Oscar Lobster's Fair Exchange

by George Selden, Peter Lippman (Illustrator)

When people take too many shells and stones from Crescent Beach, a lobster and his underwater friends decide to retaliate.

172 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1957

About the author

George Selden (1929-1989) was the author of The Cricket in Times Square, winner of the 1961 Newbery Honor and a timeless children's classic. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Selden received his B.A. from Yale, where he was a member of the Elizabethan Club and contributed to the literary magazine. He spent three summer sessions at Columbia University and, after college, studied for a year in Rome on a Fulbright Scholarship.

People often asked Selden how he got the idea for The Cricket in Times Square. "One night I was coming home on the subway, and I did hear a cricket chirp in the Times Square subway station. The story formed in my mind within minutes. An author is very thankful for minutes like those, although they happen all too infrequently." The popular Cricket series grew to seven titles, including Tucker's Countryside and The Old Meadow. In 1973, The Cricket in Times Square was made into an animated film. Selden wrote more than fifteen books, as well as two plays. His storytelling blends the marvelous with the commonplace realities of life, and it was essential to him that his animal characters display true emotions and feelings.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/george...

Reviews

[Christine Lucia Asha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a cute, fun story of the sea creatures taking back their beach from the summer visitors!!

A small group of crusteaceans and other salt water creatures decide to collect human things just like the humans collect seashells and such on the beach. They don't all agree about the methods or motives and so madness ensues....with a happy endng.

[Stephanie Harris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't know if this is really worthy of 5 stars, or if is just that way in my 5th grade memory. Such was the hold that this book had over me that I wrote, designed, constructed and performed, all by myself, a puppet show enactment of the novel for my class, sewn puppets, painted sets at all. And I haven't heard of it since.

[Courtney Anthony]

I don't know why this one is out of print. It deserves to be a classic, along with Selden's The Cricket in Times Square.

[Paul Dilley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every bit as good as Cricket in Time Square, I tracked this down even though it's out of print because of my son's love for marine animals. A playful take on a lobster who wants to build an undersea garden with his friends in competition with two children's rock garden. But the idea of a long, quiet, and lazy 1960s summer on the Long Island Sound/Thimble Islands seems like another world in itself.

[Julie Navrotsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really fun for my son to read aloud. Cute, charming characters.

[Kimbrely · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another good book by George Selden. Children's classic like Cricket in Times Square. An old book but a good one for young readers...but even my middle schooler listened to the whole thing as I read it aloud on these snow days.