Rebecca A Withey: NDCS children’s book review, ‘The Quest for the Cockle Implant’

The National Deaf Children’s Society has published a series of children’s books, all featuring awesome deaf characters. For their fourth publication they decided to open up submissions to deaf children aged 7-11 years for an incredible opportunity to publish their very own story!

The NDCS received over 150 entries, with Julia Donaldson CBE and Rachel Shenton (of The Silent Child) on the judging panel. The winner was Maya Wasserman, aged 9, and her tale ‘The Quest for the Cockle Implant’.

Maya was able to work with established children’s author Sarah Driver (of the Huntress trilogy) to create the final piece and profoundly deaf illustrator, Lucy Rogers, was commissioned to produce the illustration.

I was fortunate enough to receive a copy of the book to review, so I’d love to share my thoughts (and my children’s) with you all, in the hope that it might inspire you to grab your own copy or even put pen to paper and create a story of your own!

Before we began to read the book, my daughter in particular was curious as to what the main character, Angel the mermaid, had in her ears. My daughter wears hearing aids but hadn’t seen cochlear implants depicted before. So chatting about this was a great discussion point for us all.

It was helpful to explain how the cochlear inside the ear actually looks a bit like a shell, so the fact that the story is set underwater and led by mermaids was really quite clever. My son (who is a little older) also loved the comical word twist with ‘cochlear’ becoming a ‘cockle implant!’

Anyhow, the story follows Angel the mermaid and her sister, Coral, as they attempt to find Angel’s ‘cockle implant’ that has gone missing following a game of catch. A boy, Finn, is then introduced and joins their mission whilst pointedly remembering to move his hands from his mouth so Angel can lipread him.

The group of friends soon realise that the ‘cockle implant’ is at the much feared ‘Muddy Waters’, guarded by the terrifying Merkitty! The entrance walls to the Muddy Waters is adorned with secret instructions with images of signs, designed to help them out and navigate the fearsome waters. The use of basic sign images here was a fun interactive element, which my children enjoyed acting out.

 

Eventually, Angel discovers that Merkitty is (spoiler alert!) also deaf, and her loneliness is the reason she is so grumpy. They find the lost cockle implant, become friends with Merkitty and all is well!

On the whole, it’s a very sweet story with fantastic illustration and some very clever hidden points. The vibrating alarm clock that Angel uses; the fact that she needs to sign when she loses her implant, and new boy Finn’s reaction to her deafness – these are all wisely used to reinforce deaf awareness which, to a hearing family, would be very useful to read about!

In particular, the use of the sign language images, was a fabulous way of encouraging readers to engage with sign language and see it as a secret code that anyone can use – especially if they want to enjoy underwater adventures! So I would like to send many congratulations to Maya for creating a wonderful story and I hope she continues to write and publish many more.

 

Reading books with children is a fabulous way to bond, develop reading and communication skills and it is incredibly enriching to read about characters that are also like you – whether they wear hearing aids, cochlear implants or none.

I would love to see the NDCS continue to publish books by deaf authors, and in particular see some new stories aimed at older children and teenagers. If you’re a deaf teenager and love to write, why not see if you can produce a bestseller of your own? The sky’s the limit!

With families now homeschooling, why not check out the range of books the NDCS has published, and enjoy cosying up with your little ones with some quality reading time.

 

Full details of the books published by the NDCS can be found here:

https://www.ndcs.org.uk/information-and-support/parenting-and-family-life/parenting-a-deaf-child/our-childrens-storybooks/