reviews


was different in her grandmother’s time, as she knows from the stories Grandmother Maggie used to tell her. Maggie was the kitchen maid and she would describe how the two boys who lived in the house, together with their friend Jamie, would


in the garden. They would always pretend to be pirates – they’d fight other pirates and Indians, be taken to crocodile infested waters, get wrecked on desert islands, live in caves and collect coconuts. Jamie loved making up stories so much that it turns out he never stopped: many years later, as JM Barrie, he wrote Peter Pan and became one of Britain’s best known authors.


After a somewhat convoluted start, it was interesting


provided the inspiration for Peter Pan. Imaginative play clearly had a powerful, long-lasting effect on JM Barrie, and the rather charming, old- fashioned illustrations show that as she listens to Granny, Daisy is immersing herself in the boys’ games too. At the end of the book we’re told that the Peter Pan Moat Brae Trust has now taken over the house and garden in Dumfries, and is in the process of restoring both of them. This book would be particularly interesting to young visitors there. RW


Wild Adventures: Look, make,


Mick Manning & Brita Granström, Frances Lincoln, 48pp, 978-1-84780-436-5, £12.99 hbk


This is an engaging and life enhancing handbook for


outdoor activities in different environments including woodlands, lakes, rivers and beaches as well as parks and gardens. The contents page lists 44 topics and includes lyrical invitations to


example, ‘Evening Serenade & Dawn Chorus’, ‘Cloud Watching’ and ‘Rain, Wind & Kites’. The authors share all the ways in which they have organised activities with their own four children and so we can trust the advice. Each double spread shows a red-rimmed ‘Stay Safe’ circle: on the pages to do with making shelters we read ‘Don’t use bracken for your shelter as the fine spores of bracken can be harmful if you breathe them in’.


Few rival these author illustrators when it comes to designing exciting and informative pages. Here each double spread offers a feast of ideas by combining print text (where the size and intensity differs according to the status of the information) and Brita’s distinctive hand–lettering annotating pictures of flora and fauna. There are copious pictures, too, of children making shelters, canoeing, fishing and animal tracking. Somehow the pages are full without seeming cluttered –perhaps because everything links and mutually enriches. For example Mick’s page of small drawings of birds, rodents and mammals and their tracks sits opposite a full page picture of children looking for tracks. The reader is then directed to a page where


making plaster casts of the tracks. There is so much to enjoy and savour here. The ‘Picking Berries’ spread


there are instructions for enjoy, for families planning


explore - in nature’s playground HHHH


to see what play for hours


includes recipes for Elderberry Cordial and Blackberry and Apple Crumble. I particularly like the final section ‘Nature


which encourages young explorers to identify their finds using books and nature websites. This, it is explained, can lead on to making an annotated display of plaster


treasures. casts


feathers, shells, berries, and


beachcombing


With its excellent balance between encouraging a spirit of adventure and making sure children and supervising adults follow some basic safety rules this book would help families enjoy some great ‘wild adventures’.


MM


Eddie’s Tent and How to Go Camping


HHHH


Sarah Garland, Frances Lincoln, 32pp, 978 1 84780 408 2, £ 12.99 hbk


Sara Garland’s Eddie series takes on tents in this new camping adventure. Eddie and his family are off on holiday. Once they’ve packed (and re-packed) it’s a long drive to the campsite with a carpark picnic en route. When they arrive it’s dark but Eddie enjoys listening to the hooting owls. The next day starts with a campfire breakfast before a day on the beach where Eddie constructs his very own tent with some knots from his book. He makes some new friends, Max and his dog Bouncer, over a fish and chip lunch but when Bouncer goes missing later in the day, the boys work together to find him. When he’s safely tied up the family celebrate with a huge feast.


Recipes and information on knots is included in the back of the book - it sounds like great fun to make Damper bread. With lots of helpful information about camping, campfires and camp cooking as well as useful lists on what to bring this would be a great gift for any budding outdoor enthusiasts. KC


Millie’s Chickens HHH


Brenda Williams, illus Valeria Cis, Barefoot Books, 40pp, 978 1 78285 083 0, £6.99 pb


This picture book introduces us to Millie’s chickens and how she looks after them throughout the day; from feeding them pellets of corn to locking them up safely at night. Lots of information about chickens is woven throughout the story: the reader learns about the characteristics of a selection of breeds, where they live and lay, what they eat and differences in their eggs.


Each page begins in nursery story style (Here is Millie… Here are the chicks…). This works well, providing an effective structure to the book. However the rhyming text feels quite forced at times and is less successful.


Decorative illustrations by Valeria Cis (who also


by Laurie Krebs) are attractive and appealing. The


by the fox is highlighted well in the change from a colourful palette to the more mysterious indigo. The font design is effective, you can really imagine how loudly the cock


illustrated The Beeman danger presented


Tables and Collections’


is crowing with the ‘cock a doodle doo’ prominently stretched across a double page.


The last few pages of the book provide an additional section with more facts about chickens and eggs. Information on keeping chickens is included as well as different ways to cook eggs.


SMc Sardines of Love HHHH


Zuriñe Aguirre, Child’s Play, 32pp, 978 1 84643 726 7, £5.99 pbk


A sardine-centric story, surely not? Yes in a way, but this quirky tale is also a love story. Grandfather Lolo loves sardines; not so his wife, Lola, she hates the things. Nevertheless she runs a shop selling them because her husband spends his time fishing for them and she cooks them for him too –day in, day out – albeit with a clothes peg on her nose (and who can blame her for that). But then one day, disaster strikes: the shop runs out of sardines for her beloved’s supper. Something must be done so she takes a fishing rod and heads for the ocean and before you can say, ‘sardines’ she’s inside the belly of Jeff, the companionable


therein, she starts to think the place is actually rather homelike: there are pictures on the wall, there’s even a little stove; but the only food on offer is, guess what? And as Lola’s tummy gets increasingly rumbly she decides to sample one - with surprising results.


Back at home meanwhile a distraught Lolo misses his spouse and his tears becomes a sea upon which he floats… all the way out to the ocean and … a happy ending.


Ridiculous? Assuredly, but delightful nonetheless, from one heart-shaped tail endpaper to the other. The characters are totally endearing (I love their tattoos) and despite being a veggie I found myself falling for this one wholeheartedly. The visuals are superbly witty – take that bell ringing in Lola’s stomach when she starts feeling hungry, for instance, and the fishy décor in both Lolo and Lola’s old and new abodes. Delicious colour palette too.


JB The Paradise Bird HHHH


Marcus Pfister, Michael Neugebauer, 32pp 978 088 8240 31 9, £13.99 hbk


The ravens are living an uneventful life of tedium and monotony. ‘I’m so bored. Nothing ever happens,’ complains one. ‘Being bored makes me tired,’ says another. ‘I can hardly keep my eyes open.’ But then into this black and yellow world crashes a Paradise Bird with plumage aglow in glorious technicolour. This character’s a real joker who introduces them to dancing, singing (in their own unique Croak-a-Croak style) and most importantly, laughing. Nothing else much happens; but the bird departs leaving behind a changed society and an important message – ‘You did it yourselves … you don’t need a reason to be happy … don’t forget to share it.’ All of which goes to show that keeping an open mind and heart, and being prepared to learn from others different from ourselves can bring


octopus. Trapped


unexpected joy and happiness. Once you’ve stepped outside that comfort zone, there’s nothing to stop you …


This simple message is delivered with verve and vigour through Pfister’s punchy, staccato text, which is concentrated in a single block on each spread, allowing the exuberant glossy illustrations to take centre stage as the Paradise Bird leads the raving ravens in joyful dance across the pages.


JB


A Tower of Giraffes - Animal Bunche


HHHHH


Anna Wright, Words and Pictures (Quarto), 32pp, 978-1-91027-710-2, £11.99 hbk


Without resorting to the paper engineering which can often make picturebooks innovative and exciting these days, Anna Wright has given us a small masterpiece of design. As we turn the pages each double spread reveals a group of animals whose bodies are playfully embellished with patterns inspired by those used on fabric and wallpaper. But in each case the patterns home into something convincing about the nature and character of the animals. So the inquisitively nosed pigs are patterned in pink, grey and brown suggesting their skin colour and their liking for mud and - in the case of my personal favourite spread - sheep are shown with knitted coats reminiscent of the classic Fair Isle


tails trailing loose streams of wool – caught in a hedge perhaps? Many of the animals look out intensely from the pages and seem to connect with the viewer. This is particularly striking in the gaze of the camels and the stare of the watchful monkeys and adds considerably to the value and presence of the book.


The brief written text imparts interesting information often using lyrical language. Sheep are mostly calm but ‘run swiftly in a wild and woolly whirlwind’ to get away when danger strikes. And flamingos are ‘fancy feathered friends’ who make theatrical displays to impress other birds. In a few words the capacity for being or not being sociable of each group of creatures is explained. For example, hedgehogs mostly live on their own ‘but sometimes female hedgehogs become friends’. This is the sort of intriguing fact that young children enjoy discussing. Children are


the less familiar terms for animal groups: a ‘scurry of squirrels’ and an ‘ostentation of peacocks’ for example. The under eights will love talking about the animals pictured in


witty, original and beautiful book but it is likely to have appeal also for older children and the sharing adult. MM


Have You Seen My Monster? HHH


Steve Light, Walker, 40pp, 978 1 4063 5943 5 £11.99 hb


A little girl arrives at the fair and realises she has lost her pet monster. Where can he be? As the pages are turned the little girl searches for her monster taking us from the Ferris wheel to the bumper cars, the roller


Books for Keeps No.213 July 2015 23 this also introduced to some of jumper, their


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