins. Now, she is a feral child, and a group of doctors, psychologists and sociologists are certain they know what is best for her.

I’ve read a number of Hesse’s books and I particularly like the novels written in verse. This has a bit of that feel to it, with fragments of thought put down by Mila as she learns the English language and tries to make sense of what she is experiencing given the context of the dolphin society she has grown up knowing. There were times when I felt incredibly sad for her (and her dolphin mother). Times when I applauded her “progress” and delighted in the discoveries she made.

Then ending is rather ambiguous, and I’ve read the last three or four chapters over and over again, trying to come to a definitive conclusion. ( )

ALA, Publisher's Weekly, and SLJ Best Book of the Year!

ALA, Publisher's Weekly, and SLJ Best Book of the Year!

Publishers Weekly and SLJ Best Book of the Year! ALA Best Book for Young Adults! Reviews describe this book as "dazzling" and "haunting and unforgettable."

The title of Karen Hesse’s new book reminded me of Island of the Blue Dolphins. But The Music of Dolphins is quite different. In this story, the main character, though similarly stranded on an island as a child, finds a family in a pod of dolphins. Mila is so much part of the family that she speaks the dolphin language, swims with them, and only leaves when she needs to go ashore to find food. I would have enjoyed this storyline if it centered on this life; however, Hesse has another tale to tell. Mila is found and is immediately taken to a lab in order for scientists to study her use of dolphin squeaks, trills -- music.

Hesse thereby sets up a conflict between what the scientists want and what Mila wants. Although she tries to understand and later comply with the researchers’ desires, she is ultimately saddened and made anxious by her situation. What if Mila had been placed, instead, with a scientist and their family, committed to nurturing and acclimatizing her to humanity, along with learning everything possible about the dolphin language? Then, rather than the locked doors and an institutional setting, she would be introduced to a more “real” human lifestyle.

The author clearly wants to examine what is involved in being human, and following “Flowers for Algernon,” she uses very large font and simple sentences in the beginning of Mira’s first person narration; the font grows smaller and the sentences contain more varied vocabulary as Mila’s time on land goes by. Then we see Mila’s narration revert to larger font and shorter sentences, indicating, of course, that she is rejecting the humanizing her adult guardians wish for her.

This is a book for six- to nine-year-olds, I would say, since it contains many elements of a bittersweet fairy tale.

I received a copy of the book from the publisher. This is an honest review. ( )