This book is beautifully illustrated with full page "cut paper" illustrations combined with First Nations artwork. The story is based on a myth from the Pacific Northwest Tlingit people. The story begins a lot like a fairy tale with mother warning daughter to not go near the sea..., and ends like a folk tale with a lesson/moral and an explanation for mysterious tidal waves of the past in that area, while also bringing the impact of Europeans on a small Tlingit tribe into discussion. It is not a grim or frightening story, but not a story easily followed by 5 and 6 years. Grade 2 and up would get more out of it.