The Secret Explorers is a great transitional chapter book series for young readers! Pictures are mixed in throughout the text, breaking it up a bit. There are not too many characters introduced all at once and the topic of whales is so relevant for young readers. My daughter loves this series!

Super fun children's book that my daughter loved and cannot wait to read again. She is hoping SJ King writes a lot more books and has already requested that I buy them all.

This is listed as the first in the series but I felt like there was a lot of set up information missing. I didn't have the explanation of who and why these kids became secret explorers. That's not necessary to understand the plot but I found not knowing a bit distracting. The plot is pretty straightforward. Each complication in the mission is a pretty transparent reason to explain a new whale/oceanography,ecology fact to the reader. There's not clear conflict, just a simple mission used to educate the reader rather in the vein of The Magic School Bus..

A diverse cast of kids knowledgeable in all things STEM that should find its way into every second grade class library.

This title finds the sweet spot between a fiction adventure and a science book for kids.  It is an illustrated chapter book for elementary school aged children that features a diverse group of explorers. 


Meet Connor and his friends who are excited to have a new mission.  Watch as Connor magically arrives at the exploration station to find out what his next task will be.  Readers will discover that they are to help some whales.


This book appeals to its readers who are at the age when clubs and secrets are intriguing.  I think that kids will learn a lot while following the protagonists' adventures.  Hopefully, a love of science will be introduced or reinforced.


At the end of the book are a quiz and a glossary.  These both help to reinforce the learning that the text provided. 


Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this title in exchange for an honest review.

This was a cute, quick little chapter book about whales. I loved that it was highly informative (I didn't even realize how harmful red algae was!) and had a diverse cast of characters. It jumped a little too quickly into the mission without much of a transition/explanation. So kids who haven't read the other Secret Explorers books (are there others? This honestly was never made clear) may be a little lost because of this. But I think it would be perfect for third graders and I loved how it included additional information about ocean life in the back of the book.

The Secret Explorers consists of 7 kids who each are an expert on a certain topic. When the kids' compass badge glows they know they have a special Secret Explorers Mission!

In The Lost Whales, marine life expert Connor and space expert Roshni are called to the mission. The other kids stay and have access to the control monitors to monitor the special mission and provide communications. For each mission two kids are chosen based on their expert topics, sometimes it is obvious why one is chosen but not so obvious the other until the connection is made during the mission. Connor and Roshni are sent deep into the ocean in a submarine. They soon find out they are in search of a pod of whales to keep them back on track to where they need to go. But, of course, this wouldn't be a mission if there weren't some obstacles in the way. There are a ton of boats out in the ocean and whales need to get air every 45 minutes, if the boats are in the way chaos could break loose. One other small thing, one of the whales goes missing...

This series is so much fun! It has gorgeous cartoon-based illustrations embedded every page or two and you learn some heavy facts about marine life, climate change, and how to protect ocean creatures. I love that there's a twist in the story that you can't necessarily predict. This will keep readers on the edge of their seats. What's also so different about this series is that toward the end of the story the book contains factual diagrams like you would see in an expository nonfiction book and a quiz for the kids to take. I think this series will be a hit for reluctant readers and students who love a good story but also want to learn some cool facts too! I would suggest this book for emerging readers and those transitioning to chapter books/novels.

The secret explorers are a group of young children who investigate the natural world and help right wrongs. It's a series, so not all the kids go on every mission. They each have specialties and are selected because of what they can bring to making the mission a success. In this one, my first encounter with this series, Connor and Roshni are the underwater crew investigating why a pod of humpbacks seem to have lost their way. In process of pursuing the investigation, they encounter problems and issues that need to be worked through, and learn things about ocean life.

I was disappointed in this book for two reasons. While I appreciate its aim of trying to engage young people in developing an awareness of the natural world and the human-caused problems it faces, the natural world really needs to be left alone. The problem isn't the natural world, it's decades of human callous indifference to it that has caused the problems, and this is where efforts need to be applied. A Band-Aid and an aspirin isn't going to work where major heart surgery is urgently required. And you know, there's not a lot of point in saving one pod of whales if the Japanese or American Indians are going to hunt and kill them anyway.

The other problem I had with this ebook is that it simply did not work. I'm talking technically here. The book hung up on me around fifty percent in and crashed the entire app. I tried it in two different apps: Bluefire Reader, and Adobe Digital Editions. Both of these normally work perfectly, but this book failed at the same point in both apps, which tells me it's the publication, not the app. Just now, before I finalized this review, I tried it once more on both of those apps and the book wouldn't even open in ADR. It hung up the app. In BFR, it opened, but immediately hung the app.<.p>

I don't know if it's the intention to put this out as an ebook, or if that's simply how review copies were distributed (for my sins, I'm not the sort of reviewer who gets the hardback copy!), but given the poor quality of the e-copy, which prevented me reading half of it, and my misgivings about the priorities being set in this story, I can't commend it as a worthy read. Your mileage may differ.

<b>4 out of 5 🌟 Learning if fun!</b>

'Secret Explorers' is a new series about a group of children from around the world with scientific expertise in various topics from space through dinosaurs to volcanos. Each volume brings a new mission to resolve with the help of the most knowledgeable explorers in a particular topic. 'The Lost Whales' book takes place in the South Pacific Ocean and the chosen explorers for that mission are Connor the marine expert, and Roshni the space explorer. As always, the role of sidekick will be revealed during the mission.

'The Secret Explorers' are packed with action and useful information about the given topic. At the end of each book, there are a few pages with iconographic and schemas to sum and explain all the scientific data used in the story, the glossary, and a quiz to test the knowledge. In 'The Lost Whales' readers get to know about... yes, whales but also the ocean's ecology and global warming that poses a real danger to the whole ecosystem. The characters are funny and likable although they're also flat and without any special personality traits. The story itself was fast and packed with action, I liked it better than 'The Comet Collision'.

Overall, it's a great read for storytime or to read by kids themselves as a perfect mixture of an action story, science, and friendly, diverse characters. 'The Secret Explorers' series puts an end to gender diverse children's books and can be enjoyed by everyone.

<i>Thank you Netgalley and the publisher DK for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and feelings are my own.</i>

Successfully Walks the Line

This is an ambitious book. On the one hand we want to have a thrilling undersea adventure; on the other hand we see an honest effort to include substantial educational content. I was impressed, and thought the book worked well on both levels.

Wisely, the whole "Secret Explorers" angle is set up quickly. Whenever there's a science emergency a call goes out to the "Secret Explorers", who then drop whatever they're doing and gather at an Exploration Station. From there a team of kids with appropriate skills is selected and sent out with necessary tools and equipment. So, by chapter Two Connor and Roshni have been kitted out, briefed, and sent off on their mission.

The particular mission here is to head to the South Pacific and reorient a lost pod of humpback whales. Of course, nothing is ever that easy, so we have lost whales, a misplaced whale calf, some collisions with shipping, and so on. The kids are in a submarine that has cool sciencey stuff and have to do a lot of figuring out and problem solving. What we end up with is a tour of various deep sea and open ocean life, a lot of facts about whales, and an honest shot of wonder about these neat mammals. We also get some reasonable discussions of things like sonar and sat-nav and even star navigation. The kids have to make a lot of decisions and have to mostly reason their way out of or around problems, so the scientific method angle is mostly legit, even if some of the solutions are a bit unrealistic.

This isn't at a "Paw Patrol" level. There is decent information here. It's all a little cartoony and unbelievable, but it seems to fit in that sweet spot where you have a reader who's too old for fuzzy bunnies but not really ready for the harder stuff. And by gosh it's all very cheerful, energetic, upbeat, and gee-whiz, which seems to me like the right way to go with early STEM stories. I was impressed by the project, and delighted to see this is the first in a planned series.

(Please note that I received a free advance will-self-destruct-in-x-days Adobe Digital copy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

From the point of view of my six year old boy: This book was amazing! From the point of view of his mom, me: This was a great fiction title that wove lots of non-fiction ocean facts into the story! We partner read, each taking turns to read as the book was above his current reading level. My son adored the characters and can't wait to read more in the series. A home run in our house!

Even though I had not read others in this series, it was easy to get the idea and I did not feel I was missing too much. The story was engaging and moved at a good pace, with lots of science facts and information liberally sprinkled through. Not a lot of character development, but it wasn't necessary as the story seemed more plot driven than character driven. I liked that there are multiple characters of color represented. Some of the science words and concepts may be a bit much for younger readers, but there are lots of good facts and information in the back, including a glossary. This series seems to be a fun, engaging read for science-minded kids.

Connor loves the water and marine creatures. He is called for a secret mission to help the whales get back on track to the South. This book was fun and informational. A great mid level chapter book for kids.

My son, Connor, loved this book! I would say having a character named Connor helped!

Connor teams up with Roshni to save a group of humpback whales. Throughout their adventure they run into some roadblocks but work together to solve their problems.

This book had great illustrations, amazing lessons of teamwork and being a helper, allowing kids to learn as they read about underwater creatures and habitats.