The Adventure of Big Claw written and illustrated by Yen Vy Vo
Copyrights Š 2010, Yen Vy Vo All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without prior written permission. Photo reference: My first sand castle by Sivin Kit, Seagull snatch by Lance, Crab snatch by Rebecca Richardson, Gabi by Melissa Angtuaco, On Top of the World! by Yves Rubin http://rubinphoto.com
The Adventure of Big Claw written and illustrated by Yen Vy Vo
In the bright sunlight, the sand was sparkling with thousands of colourful seashells. 1
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A little girl in a red dress and a sun hat knelt down to collect sparkling seashells buried in the sand. She placed them carefully into her juice bottle. 3
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Big Claw, the little crab, was crawling nearby. The girl did not see the tiny crab. He was caught among the seashells she placed in her bottle. The poor crab was now stuck inside the bottle. Suddenly the girl heard her mom calling, “Sammie, come for your ice cream.� The girl was so excited about the ice cream that she quickly ran towards her mom. The shiny bottle was left behind. 5
The crab tried desperately to break out but his claws were too small and too weak.
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The bottle floated further and further out to sea.
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Something colorful surprised Big Claw and it was moving closer to the bottle.
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A jellyfish swam lazily below the bottle. Eventually, it was out of sight. The bottle kept bobbing on the sea.
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Suddenly the waves became wild. The crab was shaken but noticed an enormous shadow over the bottle. He spotted an eye blinking at him; it was a whale’s eye. They looked at each other for a moment with surprise. The crab had never seen any creature that big. The whale had never seen anything that small. The crab was too small to be of any interest to the whale. So he dove back into the sea. 14
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There were two seagulls flying in the distance. They saw the bottle, too. They mistook it for a fish and tried to snatch the bottle. 17
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The crab desperately wanted to get out of the bottle before the seagulls noticed him. In a hurry, he made a clever plan. He tricked one of the seagulls to poke a hole through the bottle and then grabbed the feathers of the seagull’s wing.
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Big Claw let go of the wing before the seagull reached his nest. He bounced from pebble to pebble and finally settled on top of a turtle’s back.
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The old turtle was sunbathing without a care in the world. He was not at all irritated because of the interruption. The crab explained his story to the turtle. The turtle listened with curiosity.
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Then, the turtle kindly accompanied the little crab back to the seashore.
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THE END
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Vo Ngoc Yen Vy