Can an Island Disappear?
Carrie wonders about the mysterious island that her grandmother plans to take her to on her ninth birthday, a place that is visible only at low tide and the rest of the time remains a secret beneath the waves. When they finally make the trip to the island off the coast of Cape Cod, Carrie is amazed to find that it’s nothing more than a flat stretch of beach in the middle of the sea. But as she and her grandmother set out to explore, Carrie discovers many treasures — a broken brick in the sand, a piece from a lighthouse — all traces of an island community that is long gone. The greatest treasures of all, though, are her grandmother’s stories, which bring the past to life for Carrie — and help her to appreciate the beauty and power of nature. Illustrated with watercolors that are as brilliant as a summer day, The Disappearing Island captures the joy of sharing a secret place with someone special.
Sometimes an island appears out of nowhere, when a volcano under the ocean erupts or when the ocean bed buckles and pushes land to the surface of the water. But islands can disappear too, when the ocean bed buckles and pulls land under the water. Falcon Island, which is really the peak of a volcano, is about 2,000 miles east of
For my ninth birthday my grandma gave me a small box. Inside was a perfect sand dollar and a note. The note said: To celebrate your birthday we will voyage out to the disappearing island where I found this sand dollar when I was just your age. “How can an island disappear?” I asked. Grandma laughed. “When I take you out to Billingsgate Island, Carrie, you’ll see,” she said. Carrie and her grandmother journey out to Billingsgate Island by boat the next day. There were no buildings, no trees, not even a blade of grass. Just sand. The sand was all in long ripples made by the waves as the tide had gone out. As they explore the island, Carrie finds clues to the past: a brick from a chimney, a piece of the old lighthouse. Her grandmother’s stories help her imagine what it was like there a hundred years ago. When the tide starts coming in, Carrie discovers not only the mystery of Billingsgate Island, but the power of nature, itself. Although The Disappearing Island is fiction, Billingsgate Is
