A Story of Jacques Cousteau

By Jennifer Berne 

Illustrated by Eric Puybaret

Manfish: The Story of Jacques Cousteau is a Junior Fiction Biography picture book about an amazing and famous underwater diver, inventor, and filmmaker who believed that it is our responsibility to protect our earth.

It begins with Jacques Cousteau’s birth in France. It is the story of a little boy who was very curious about the world around him. He loved the water, creating things, movies, and experimenting. As he grew into a man, his love for the things he loved as a child continued and took him to many far away places.

This biography is beautifully written and not at all “text booky”; the wording is clear and concise with many short sentences…and a few longer ones.

While reading Manfish, you may feel like you are underwater. The beautiful illustrations of the above and below water scenes are painted in acrylic sea colors. You will see vivid pictures of sea creatures, sea plants, and divers. Perhaps the pictures are realistic because the illustrator, Eric Puybaret, also loves the water and is an underwater diver.

Read to find out what Jacques Cousteau found in the ocean that disturbed him greatly, what he did about this disturbing find, what he invented,  what the Calypso was and where it came from, and many other things that the amazing Manfish learned in his lifetime.

The book, Manfish, has a Maine connection. The author, Jennifer Berne, and her husband live and travel on their boat in Penobscot Bay during the summers.