Princess Olivia Investigates The Sea of Plastic

Join best friends and science detectives Olivia and Ravi as they explore the oceans in the new book in my Princess Olivia Investigates series.
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Find out more about Princess Olivia and the Wrong Weather

Meet Zoe Persico, the Illustrator and see how she paints

Find out more about the ocean science behind the story

Find out more about Princess Olivia and the Wrong Weather

Meet Zoe Persico, the Illustrator and see how she paints

Find out more about the ocean science behind the story

Since we last met Princess Olivia when she and her two school friends investigated the Mystery of the Wrong Weather, the ex-princess’s life has been going along quitely nicely. She lives at home with her Mum and Dad, the ex King and Queen of Alez, in a tiny appartment that her Mum still insists on called ‘the Royal Residence.’

Olivia’s Mum and Dad found it very difficult to become normal people after they were asked (nicely) to stop being the royal family because they’d had their turn at running the country and hadn’t done a very good job. At first, Olivia’s Mum and Dad were very confused by every aspect of their new lives as ordinary people as they didn’t know how to look after themselves or anyone else! But with the help of their practical and smart daughter Olivia, they’re now managing much better. Olivia’s Mum has even set up her own online store called Royalty Rocks, selling a range of hand designed tiaras and crowns for ‘the royal you, whoever you are!’

At the start of Princess Olivia Investigates the Sea of Plastic, Olivia has a very different life to the one she had when her father ruled the kingdom from a mountain top palace overlooking the capital city where she now lives. For a start, she now has friends which she never did at the palace as there were  no other kids to be friends with! And she’s allowed to do all sorts of cool things which princesses don’t get to do, like have sleepovers, hang out with her friends and best of all, go to school to learn amazing facts about the real world.

And Olivia is just about to go on holiday with her friend Ravi to stay with Uncle Cassander on Turtle Island, the beautiful island in the bay where Olivia’s run away uncle has been living since he left the royal palace years ago to become a surfer on the beach. Sadly, Helga, Olivia and Ravi’s other friend isn’t allowed to come too because her Mum has become President of Alez and so Helga has important things to do all summer long which don’t include looking out for baby turtles and playing with Uncle Cassander’s two kitty kats.

But when Olivia and Ravi reach Turtle Island, nothing is as they expected. The beach is covered in plastic which washes up with every wave of the tide so the turtles can’t hatch any more. There are no fish in the sea. And most weirdly of all, who is Captain Maximillion de Beaujour Longshot Fadoodle Jones and why is his pirate ship, the OK Nothing, anchored off the coast of Turtle Bay? What are Captain Max and his crew of pirates doing here and could it have anything to do with the old treasure map that Uncle Cassander stole from the royal palace all those years ago? But that’s only one mystery for Olivia and Ravi to investigate! What has happened to the oceans of the world and what should we do to save them? Olivia and Ravi with the help of Helga have got plenty to say on all these topics…

Containing amazing facts and up to the minute essays by oceanographers, combined with a hilarious, fast paced story line, Princess Olivia Investigates the Sea of Plastic is ideal for young readers who care about the environment and want to read more about the adventures of Olivia, the princess who became a scientist and her friends, new and old. 

Meet the Characters

Here are some of the characters in the story.

Click on the down arrow to read more about each character.

Princess Olivia is the 9 year old heir to the Kingdom of Alez, a small country with a coast on one side and mountains on the other. Her family have ruled the country for over a thousand years and expect to carry on for another thousand. She lives with her Mum and Dad, Queen Paragona and King Tolemy the Thirty Second in a mountain top palace.

Olivia doesn’t really like being a princess. She finds it very boring and her parents only let her have lessons in topics she finds really dull, like playing the lute or learning table manners. Olivia has decided to give herself an education by reading all the books in the Royal Library – but they are not very helpful. She thinks she may have learnt how to joust from one of them but at the same time, suspects this isn’t going to be a useful skill when she finally achieves her dream of escaping the Palace.

One day, to her enormous surprise, her life changes immediately. Her dream of leaving the Palace comes true but not at all in the way she expected. Pushed into a completely new environment, Olivia at first struggles to adjust but quickly learns that she has greater resilience, perception and ability than she could ever have thought.

Olivia is bright, engaging, quirky, stubborn and loyal. She makes friends quickly in her new world and is adaptable and resourcesful. She is also brave and determined. Faced with multiple challenges, she rises to them and through her persistence and intelligence, sees something that the adults around her are failing to address. Olivia realises the weather has gone wrong and that she and her friends need to use the power of science to find out why…

Ravi is Olivia’s best and first friend. They met on her first day at school when Olivia was finding it hard to adjust to being a school student instead of a princess. Olivia had always wanted to go to school and have her own friends – but she hadn’t imagined that her Mum, the former Queen Paragona, would insist on coming to school with her! Olivia was so embarrassed, she wanted to cry but Ravi saved her and they’ve been best friends ever since. Ravi lives with his Mum who works very hard for long hours so Ravi is very independent and street smart. He loves dressing up and jewels and has also become firm friends with Olivia’s Mum who now has her own jewellery line, Royalty Rocks. Ravi has been helping her design beautiful tiaras and crowns which, it seems, the people of the new republic of Alez can’t buy fast enough! Ravi is creative, clever and brave – and would do anything to help Olivia.

Helga is Olivia’s super smart school friend and President of the Science Society of Investigators which the three friends formed in the last book. One of Helga’s Mums, Gretchen, is also a president – but she is President of the whole country of Alez! Gretchen took over from the last president, the devious Jeremy Pont, when the three science investigators discovered he had been secretly cutting down the forest to make way for factories which belched pollution into the atmosphere, driving temperature rises which led to outbreaks of the ‘wrong weather’. Now that Gretchen is President, Helga’s life has changed. She is followed everywhere by security guards and she isn’t allowed to do fun things like her friends Olivia and Ravi. Helga is quite cross about this but conflicted as she loves nothing more than rules and following them. Will she ever work out that some rules might be asking to be broken?

Uncle Cassander is the identical twin brother of Olivia’s father, the former King Tolemy. Unfortunately for Cassander, being born two minutes after his brother meant that he got to live the life of a ‘spare’. a prince that no one takes much notice of and who is only there as a back up to his very slightly older brother. A few years back, Cassander got fed up with royal life and ran away to live on Turtle Island, a beautiful island in the bay which has been a sanctuary for wildlife as so few people live there. However, even since he has lived there, Cassander has noticed environmental changes. The sea level is rising and there are no fish in the water. But until Olivia and her best friend Ravi come to stay, Cassander hasn’t started to add up what it all means, even though he is one of the few people to have seen the Sea of Plastic, out there in the ocean beyond the Lost Archipelago. And it turns out that Cassander has an old treasure map, one which may hold the clue to where the missing royal treasure ended up. Can Olivia and Ravi join up all the dots to make ancient history and modern science match up?

Captain Max is a mysterious character who sails the seven seas on his ship, the OK Nothing, in search of treasure. While Captain Max likes to pretend he is a fierce swashbuckling pirate, his crew know he is a hopelessly soft hearted and kind individual. A great sailor and a pirate to the end of his huge beard, Captain Max really loves the adventure of being out on the open sea more than he craves actual treasure. For him, it’s all about risk and not much about reward. Max would challenge anyone who threatened his crew and would go to great lengths to keep them safe and well, for which he has earned their eternal loyalty and devotion.

Pieces o Plastic is Captain Max’s parrot. He used to be called Pieces o Eight but Captain Max changed his name when he setarted to notice how much plastic there was in the oceans as he sailed around the world in his ship, the OK Nothing. Pieces o Plastic is a crafty but courageous bird, totally devoted to Max but ready to make new friends when Olivia and Ravi join the pirate crew.

Around the world

Princess Olivia books are now available in multiple languages

Ukraine

Italy

Germany

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