by Paul W. Richard (Author)
Fernando, a young South American finch, becomes cast out to sea and is all alone on floating debris. After a horrid storm-tossed six-hundred-mile trip, he is eventually stranded on a Galapagos island and ends up adventuring, learning, and exploring other islands and new ideas with a sidekick finch, Hector. Along with seeing and meeting many wondrous wild creatures on the enchanted islands, Fernando experiences earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and watches nature at work, which keeps his keen mind filled with questions and flowing ideas. After seeing six strikingly different islands, can Fernando really understand the true nature of them and the humans he travels with? Can he and Hector, his sturdy sidekick, survive the many perils and ever find a way back to their homes? Can he learn why little finches do most bird tasks on all the different islands? Can he understand why giant tortoises and huge iguanas on the Galapagos Islands are so different from those in his South American mainland? He struggles to answer all these puzzling questions as he travels and trusts his luck. It's an exciting trip with feathered adventurers investigating many secrets of nature on unique enchanted islands with weird new animal life far out in the Pacific Ocean. Amazingly, Fernando discovers answers to many of his questions. But how does he get this new knowledge, insight, and himself back home to South America? Yet this feathered adventurer does just that.