The Octopus Read online

  Everything was good this day. It was always good to make new friends.

  CYNTHIA RYLANT is the author of more than 100 books for young people, including the beloved Henry and Mudge, Annie and Snowball, Brownie • Pearl, and Mr. Putter • Tabby series. Her novel Missing May received the Newbery Medal. She lives in Lake Oswego, Oregon. Visit her at CynthiaRylant.com. PRESTON MCDANIELS lives on the Great Plains in Aurora, Nebraska.

  BEACH LANE BOOKS

  Simon & Schuster • New York

  Visit us at SIMONANDSCHUSTER.COM/KIDS

  authors.simonandschuster.com/Cynthia-Rylant

  authors.simonandschuster.com/Preston-McDaniels

  Other books in the

  Lighthouse Family series

  The Storm

  The Whale

  The Eagle

  The Turtle

  The Otter

  BEACH LANE BOOKS

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2005 by Cynthia Rylant

  Illustrations copyright © 2005 by Preston McDaniels

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  BEACH LANE BOOKS is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Also available in a Beach Lane Books hardcover edition

  The text for this book was set in Centaur.

  The illustrations for this book were rendered in graphite.

  First Beach Lane Books paperback edition March 2016

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

  Rylant, Cynthia.

  The lighthouse family : the octopus / Cynthia Rylant ; illustrated by Preston McDaniels.—

  1st ed.  p. cm.

  Summary: Whistler and Lila, two of the mice children who live in a lighthouse, meet a young octopus when they visit the beach during low tide.

  ISBN 978-0-689-86246-5 (hc) — ISBN 978-0-689-86314-1 (pbk)

  ISBN 978-1-4424-9938-6 (eBook)

  [1. Mice—Fiction. 2. Octopuses—Fiction. 3. Seashore—Fiction. 4. Animals—Fiction. 5. Lighthouses—Fiction.] I. McDaniels, Preston, ill. II. Title.

  PZ7.R982Lc 2005  [Fic]—dc22  2004028506