I like the lessons in this story about friendship, doing your own school work, and making friends. I also like that two of the main characters are taking time to be nice to a grown up when they can tell he doesn't seem to be happy. The addition of science in a book about fantasy creatures living out human situations is a bonus.

My daughter thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and I loved listening to it. We are ready to fly through this series and learn all about the merkids at Trident Academy. ( )

Fine, I'll up it to 2 stars. But I'd say it's more 1.5. See, I'm totally the wrong audience for this book. My sister got it from the library (she's eight, and therefore really is the right audience), and i picked it up out of boredom.
Please. Just because they're young doesn't mean we need to spoon feed them ridiculously simplified (and stupified - the word not the Harry Potter spell) story lines. I think the lesson in this book is about taking care of the ocean and keeping your friends, but in reality the characters just kind of stumble around, get in a fight for a ridiculous reason (fighting over wether or not to ask an adult for help on a school project), and just as quickly make up toward the end. The mean girl at school is incredibly typified, just rude and horrible for no apparent reason other than being very rich.
So, again, I'm not the target for this book. But I'm appalled at this book, and every other little fairy book or unicorn book (or talking kitty book, but my sister would probably disown me for saying this) out there. Please. They're not idiots. Give them something a little more readable, like the Animal Rescue Farm books (slightly better, my sister loves the ones about rescuing kittens/cats), or The Princess in the Pigpen, a gem I just found that's slightly older, but still a fairly easy read.

And the environment message? Ridiculously trumped. The guy mentions not putting oil in the water once, and the author expounds on it at length once the book is over. ( )