Two Unlikely Heroes Embark on a Whale-Sized Adventure to Save the Planet

Mike & Alex Parts 3 and 4: World Cruise by Whale by Peter van Wermeskerken

"By teaming up with the whales, dolphins, octopi and even some tuna, Mike and Alex can have a profound positive impact on the environment around them"

Upon first glance, you might not immediately suspect Mike and Alex to be best four-legged friends. What exactly would a rabbit have in common with a boar?

Well, as it turns out, a lot! As the biggest in his rabbit family, Mike could relate to Alex, who was the smallest of all his boar siblings. This similarity brought them together, and thus a powerful friendship was born — one that’s had an impact on ecosystems across the world. Because when Mike and Alex work together, they can achieve some incredible things — like saving fellow animals from humanity’s effect on the environment.

In the first book in the Mike & Alex series, The Defenders of the Animal Forest, these two friends worked alongside a host of other animals to protect the forest from nearby humans. Now, in Mike & Alex Parts 3 and 4: World Cruise by Whale, written by Peter van Wermeskerken, these two conservationists come upon their biggest challenge yet — one that’s about to take them across the globe for the journey of a lifetime.

All Aboard

The story begins on the dunes of Normandy with Mike and Alex, and Jean-Pierre — their rabbit guide to the region. Mike and Alex are enjoying the seaside view, when they’re flagged down by a pod of dolphins whose dear friend needs assistance. Wally the whale is beached on a nearby sandbank, with a whaler’s harpoon stuck in his back! Lucky for Wally, Mike and Alex are now famous across the animal kingdom for their work in protecting the forest from those nasty “two-leggers,” as they refer to humans.

With help from the dolphin pod, Mike and Alex treat Wally, removing the harpoon and ensuring the wound heals enough for him to return to the ocean. Wally’s beyond grateful, and he offers them a reward for their hard work — to take a world cruise from the comfortable furnishings of his mouth! Eager for a chance to sightsee, Mike and Alex hop in and the three of them set off. But they soon end up on a far more daring adventure than they could ever have foreseen — helping to defeat whalers in the South Pole and pull human pollution out of the oceans!

Education Meets Entertainment

Formatted with large text and wide spacing, this children’s chapter book is for ages 6-12, and especially aimed at children first learning to read. Wermeskerken has good reason to keep this target audience in mind, since this series has been used for comprehensive learning in several schools in the Netherlands. It’s for reasons like this that he’s chosen to include unique characteristics within the text, to add an additional lesson to the text.

For example, in World Cruise by Whale, the chairman of the whales has a speech impediment that prevents him from pronouncing the letter “o”. The text reflects this by using a symbol in its place, teaching children to read what is there on the page and infer what the full word meaning is, based on the missing letters. It’s moments like this that show Wermeskerken’s drive to educate young readers.

But while there may be a reading comprehension lesson in World Cruise by Whale, that doesn’t make it any less fun. By teaming up with the whales, dolphins, octopi and even some tuna, Mike and Alex can have a profound positive impact on the environment around them. Their cooperation and leadership skills model excellent behavior to young readers — that when we work as a team, we can help the earth and our community in big ways.