Chapter Book 4 / The Pull of the Ocean

Title	The Pull of the Ocean
Author	Jean-Claude Mourlevet
Illustrator	N/A
Publication Year	1999
Awards	Mildred L. Batchelder Award
Publisher	Delacorte Press
ISBN	978-0-385-73348-9
Readability Score (GLE = Grade Level Equivalent)	Lexile	620
	DRA	60
	GLE	4.2
	Guided Reading	M
Theme	Seven brothers running away from being murdered.
Primary Character	Yann
Secondary Characters	Yann’s six brothers, Mr. and Mrs. Doutreleau, The social worker.
Classroom Use	I would use this book to read in class to talk about family issues that some people may have.
Book Summary	Yann Doutreleau has six brothers, all tall for their age, but he is no more than two feet tall. Yann is the youngest and mute as well, but he is also the cleverest and most intelligent of the brothers and their undisputed leader. He communicates by gestures and looks and can say more with his eyes than most people can say with their voice. Yann loves school and learning while his brothers do not. The Doutreleau brothers are very protective of Yann and love him very much in spite of his differences or perhaps because of them. On a dark and stormy night, little Yann overhears his parents fighting. He wakes his three sets of twin brothers, telling them their parents plan to harm them. They leave, led by Yann, and start a journey to the ocean. It’s a strange little parade, three sets of malnourished, ragged twin boys and one very tiny doll of a boy leading the way, sometimes from the inside of a bag. Each chapter is narrated by a different person. At the end of the book, all of the boys except for Yann go back home.