Review of “The Adventures of Danny Discus Volume 3: Danny Goes to Tobago” by Kirt Seuchan

Score: 91+/100 (9.1+ out of 10)

The Adventures of Danny Discus is a friendly, positive, and uplifting children's book series by Kirt Seuchan! The series follows the hopeful, optimistic, and big-dreaming Danny, a discus fish who lives in an aquarium. The aquarium is owned by Mr. Chan, a friendly character in these books, on the island of Trinidad in the West Indies.

Well, this book takes our characters a little bit out of their comfort zones by bringing Danny and Mr. Chan to Trinidad's sister island of Topango. It is there where Mr. Chan hopes to participate in an aquatic exhibition to show off some of the most extraordinary fish (including discus fish) in the West Indies.

It is a huge opportunity for both of our beloved characters to branch out, experience new things, learn something, and perhaps even accomplish something outside the confines of the aquarium and pet store. Danny's friends, particularly Tina (a tetra fish), are both excited and curious about his upcoming adventure, saying that they've heard all sorts of things about Tobago and the surrounding area including the beaches and coral reefs.

Indeed, a lot of extraordinary sea creatures inhabit the coral reef between Trinidad and Tobago including various types of fish, whales, and turtles. Some of these sea creatures (somehow) interact with Danny despite him being in an oxygen-filled bag for much of the journey. You kinda have to suspend your disbelief and just play along with it for the sake of the story. It's not so hard to do considering that this is a book about anthropomorphic talking animals.

Anyway, the key animal that talks to Danny is a wise sea turtle named Tito who tells Danny that Tobago and its surrounding reefs need to be respected and taken care of because the ecosystems there are very delicate. Danny also meets a parrot fish named Poly and a seahorse named Sandy.

On Mr. Chan's end, he connects with Captain Kurt at Pigeon Point Beach, a veteran of the seas who is able to give Mr. Chan and Danny an eye-opening voyage.

This is an adorable and charming book. We do have a few questions and issues, especially as it relates to the previous book in the series, The Adventures of Danny the Discus Volume 2: Love of a Mother. Where was Danny's mother? It was strange and more than a bit of an elephant in the room considering that Danny's mother was a HUGE centerpiece and character in the previous book. Not to mention that her chemistry with Danny was off-the-charts and put over in a big way. So, what happened to all of that? She just seems to have vanished from the series all of a sudden. Kids who may have loved the previous book may be a bit concerned. Did she get purchased by a customer? Did she go the way of the dodo? There really needs to be a bit more continuity.

There's also a sense that this book seems rushed. It probably could've been 5+ pages longer, expanding on more of what Danny and Mr. Chan actually did on Tobago. It seemed more like all they did was go to the beach, ride a boat, and see a few creatures in the seas nearby. It's pretty limited considering that the whole premise of the book was built around the excitement of what Tobago was like (and how it differed from Trinidad). The next thing we know, Danny is just back in Trinidad being greeted by his friends. Wow! Did we skip like a week or a chapter full of content? What did we miss between Danny talking to animals and him returning to Trinidad? It seems like a lot got trimmed or cut for time. Or maybe it was cut for a budget because illustrations are, frankly, expensive.

Speaking of illustrations, this book's illustrations have the same pros, cons, and overall style of the previous book. It's colorful, bright, and eye-catching. At the same time, it has the same issue with the action being out of focus because the draw distance and scope are too great (arguably).Take page 5, for example. It's a shot of the entire pet store and aquarium. It's nice and all, but where is the main character? Where is Danny? He makes up maybe 1-2% of the page space. On pages 18 and 19, we see so much of the beautiful, colorful coral reef and ocean, but what about he central characters we're supposed to be focusing on like Danny and Tito? Anyway, those are some minor gripes. And, ultimately, it probably doesn't matter to most children who'll just enjoy seeing the fish and the colorful illustrations.

At least the author was able to take us on a fun adventure with Danny!

Check it out on Amazon!