Twenty one Balloons by William Pe'ne du Bois

This story is about Professor Sherman. He is an old man who taught school but he did not like teaching school because he had to go room to room at certain times and he was tired of it. So he decided to build a balloon and go floating away. He hoped that his balloon would stay in the air for a year or a lot of months. However , he ran into Krakatoa , an island in the Atlantic ocean.
On this jungle island of Krakatoa there were so may diamonds and everybody who lived there owned a share of diamonds. Everybody on the island was very nice and very rich. Each family owns a restaurant and on their day of the week they have to make food for everybody on the island. Each restaurant serves a different type of ethnic food. Professor Sherman's favorite day was I day because he loved spaghetti and on I day you get whatever you want.
Krakatoa was an volcanic island. The ground moved there up and down and back and forth. The people there thought it might explode - so just in case they made and escape plan. It was already made when Professor Sherman got there. One day there was an explosion and they used the escape plan. The plan was twenty one balloons some small and some big tied to a rectangular platform. Everybody had a family parachute - except Professor Sherman did not , he had to crash into an ocean.
A ship came and picked him up in the ocean. The captain of the ship was Sam. He wanted to know all about Professor Sherman and why he was in the ocean. But Professor Sherman did not tell the story until he got back to San Francisco. By then so many people wanted to know all about him that they made a big party for him.
The people of Krakatoa valued their riches and were greedy. In the end they learned that lives were more important than money.


I liked this book a lot - super dupper a lot. The best part of all was his balloon it had a house built of bamboo and a porch made of bamboo that surrounded his house. I wish someday I could travel on something like that.