Rating: Needs Parent Supervision

Reading Level: Early Elementary

I’m so impressed with this book that I’d look for another in the You Should Meet series. The story highlights the perseverance and heroism of a Hawaiian Olympic swimmer/actor/surfer.

Although in the Ready to Read juvenile reading series, there is still plenty of prose on some of the pages. (See example below.)

Things I like:

  • Touches on Duke’s experiences with Racism: Duke is portrayed a having a forgiving heart
  • Courage: Duke rescues some shipwrecked sailors by swimming into dangerous waters
  • Innovation: Duk euses his surfboard to rescue the sailors & his idea has been adopted by many lifeguards
  • Perseverance: wh en Duke’s record-breaking swim times are undermined, he perseveres & proves officials wrong.

My main hesitation:

  • In the end notes with details about Hawaiian culture, the hula is described as a dance to the gods. I told my son not to read that page in the library book, and if I ever own it for my own bookshelf I’ll probably just remove that page.

Otherwise I think this is a great way to hear about the life of a true hero from an underrepresented community.