Mandy Collins

Fishboy Mandy Collins

Fishboy is a children's adventure story based in north Cornwall. The three main characters, Bruno, Hamish and Paisley meet Finn, a boy from Marino. A magical Cornish slate house built underwater below the local windfarm. It is the home to a large family of "Gillanders", stretching back many generations. The Gillanders are born with one lung on one side of their body and gills on the other that allow them to breath underwater. Finn takes the boys to his unusual home via the dolphin water taxis, Botolph and Osquirt, to meet some of Finn's family and marine friends like Bono the Shark, Consomme the Turtle, and many more sea creatures. The Gillanders get their energy from the local windfarm just above them, but there is gossip of a new one being built much further out to sea which would mean closing this one down. The Gillanders need to stop these proposals going through. With the help of Catapus the blue whale, and the local Lobster family, the youngsters get involved with the Gillanders to help solve the problem. The book is full of elements to stir the imagination. For instance, the egg shaped glass taxis, that use the power of the tide and run on an underwater cable to Marino from a secret cove in the basement of a hotel on the headland. Paisley is lifted ten metres high onto the platform of the test wind mast by the waterspout of the Blue Whale, and the lunch scene in one of Marino's breathable rooms consisting of live snails and eels which almost get away before they can be stuffed into the Gillanders' mouths.