Swim Fins Recommended: How to Catch a Mermaid by Adam Wallace

How do you catch a mermaid?
You must be very clever.
With mirrors, crowns, and pearls galore.
This quest can't last forever.

For one thing, these kids can't hold their breaths underwater that long!

But kids who have taken on the detection and capture of the Tooth Fairy, a Christmas elf, a unicorn, a leprechaun, and the odd monster don't easily quit their quests.

But it's not easy. The M.O. of mermaids is little known, and outside of a predilection for sitting on rocks, singing, strumming lyres, and an admiration for fine jewelry, the habits and behavior of mermaids are not exactly common knowledge.

You don't learn this in school.
We'll need to build a gentle trap
And start near the tidal pool.

They come in peace to the tidal pool, hoping to befriend the finny beauty, but their soft seaweed lasso fails to hold the seemingly sturdy mermaid. The old sparkly-necklace-inside-the-fake-clamshell trick fails, too. It's time to try some technology.

But their submarine with robotic arms is too slow for the swift mergirl, and their cleverly rigged treasure chest only attracts an unwanted underwater bad guy!

SHARK!

The tables are turned. The would-be captors are now about to become shark snacks, and they have to rescued by what turns out to be a friendly mermaid after all, one who is pretty tough on her own turf, er, surf, in Adam Wallace's brand-new How-To Catch book, How to Catch a Mermaid (Sourcebooks/Jabberwocky, 2018). Author Wallace follows his familiar rhyming formula as his young heroes attempt to trap yet another mythical being. With their skills honed on catching unicorns, leprechauns, and Santa's little minions, this lighthearted quest nevertheless ends with the score Kids 0, Mythic Critters 7 in some buoyant high jinks, illustrated admirably by artist Andy Elkerton, whose mermaid is both comely and brainy and proves herself as totally in charge of the situation in her exquisitely illustrated under-the-sea domain.

Better luck next time, kids. Halloween is coming, and there are still plenty of spooks out there to be snared.