Books of Wonder

Ahab and the White Whale

Ahab and the White Whale - Main image
$13.17 $19.95 In stock

Category: Picture Books

Get the story of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick from the weird-but-lovable villain, Captain Ahab, in this silly and thrilling kids picture book for ages 5-9!

Ahab’s beautifully illustrated, off-kilter adventure on the high seas offers an important lesson on obsession and staying true to yourself.


On the island of Nantucket lives the greatest whaling captain of all time. Call him Ahab. He has long searched for the great white whale known as Moby Dick. Whenever Ahab heard any news of the whale, he rushed off to sea in his ship the Pequod. He climbed mountains, scaled sunken wrecks, crossed oceans without any luck. He wasted whole days shut up in his cabin. He traveled to the ends of the earth, but still the whale was not to be found. Ahab spent so much time on the hunt that he even forgot what he was looking for! The sea is a mystery, that much he can say for sure.

In this exquisitely illustrated story inspired by Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, Manuel Marsol turns Captain Ahab into a sympathetic, driven goofball with valuable lessons to impart about life, leviathans, and not letting our goals obscure the world right in front of our eyes.

Translated by Chloe Garcia Roberts

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Customer Reviews (5.0 / 5 · 5 reviews)

Ella D. ★★★★★

My five-year-old is obsessed with Ahab’s strange little crew and keeps asking why the whale is so white, which has led to some surprisingly deep bedtime chats. The off-kilter illustrations really bring the silly tension to life, and the text keeps the original story moving fast enough for a short at

Isabella ★★★★★

The illustrations have this wonderfully off-kilter charm that perfectly matches Ahab’s crazy obsession, and the text keeps the story moving at a silly, thrilling pace. My six-year-old actually giggled at the whale’s big, goofy eyes, and even I found myself sucked into the retelling. It’s a clever wa

Lucy A. ★★★★★

My kid asked to read it three nights in a row, which never happens, and the way Ahab’s one-track pursuit is played for laughs while still staying true to the original story is genuinely clever. The text manages to be silly for a 5-year-old and clever enough for me, so it's a win.