Sinbad the Sailor a personalized book with your child as the hero

Long ago, in the city of Baghdad, there lived a young merchant called Sinbad. He had heard the sailors' stories in the market, about islands where pepper grew on trees and seas so clear you could count the fish, and he longed to see the world for himself. So he packed sacks of spices and bales of bright cloth, said goodbye to his family and went down the river to the harbour of Basra.

At the quay a wooden ship was waiting, a dhow with a high carved stern and one great triangular sail. Porters carried the sacks aboard, the old captain gave the order, and the sail filled with wind. "Goodbye!" called Sinbad, waving from the deck until the palm trees of Basra were only a green line on the water.

Far out on the open sea, dolphins leapt beside the ship and flying fish skimmed the waves like silver arrows. In the evenings, when the sky turned violet, the old captain leaned on the rail beside Sinbad and pointed up. "On land you can ask the way," he said. "At sea, the stars tell you. Learn them, and you will never be lost." Sinbad learned them one by one, the brightest first.

One morning the ship came to a small green island, so small you could walk round it before breakfast. The captain dropped anchor, and the sailors went ashore with their pots and their washing. They lit a fire to cook their dinner and set a big wooden washtub beside it, and Sinbad ran off to explore among the few trees.

How strange the island was! The ground was smooth and grey and warm, and when Sinbad pressed it with his hand it felt almost like skin.

Then the island shook. It trembled, it tilted, and it began to rise out of the sea. The fire had woken it, for it was not an island at all: it was a giant whale that had slept so long on the surface that trees had grown on its back!

"Back to the ship!" shouted the captain. The sailors ran and splashed and scrambled aboard, and the wind filled the sail and carried the ship away. But Sinbad was on the far side of the whale. As the great creature blew a fountain of spray high into the air and slid down into the deep, Sinbad grabbed the wooden washtub, climbed in and held on tight.

The whale swam away, and the ship was gone over the horizon. All that night and all the next day Sinbad floated alone on the wide sea, paddling with his hands and keeping his eye on the stars the captain had taught him.

At last the waves carried the tub to a quiet beach. Sinbad climbed out, stretched his stiff legs and looked around. On the sand stood something enormous and white: a smooth round dome, as big as a house, with no door and no window at all. Sinbad walked all the way round it, fifty steps, and touched its smooth shell. Then he understood. It was an egg! The egg of the Rukh, the giant bird the sailors talked about.

Just then the sky went dark, as if a cloud had covered the sun. It was not a cloud. It was the Rukh, coming home to its egg, with wings as wide as a ship's sail. The great bird settled down on the egg and went to sleep.

Sinbad had an idea. He unwound his long sash, crept close and tied it round the Rukh's enormous leg, then held on to the loop. In the morning the Rukh woke, spread its wings and rose into the sky, and Sinbad rose with it. Over the sea they flew, over islands and over mountains, Sinbad swinging safely beneath the great bird and laughing in the wind.

At last the Rukh came down in a deep valley between high cliffs, and Sinbad quickly untied his sash. The Rukh flew off, and Sinbad looked around him and gasped. The whole floor of the valley sparkled. It was covered with shining stones, red and green and clear as water, glittering in the sun.

Sinbad filled his sash with a few of the stones. But how would he ever climb out? Then he heard voices high above him. Merchants stood on the cliff top, and they had seen him. They lowered a long rope with a basket on the end, and Sinbad climbed in, and they pulled him up, hand over hand, all the way to the top.

The merchants took Sinbad with them to a harbour by the sea. And there, moored at the quay, was a ship he knew: his own old dhow! The captain was unloading bales of cloth, and when he saw Sinbad he stared as if he had seen a ghost. Then he laughed and threw up his arms. "These are your bales!" he cried. "I kept them for you all this time, though I thought we had lost you to the whale." And he gave Sinbad back every one.

Sinbad sailed home on his old ship, past the islands and the dolphins, all the way up the river to Baghdad.

There, one evening, an old porter came to rest in the shade of Sinbad's courtyard. His name was Sinbad too: Sinbad the Porter, who carried heavy loads all day long. Sinbad the Sailor invited him in, and the neighbours, and they all sat on cushions round the little fountain under the lanterns. Then Sinbad the Sailor told them the whole story, the whale and the washtub, the giant egg, the flight with the Rukh and the valley of shining stones, and he shared the gifts from his voyage with everyone there.

"What a sailor!" said the old porter. And Sinbad smiled, because he knew that one day soon he would set sail again.