The Jolley-Rogers and the Ghostly Galleon

LOVE THIS BOOK!For kids a bit more mature than the "Pirates Next Door" but in a similar vein. Great characters, a great adventure, and wonderful illustrations. I read it with my pirate-loving five-year-old as his first chapter book and he was begging for the next one as soon as we were done!We now have all three of these that have been written, have read this one and the next one "Jolly-Rogers and the Cave of Doom" and can't wait to start book three!If you like pirates and a good read try these books!Enjoy!

Our whole family LOVES these books! We started with The Pirates Next Door and fell in love with Jim and Matilda, then we got the Pirate Cruncher. We have now read both The Ghostly Galleon as well as the Cave of Doom. Those are the only "chapter books" my 5 1/2 yr old son will listen to. And, since we have to wait for the new book to be released we have started The Ghostly Galleon all over again! My only complaint is that there aren't more to read while we wait! Well that, and, my 7 yr old daughter thinks that the chapter book stories are scary, but as long as my son loves them, I will continue to buy them for him!

Great read aloud with my 5 1/2 year old. We read the picture books first and then the Ghostly Galleon, so we were already familiar with Jim and Matilda. My son loved that there was a picture on almost every page. We can’t wait to read more in the series!

Brilliant books, actually we bought all three plus the original large format ones, good transition from simple books to reading a novel. Great illustrations and narrative, what more can you say, the Brits rule where kids books at concerned, cool and then some...

A fun and frolicking good time with Matilda and the Jolley-Roger gang.

Excellent book. A must have in your Johnny Duddle/ pirate collection. Full of amazing illustrations and a wonderful, exciting story.

Jonny Duddle started the Jim and Matilda series with the very successful picture books  The Pirate Cruncher  and  The Pirates Next Door . These funny, brightly colored, amusingly illustrated and ripping books introduced Jim the pirate lad and his friend Matilda, as well as Jim's entire pirate family.In a great creative stroke, Duddle has moved on to write and illustrate a series of graphic chapter books that follow upon the picture books and feature the same characters and settings. As a consequence a kid can start with the picture books. If he or she likes them then this chapter book and its sequels just naturally draw them along to the next reading level. So, this ends up as a series a little reader can grow with. What a nice plan.And these are worth getting into. The story here is that ghost pirates are raiding pirate museums, gathering pirate treasure. They land at Dull-on-Sea and clean out the local Museum. Matilda sends a message in a bottle to Jim and his family, and they arrive to help stop the ghost pirates. SPOILER. It turns out that there is something important in Dull-on-Sea that could send the ghost pirates away for good and so the race is on between the ghosts and Matilda/Jim to see who can get the whatchamacallit first.This book has great appeal. There are lots of funny bits, frantic action, clever wordplay, deadpan humor, and some sly bits for adults. Matilda and Jim are cheerful and resourceful can-do heroes. Added appeal arises from the nice match between the graphic aspect and the printed words. This is not a "comic" or a pure graphic novel, but more along the lines of a very heavily illustrated book. The drawings are black and white, but heavily detailed and exaggerated in an amusing fashion. They also clarify what's been written and so help a younger reader avoid confusion and follow the story, which can be a bit antic and breathless.The upshot is that this book is entertaining, good-natured, funny and pretty exciting. While it stands alone just fine it's also a great extension of Duddle's pirate series for the picture book crowd, which just strikes me as a swell idea. A very nice and satisfying find.

I got this book to read to my son. He loved it! I did too.Some nights I wanted to keep reading! Lol!I ended up buying the other books in the series. Every book was enjoyed! I hope he writes another one!

We bought a few of these Jolley Rogers reading books as we enjoyed the Johnny Duddle's Pirates Next Door picture (and the Pirate Cruncher) books so much. And now that our daughter grew up a little she is ready for a more comprehensive story, with less pictures in the familiar brilliant style.You'll definitely get a neat sequel story line and still many excellent illustrations. This small series of books is great for young reader as the main characters Mathilda, Jim the Lad and the setting need no introduction - a great concept as the material now stays with children through their reading stages.The story is about ghost pirates raiding the Dull-On-Sea pirate museums, gathering pirate treasure. Matilda gets Jim's help through a bottled message. But there is something more to the museum-raiding ghosts and Matilda/Jim in their usual cheerful, resourceful manner sort the issue. As an adult I found the story just a little less memorable than the picture book.This is a very appealing book, funny and with a bit of action heavily illustrated book. The drawings are in black and white but quite amusing and adding to the story.All the pirate-jargon gives the book an authentic feel, but might be a bit hard for early readers. I read this book to my daughter but the other ones in this series she read herself during guided-reading sessions.

Jonny Duddle started the Jim and Matilda series with the very successful picture books  The Pirate Cruncher  and  The Pirates Next Door . These funny, brightly colored, amusingly illustrated and ripping books introduced Jim the pirate lad and his friend Matilda, as well as Jim's entire pirate family.In a great creative stroke, Duddle has moved on to write and illustrate a series of graphic chapter books that follow upon the picture books and feature the same characters and settings. As a consequence a kid can start with the picture books. If he or she likes them then this chapter book and its sequels just naturally draw them along to the next reading level. So, this ends up as a series a little reader can grow with. What a nice plan.And these are worth getting into. The story here is that ghost pirates are raiding pirate museums, gathering pirate treasure. They land at Dull-on-Sea and clean out the local Museum. Matilda sends a message in a bottle to Jim and his family, and they arrive to help stop the ghost pirates. SPOILER. It turns out that there is something important in Dull-on-Sea that could send the ghost pirates away for good and so the race is on between the ghosts and Matilda/Jim to see who can get the whatchamacallit first.This book has great appeal. There are lots of funny bits, frantic action, clever wordplay, deadpan humor, and some sly bits for adults. Matilda and Jim are cheerful and resourceful can-do heroes. Added appeal arises from the nice match between the graphic aspect and the printed words. This is not a "comic" or a pure graphic novel, but more along the lines of a very heavily illustrated book. The drawings are black and white, but heavily detailed and exaggerated in an amusing fashion. They also clarify what's been written and so help a younger reader avoid confusion and follow the story, which can be a bit antic and breathless.The upshot is that this book is entertaining, good-natured, funny and pretty exciting. While it stands alone just fine it's also a great extension of Duddle's pirate series for the picture book crowd, which just strikes me as a swell idea. A very nice and satisfying find. The Pirate CruncherThe Pirates Next Door

Black and white pictures Children seem to like story but daddy does not enjoy reading it to them so maybe better to read themselves which they are not yet able to do (6 and 7) First books were great to read as on rhyme and the one with sounds is fabulous.

This is my 4 year olds favourite book ever. He loved Pirates next door but I thought I might be taking a chance with Ghostly Galleon as it is a novel approx 150 pages with limited illustrations. I thought he may struggle to follow it without the illustrations but because he knew Jim lad and Matilda and the Jolley Rogers characters from PND he loved it. He is obsessed by it we have read it 7 times now and he only got in February. I had to limit him to a few chapters a night but always gave in after pleads for one more. It was layed out brilliantly to create intrigue for younger readers. He loves the villain Twirleybeard and is counting the days to the release of Cave of Doom the next installment from Johnny Duddle - can't recommend this highly enough to get your child commited to and excited about reading.

Plenty of action and suspense without frightening our 4 year old. Well written for reading aloud with lots of pirate words and plenty of enjoyable descriptive language. (There's a glossary of pirate words if needed!) Atmospheric images on half the pages add to the story and will make it a good book for him to read for himself in the future. At 4 some aspects of the story went over his head but this didn't stop him enjoying it immensely, and I expect it will enrich the adventures of his play pirates and their ship. I suspect we will read more from this author.