Pete is excellent at the parts of the beach that stay dry. Shells, sandcastles, sunshine. Then it gets too hot, the only way to cool off is the ocean, and it turns out this particular groovy cat is a scaredy cat about waves.

His big brother Bob takes him out anyway. Falling off is fine, Bob shows him, and once falling off is fine there is not much left to be afraid of. It is a small, exact story about a fear a child actually has, and it ends in a surf lesson rather than a lecture, with mom on the sand and a red flag snapping over the sandcastle.

My First I Can Read is where the whole series starts — the tier HarperCollins calls perfect for shared reading with a child, an adult reading alongside rather than a child going it alone. That is what this is, thirty-two paperback pages of it, ages 4 to 8 on the publisher’s own grading. Pete the Cat: Sir Pete the Brave is the same tier at the same price, and the picture books Pete the Cat Falling for Autumn and Pete the Cat: Five Little Pumpkins are on the shelf for when a longer sit is possible.