Harry has hopes of hammerhead stardom in this second book of a fin-tastic chapter book series. When humans show up at Shark Point to film an underwater documentary, Harry Hammer is thrilled. He’s sure he’s meant for the spotlight, but will he end up with the starring role of his dreams, or stay in deep-sea oblivion? Davy Ocean is the pseudonym of a collective of writers from the creative agency Hothouse Fiction, based in London. Aaron Blecha is an artist and author who designs funny characters and illustrates humorous books. His work includes the Shark School series and Goodnight, Grizzle Grump ! . Originally from Wisconsin, Aaron now lives with his family by the south English seaside. Lights! Camera! Hammerhead! “Open wider!” Ralph yells. “Ahh caaaaaannn’t!” I splutter. “Open wider!” “Ahh said, ahh caaaaaannn’t!” “What?” “Ghet zout ov muh mouf!” Ralph swims out of my mouth and frowns at me. “Harry, I can’t understand what you’re saying. Why are you speaking in code?” Now that Ralph is out of my mouth, I can speak normally again. “I can’t open my mouth wider!” I say. “If you went in any farther, you’d be able to shake fins with my rear!” It’s the first day of the school vacation and my best friends, Joe and Ralph, and I are supposed to be on our way to Shark Park. But Joe has made us stop so he can go into Kois “R” Us for the latest set of koi carp cards, and Ralph has taken the opportunity for a feed. Ralph narrows his eyes. “How else am I supposed to get my breakfast? I’m a pilot fish, and pilot fish eat the leftover food from between sharks’ teeth. It’s how we’ve always done it, and I don’t see why we should change now.” “I’m not saying we should change it. I just don’t want to swallow you!” Ralph flicks his tail angrily. “Well, if you’d saved me some of your prawn flakes in your front teeth, maybe I wouldn’t have to go searching the back of your mouth for bits of last night’s dinner.” I poke around at the back of my mouth with my tongue and flip out two pieces of yesterday’s clamburger. Ralph gobbles them up greedily, then floats in front of me, looking hopeful. “That’s all there is,” I say as Joe swims out of the store empty tentacled. “They don’t get the new cards in till tomorrow,” Joe says miserably. “Well, I’m going to need something else to stop my tummy from rumbling,” Ralph moans. “Half a prawn flake and two crumbs of clamburger aren’t enough for a growing pilot fish.” Ralph and Joe swim off toward Shark Park. I hope they cheer up before we get there. Vacations are supposed to be fun, but they’re not if your best friends are moping around like a couple of bluefish. As we get to the park gates Joe turns to me. “Do we have to go in?” he asks gloomily. “I still haven’t recovered from what happened last time.” Ralph starts to giggle at the memory and, I have to admit, it was pretty funny. What happened last time was this: 1. Joe jumped on the wrecked-ship’s-wheel merry-go-round, but he hadn’t realized how fast it was going. 2. He came flying off. 3. He shot right up the slime-algae slide THE WRONG WAY . . . 4. He catapulted around the whale-rib swings SIXTEEN times, and then . . . 5. He landed with a huge TWANG on the seahorse-on-a-spring . . . 6. Which BOINGED him right up toward the surface of the sea like an out-of-control jellycopter! If it hadn’t been for Ralph and me swimming up as fast as we could to catch him, Joe would have plopped right out into the air. And everyone knows how bad being in the air is for a jellyfish—the heat of the sun can turn them crispy in seconds. Joe eyes the sign by the gate suspiciously. The sign says SHARK PARK—FAMILY FUN FOR EVERYONE! “Hmm, I don’t call being spun around like my mom’s laundry fun,” Joe mutters. “I don’t call being thrown through the water upside down fun!” I decide not to tell Joe that watching him get flung around the park was fun for Ralph and me. I look around Shark Park-at the merry-go-round, the slide, the swings, and the seahorse-and then I look at Joe, who is folding each of his arms over the other. One by one. This is going to take a very long time, so I hold up a fin. “Okay, okay,” I say, “we’ll do something else.” To be honest, I don’t know why I suggested Shark Park in the first place. It’s vacation for all the kids in Shark Point, not just us three. That means the place is stuffed to the gills with fish and sharks and dolphins and octopi. So I turn back to Ralph and Joe. “It’s already full,” I say. “It’ll be ages before we can get on the whale-rib swings, and they’re the best thing in the park.” Ralph and Joe nod, so I continue. “We’re all too old to go on the seahorse-on-a-spring.” Ralph nods. Joe hides behind Ralph, and his bottom toots. I know he’s trying to be brave, but the Seahorse TWANGING incident did scare him quite a bit. “The only thing left for us to do would be to go and play on the sea grass, but lots of girl fish—” “Yuck,” say Joe and Ralp