Gunner's Big Day on Frobisher Bay

Gunner and his owners head out to go fishing in Frobisher Bay. However, along the route, Gunner has to go pee. His owners load him up into the dinghy and head to shore. A surprise in the form of a huge polar bear awaits them as they approach the shore! Gunner does his best to bark and get the polar bear to make way, but the polar bear is obdurate and refuses to move along. Gunner is forced to wait and go pee at another spot.

Trevor Taylor wrote this book in rhyme. The text is light and flows very nicely. The story is paired with excellent illustrations by Marcus Cutler. The story is also translated into Inuktitut which is an excellent feature to see although it is not possible to review this due to the reviewer’s lack of knowledge of the language. This reviewer read Gunner's Big Day on Frobisher Bay to four different classes and asked for their feedback. Each class gave the story a high rating for artwork and that they thought the story was good and that students in grade 4 and under would be interested in it. The students also felt that the illustrator did an excellent job portraying the encounter between Gunner, the dog, and the polar bear. The adults who heard the story thought the illustrations were excellent, and one felt like they were an excellent representation of the landscape as they were raised in Nunavut. One adult thought the story was a bit anticlimactic. When asked to explain, this adult thought that the story disappointed in that the dog and the bear only barked and roared at each other and then the dog (and owner) turned the dinghy around. Though an accurate observation, the intended audience of young people did not raise this same concern, and so this reviewer will let it be. The only thing that stood out to this reviewer and the adult from Nunavut was the lack of recognition of the translator. The author and illustrator are easily found on the cover. Presumably the translator is Louise Flaherty who is listed under the subtitle Inuktitut Working Group on the copyright page. A quick Google search of Louise Flaherty revealed that she is indeed a proficient speaker of Inuktitut and has spent much of her career promoting and teaching the language (including co-founding Inhabit Media, the publisher of this and many other stories).

Overall Gunner's Big Day on Frobisher Bay will be a nice addition to school or classroom libraries.