The Incredible Journey Books are a new series for children published by Kid’s Fun Press. I received The Criminal in the Caymans and Treasure in Tahiti books to review for this series.

These stories are told from the perspective of Sam and Max Stone, elementary school-aged boys who are precocious and curious. In both of the books reviewed, the boys are surprised with family vacations to the titular locales. The boys have a younger sister, Sydney, who is conveniently left with their grandparents prior to both trips. In both books, a mystery unfolds which they help to solve.

Each book was approximately 85 pages long with big font and pictures. I was able to read both stories in about an hour. I then passed them to my young son who was immediately engrossed in the plot of Criminal. The wonderful quality of these books is that they are very fast-paced, and for a mystery to be laid out and solved in less than 100 pages demands that no words be wasted on the kind of irrelevant details we would look for in a classic novel.

Another fantastic aspect of this series is that there is an ongoing mystery that is not resolved at the end of the books. Is their father an FBI agent? And who is putting initials on the map they mysteriously received? I can’t wait to find out. In addition, the “Science Pick” at the very end of each book gives your child a science project to work on when the story is over.

I am glad to see a new adventure series for children that seems to understand that the attention span of an 8-year-old is short and that, in order to grab and keep that attention, a book needs to keep moving. The Incredible Journey Books are wonderful additions to our library and I’m looking forward to finding out the ultimate mystery myself!