20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: A Puzzle Adventure

Captain Nemo from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea has challenged readers to set sail in search of adventure and priceless treasure – and to do so, readers must follow ladders, waterways, gaps and spaces in shipwrecks, coral reefs and all manner of under-sea settings. The aim is to find seven keys that are hidden throughout the book: only those seven keys will open Nemo’s secret sea chest.

Though this book is predominantly a mix of search-and-find and maze activities, the combination of Artymowska’s amazing illustration and the factual questions that accompany the puzzles – finding the hammerhead sharks among a variety of other sharks, puzzles centred on detailed cross-sections of submarines –  make it feel like non-fiction.

There is also a narrative within the book that takes inspiration from Jules Verne’s original story, with escapes from giant squids, reproductions of the Nautilus, ancient ruins under the sea and many more of the story’s iconic imagery. The puzzles are reasonably advanced, so would suit children in the mid- to upper-primary age.

The illustration is utterly fantastic, and anyone who loved Artymowska‘s previous masterpiece, Around the World in 80 Days, will be enthralled with this illustrative homage to a science fiction adventure classic.