by Moe Zilla

Created on: March 14, 2010

Cap'n Smudge has a problem. Actually, he has several problems - including a wooden leg that's been replaced with a mop! (And instead of a parrot on his shoulder, he's forced to resort to a gloomy mudlark.) He's one of the most bitter characters I've seen in a children's book. But that's ultimately what makes this story story so satisfying.

Stephen Cosgrove wrote "Cap'n Smudge" in 1977, and his own story is just as interesting. When no one would publish his stories "the way he envisioned them," Cosgrove founded his own publishing company called Serendipity Press (according to

a biography at Amazon.com.) Over the years he wrote over 300 books including many "value-based fantasy stories". But "Cap'n Smudge" may be one of the best.

"On a beat up, battered boat in a very small port...stood the dirtiest, dustiest sea captain in the world." Cosgrove starts painting a gloomy picture from the very first page. (The sea captain has gum wrappers stuck in his hair, coal dust on his nose and "a filthy smile on his face.") The other sailors call him Cap'n Smudge, but only because they never bothered to learn his real name. And after a sea monster bites off Smudge's leg, the other sailors set his wooden leg on fire. He's forced to replace it with a mop handle because "he couldn't afford to buy another wooden leg..."

The bitter sea captain sets out for revenge - and he does it in an ingenious way. The sailors earn their living from the fish that they catch in their nets. So Smudge fills the ocean with garbage - lots and lots of garbage. For years he clogs the ocean with trash, so it's harder and harder to catch fish. Finally the sailors ask help from a benevolent pink sea monster who - like Cosgrove's publishing company - is named Serendipity.

I liked the story of alienation, and one miserable man who resorts to behaving badly. Because it's very touching when the sea monster finally visits the sea captain, and hears him describe what made him so bitter. And in the end, Serendipity doesn't need magic. She simply shares Smudge's story with the sailors in town, and it's simple human compassion which solves the problem. Towards the end of the book there's a drawing where Cap'n Smudge is finally smiling.

Because the sailors presented him with a new wooden leg - and it's decorated with a shiny red bow.

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