A Pirate's Twelve Days of Christmas

by Philip Yates, Sebastià Serra (Illustrator)

Overview

On the first day of Christmas, a gift was sent to me: a parrot in a palm tree! Ahoy mateys—Christmas is coming, and even pirates celebrate the holiday! This follow-up to the hugely popular A Pirate's Night Before Christmas offers a witty reimagining of “The Twelve Days of Christmas”—with a sly buccaneer twist. A brave cabin boy receives marvelously mysterious gifts for each of the 12 days he is left alone to guard the pirate ship: 12 cannons blastin', 9 mermaids singin', 6 Jolly Rogers, and so on—but who are they from? With impeccable rhythm and a lively sense of fun, Philip Yates and Sebastià Serra create a delightful world all their own.Now in a deluxe paperback with flaps!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781402792250
Publisher:	Sterling Children's Books
Publication date:	10/02/2012
Pages:	32
Product dimensions:	11.10(w) x 10.10(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	3 - 6 Years

About the Author

Philip Yates lives in Austin, TX, and works in one of the branches of the Austin Public Library system. He is the coauthor, with Matt Rissinger, of several humor books for children, including Biggest Joke Book in the World, Great Book of Zany Jokes, and World's Silliest Jokes, all published by Sterling. His first pirate picture book for Sterling was A Pirate's Night Before Christmas, praised by Children’s Literature as “a treasure in every way.”   Sebastià Serra hails from Barcelona, Spain, where he studied Fine Arts at the Universitat de Barcelona. He is an award-winning illustrator whose work has appeared in magazines and on television. Sebastià has illustrated a number of picture books in Spain and in the US. His work has also been displayed in exhibitions all over the world, including the US, Italy, Japan, China, and Korea.

Editorial Reviews

The crew from A Pirate’s Night Before Christmas sails through another Christmas-tide romp. A cabin boy is banished to swab the decks while his Scrooge-like cap’n (“Arrrgh-humbug!”) and mateys set off to “plunder wrecks.” But the boy’s dreams of “jolly ol’ Sir Peggedy” delivering doubloons are interrupted by the arrival of a parrot in a palm tree and other pirate booty, including five chests of gold and nine mermaids singin’. Finally “12 pirates cheerin’” let readers in on their secret (they sent the gifts). Serra’s digitally colored pen-and-ink compositions are filled with swashbuckling action and create a rollicking holiday mood. Ages 3–6. Agent: Quinlan Lee, Adams Literary. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

The pirate cabin boy who narrated A Pirate's Night Before Christmas (2008) returns with this sequel, another witty parody of a holiday classic. The lonely lad is left behind to swab the decks when all the other pirates leave to "plunder wrecks." He awakens the next morning to a surprise gift: "a parrot in a palm tree!" The patterned text of the familiar song unfolds, including cutlasses, black cats, chests of gold, monkeys, mermaids and dolphins. On the 12th day of Christmas, the 12 pirates return in jolly humor, admitting they sent the gifts to their cabin boy. The last pages cleverly reverse the sequence, with all the characters falling asleep, including the parrot and the cabin boy up in the crow's nest, as Sir Peggedy, the pirate Santa, flies by. The parody is just as skillfully written as the first volume in the series, and the busy, detailed illustrations manage to pack all the accumulating characters into successive spreads. The cabin boy is a little overshadowed in this effort, but that is due to the crowded and cumulative nature of the song. A glossary of pirate terms is included, surrounded by a border of mermaids and sea creatures. Avast, me hearties! Here be another bonny piratical parody ready for the readin' to the young'uns at the Christmas season. (Picture book. 3-8)

Kirkus Reviews

Praise for A Pirate's Night Before Christmas   “The crew from A Pirate's Night Before Christmas sails through another Christmas-tide romp . . . Serra's digitally colored pen-and-ink compositions are filled with swashbuckling action and create a rollicking holiday mood.” —Publishers Weekly   “. . . this pirate crew is having such a grand time you'll get into the swashbuckling spirit in no time. Back for their second holiday high-seas adventure . . .  the Black Sark buccaneers plan twelve days of Yuletide surprises for their cabin boy. The pirate lingo and raucously detailed color-rich illustrations add seafaring flair to this holiday standard.” —The Horn Book Magazine

From the Publisher