The Sea Fairies
Written by L. Frank Baum
List of chapters
1. TROT AND CAP'N BILL
2. THE MERMAIDS
3. THE DEPTHS OF THE DEEP BLUE SEA
4. THE PALACE OF QUEEN AQUAREINE
5. THE SEA-SERPENT
6. EXPLORING THE OCEAN
7. THE ARISTOCRATIC CODFISH
8. A BANQUET UNDER WATER
9. THE BASHFUL OCTOPUS
10. THE UNDISCOVERED ISLAND
11. ZOG THE TERRIBLE AND HIS SEA DEVILS
12. THE ENCHANTED ISLAND
13. PRISONERS OF THE SEA MONSTER
14. CAP'N JOE AND CAP'N BILL
15. THE MAGIC OF THE MERMAIDS
16. THE TOP OF THE GREAT DOME
17. THE QUEEN'S GOLDEN SWORD
18. A DASH FOR LIBERTY
19. KING ANKO TO THE RESCUE
20. THE HOME OF THE OCEAN MONARCH
21. KING JOE
22. TROT LIVES TO TELL THE TALE
After 'closing' up his OZ series with The Emerald City of Oz, Baum began another series involving the adventures of Trot and Cap'n Bill, beginning with this book published in 1911. Although well-received by his fans, enough for a sequel to be published the following year, they still clamored for more from Oz, and in 1913, he published The Patchwork Girl Of Oz. He later brought Trot and Cap'n Bill to Oz in The Scarecrow of Oz.
Although he'd explored various terrains above and below ground in the Oz series, he still hadn't delved into magical lands underwater, or in the air. With the Trot and Cap'n Bill series, he does, to some entertainment. In this book, Cap'n Bill tells Trot malicious tales about mermaids, who overhear them and invite the two into their domain to learn the truth and 'live to tell the tale'. Several of the encounters underwater are as cartoonish as Disney's The Little Mermaid, and Baum's ignorance of sealife and propensity for stretching a pun often gets in the way. However, this book has the scariest wickedest villian of all of his books, making a worthwhile read.
A better underwater tale which involves dastardly pirates, and the ability to swim underwater, as well as a nonsense singing brave Octopus, is Richard Linklater's Pirates of the Deep Green Sea. The sequel to The Sea Fairies, Sky Island, will soon be is now noded.