Book Description

Thomas the Tank Engine and all his engine friends on the Island of Sodor consistently strive to be very useful engines, but sometimes their desire to do their best inspires a competitive spirit that gets them all into trouble. Thomas is scheduled for an important run transporting the Admiral to the opening of Sodor's Maritime Museum in "Thomas and the Treasure," but when Salty tells Thomas about the lost pirate treasure of Sodor, Thomas can't resist following the clues. Problem is, the other engines laugh at Thomas for believing the story and Thomas' treasure hunting causes him to miss his scheduled pick-up of the Admiral and become an unreliable engine in Sir Topham Hatt's eyes. "Duncan's Bluff," Skarloey the Brave," "Big Strong Henry," and "Seeing the Sights" all deal with rivalry between engines; focusing on various engines' efforts to prove themselves the bravest, fastest, or strongest and the bad things that happen when the engines compete with one another at the expense of working together. Thomas proves himself a very helpful engine when he repeatedly comes to the aid of a lazy new engine named Dennis in "Thomas' Day Off" while Dennis eventually learns an important lesson about the pitfalls of being selfish.