Now in board book! The story of a boy who discovers a whale in his pool one hot summer day.

Abigail dreads swimming lessons because all the kids yell, "Abigail is a whale", when she jumps into the pool. But when her swimming teacher suggests that she needs to think light in order to swim well, things begin to turn around. And soon Abigail starts thinking about a lot of things.

What happens when two shy children meet at a very crowded pool? Dive in to find out! Deceptively simple, this masterful book tells a story of quiet moments and surprising encounters, and reminds us that friendship and imagination have no bounds.

“A truly exceptional book.”—Washington Post There's bad news and good news about the Cutter High School swim team. The bad news is that they don't have a pool. The good news is that only one of them can swim anyway. Bestselling author Chris Crutcher’s controversial and acclaimed novel follows a group of outcasts as they take on inequality and injustice in their high school. "Crutcher's superior gifts as a storyteller and his background as a working therapist combine to make magic in Whale Talk. The thread of truth in his fiction reminds us that heroes can come in any shape, color, ability or size, and friendship can bridge nearly any divide.”—Washington Post T.J. Jones hates the blatant preferential treatment jocks receive at his high school, and the reverence paid to the varsity lettermen. When he sees a member of the wrestling team threatening an underclassman, T.J. decides he’s had enough. He recruits some of the biggest misfits at Cutter High to form a swim team. They may not have very much talent, but the All-Night Mermen prove to be way more than T.J. anticipated. As the unlikely athletes move closer to their goal, these new friends might learn that the journey is worth more than the reward. For fans of Andrew Smith and Marieke Nijkamp. "Crutcher offers an unusual yet resonant mixture of black comedy and tragedy that lays bare the superficiality of the high-school scene. The book's shocking climax will force readers to re-examine their own values and may cause them to alter their perception of individuals pegged as 'losers.'"—Publishers Weekly An American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults New York Public Library Books for the Teen Age Features a new afterword by Chris Crutcher

*Now a New York Times Best Seller* Over the course of two decades, John Hargrove worked with 20 different whales on two continents and at two of SeaWorld's U.S. facilities. For Hargrove, becoming an orca trainer fulfilled a childhood dream. However, as his experience with the whales deepened, Hargrove came to doubt that their needs could ever be met in captivity. When two fellow trainers were killed by orcas in marine parks, Hargrove decided that SeaWorld's wildly popular programs were both detrimental to the whales and ultimately unsafe for trainers. After leaving SeaWorld, Hargrove became one of the stars of the controversial documentary Blackfish. The outcry over the treatment of SeaWorld's orca has now expanded beyond the outlines sketched by the award-winning documentary, with Hargrove contributing his expertise to an advocacy movement that is convincing both federal and state governments to act. In Beneath the Surface, Hargrove paints a compelling portrait of these highly intelligent and social creatures, including his favorite whales Takara and her mother Kasatka, two of the most dominant orcas in SeaWorld. And he includes vibrant descriptions of the lives of orcas in the wild, contrasting their freedom in the ocean with their lives in SeaWorld. Hargrove's journey is one that humanity has just begun to take-toward the realization that the relationship between the human and animal worlds must be radically rethought.

On February 24, 2010, Tilikum, the largest killer whale at SeaWorld, suddenly dragged Dawn Brancheau, his trainer, into the pool and killed her. Journalist Tim Zimmermann set out to find out why. His riveting account of Tilikum's life, and the history of killer whale entertainment at marine parks, dives into the world of the ocean's top predator. It chronicles Tilikum's capture and separation from his family, and the physical and psychological stress he experienced in marine park pools over some 30 years. It explores Tilikum's involvement in two previous deaths. And it details the inherent risks of using captive killer whales for human entertainment. Ultimately, Zimmermann explains how the life of Tilikum came to mean the death of Dawn Brancheau.

Games and exercises for swimmers of all levels.