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The Beck, written by Anthony McGowan, reviewed by Pippa Goodhart 14 Mar 4:30 PM (7 hours ago)

        This new short novel by Carnegie Prize winning author Anthony McGowan is excellent. Funnier than his wonderful 'Lark', but equally insightful about adolescent characters, families, and the natural world. 

    Thirteen-year-old Kyle, 'only ever got left with Grandad when all the other babysitting options were used up. It was like when you look in the cupboard for some biscuits, hoping for maybe a Jaffa Cake or a Jammy Dodger, and all your find is a cracker.' Grandad's boring and embarrassing (insisting on wearing his Elvis impersonator wig). But of course Grandad actually leads Kyle into a naughty scrape, into becoming friends with a girl, making his tormentor bullies change their minds about him. 

     After showing Kyle the wildlife in and around the beck, and also showing where developers are about to concrete that life out of existance, Grandad intends to do something naughty, borderline illegal, to stop this from happening. But then he's hospitalised with a stroke, and Kyle decides to do the deed himself. So the triumphs of friendship and protecting wildlife are properly his own achievements. 

    Thought-provoking, involving, moving and funny, this makes a very satisfying read, and a quick and accessible one as you'd expect from Barrington Stoke.

    Oh, and Grandad's three-legged dog is called Rude Word. 

Build a library, build a reader - Anne Rooney 12 Mar 11:40 PM (2 days ago)

Peck, Peck, Peck — a favourite in Berlin

It took a while to settle on this plan, so he got six books the first time. If I see him in a month, I give him a book directly. If I'm not in Berlin, or he's not here, I buy the book from Curious Fox, an English language bookshop in Berlin and they deliver it to him. (I did try buying the books here and posting them, but the postage cost more than the books and they took forever to arrive. And I don't use Amazon.) I am buying him books in English, though not necessarily English books. This month's book is by a Brazilian writer and was first published in Portuguese (see Penny Dolan's post yesterday on Guilherme Karsten's Are You a Monster?) Instructions from his kita are to use English at home and German at kita/school to build a bilingual child. 

He's not obliged to keep the books. He/his parents can pass them on to younger children if he outgrows them, though it will be nice if he does keep them. I might have a stamp made up so that they can stamp each incoming book.

These are some of the books from his first twelve months. They include some favourites from my daughter's childhood that she specifically asked for, I'm not being unimaginative!

Clive Penguin, Huw Lewis Jones and Ben Sanders, Little Tiger, 2024

A Boy Wants a Dinosaur, Hiawyn Oram and Satoshi Kitamura,  Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1990

Where's Mr Puffin? Ingela P Arrhenius, Nosy Crow, 2022

Peepo! Janet and Allan Ahlberg, Puffin, 1997

Funnybones,  Janet and Allan Ahlberg, Puffin, 1999

Hoot Owl, Master of Disguise,  Sean Taylor and Jean Jullien, 2016

Shh! We Have a Plan, Chris Haughton, Walker Books, 2016

Peck, Peck, Peck, Lucy Cousins, Walker Books, 2013

Are You A Monster?  Guilherme Karsten, Quarto, 2023

Next month's book will be How Long Is That Dog by John Bond, HarperCollins, 2025.

ARE YOU A MONSTER by Guilherme Karsten 10 Mar 11:00 PM (4 days ago)

When I go to the Children's Library on Mondays, I am always looking out for good stories to read aloud  to the Under Fives Storytime group.  Some books work well read out loud to a group, while others - though just as good as stories - are better for quieter sessions or for reading at home. 

My choice today has a black cover, which can immediately put people off. Books are expected to have white, light, colourful pages and bright covers. This one doesn't.  Thoughout, though there are dark pages, others are white, or red or yellow or pale blue, the colour balanced with the play of the story. 

The central character is a greenish-yellow monster, and the book has a direct attitude: the solo monster character starts by boasting, and then asking questions. He insists he wants to know if the reader is a monster too.  

ARE YOU OR ARE YOU NOT? Do you have a long, pointy tail? No? Do you have long pointy nails? No? Show me your BIG YELLOW EYES . . . No? 

Obviously the reader has not, so suddenly, cleverly, midway through the text, the monster calls the story to an end.  'OK. I'M DONE. YOU ARE NOT A MONSTERY. You can close this book now. THE END  BYE-BYE.

Then, in case the reader is upset by the sudden ending, the Monster checks again. 

Show me your teeth again. A HUGE mouth. Interesting! Can you make a LOUD noise like GRRR or ROARRR? Can you walk like a monster STOMPING HARD ? Can you? 

Of course, the Storytime group can join in and do, with encouragement. Can you now do all three together? I love the traditional cumulative framework there behind this telling!

The Monster is, at first, delighted to have found such another scary monster in the reader . . . except that now, the Monster suddenly starts to feel a bit scared of such excellent scary monsters itself . . .  and eventually the real ending to the story arrives. 

Which I will leave you to find out for yourself.

Although the reader needs to put a bit of ooomph into the reading, and allow time for joining in, the story itself moves along swiftly and amusingly. Karsten has created a book that is great fun, beautifully structured, and that uses language in an interesting way: one that I'd enjoy using over and over again.  For small family books sharing as well as for 'louder' readings.

Additionally, after enjoying this book myself, I found, while searching for images, that it was also the BookTrust Storytime Book of the Year 2024.  Well done, Guilherme Karsten!

Penny Dolan 

ARE YOU A MONSTER? was published in 2023 by Happy Yak, an imprintof the Quarto Group. Guilherme Karsten is both the author and illustrator.

THE WISHING WELL. by Sharon Tregenza 9 Mar 5:01 AM (5 days ago)

Madron wishing well is down a muddy path lined with hawthorn and blackthorn and is close to the village of Madron, near Penzance. For as long as I can remember it's been known as a magical place of healing. You'll still find strips of cloth (known as clouties) tied to the surrounding branches as tokens of homage and well wishes for sick relatives and friends.

The well head is a rough circle of granite slabs that were relaid in the 1980s. Up until the 20th century there was also a large granite trough there, which has unfortunately disappeared.

Members' News - March 6 Mar 10:00 PM (8 days ago)

New out 

The Hamish McHaggis series is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year 2005-2025.

School Visits Workshop sold out

MY WORLD BOOK DAY SURPRISE by Penny Dolan 6 Mar 5:36 AM (8 days ago)

Today, trains and buses and cars are taking - or have already taken - hundreds of authors, illustrators, storytellers and other 'book people' into schools and libraries and bookshops - and more - to celebrate this year's WORLD BOOK DAY UK.

I do hope that everyone is having a very happy time, no matter the troubles of those journeys. There's nothing  like the feeling of sharing the enjoyment of your book with a host of young readers. Their enthusiasm and the things they say can really boost an author or illustrator on the day of the visit.  And its wonderful when teachers and staff join in with the fun too, an dhelp the day along.

But - big secret - those Book Day visit memories can also feel magical  afterwards. Those days can help and inspire the authors and artists and others during the quiet and sometimes less than cheerful day when they are working all alone and stuck in a difficult patch.  So a big thank you to all those hosting or sharing in book events this week - or anytime,

I loved school visits, although now I rarely do them. However, I was totally delighted an email this morning. Rhian, a generous mum,  shared her daughter's Book Day Dressing Up choice. 

There was this lovely girl, beautifully dressed as one of my long-ago-characters, and on that I had loved creating. It was such a joy to see the amazing trapeze artist Lola Fanola, gold dress and velvet cape, there before my eyes this book day.  

Thank you so much, both of you, for making my own WBD a happy one, and hope the doughnuts were simply delicious!

Penny Dolan

About William by Paul May 3 Mar 9:00 PM (11 days ago)

I was wondering what to write about this month when I glanced over at a poster on my wall that I was given recently. It advertises the World of William exhibition at the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green back in 1990. I've mentioned before that there are places in Arthur Ransome's books that seem as real to me as my memories of real places. The village where William Brown lives with his family has a similar place in my mind.

Probably, this is because my life as a child wan't so very different from William's, at least once I was out of the house. And even the house William lived in was familiar in a way. Even though we didn't live in a big house ourselves there were plenty of roads in our neighbourhood where there were large detached houses in spacious gardens and where, amazingly, servants were still employed.

When I was in my teens I had a succession of weekend jobs as a garden boy in those big houses. My mother had taught me how to weed and, perhaps more importantly, how to tell a weed from a carefully cultivated plant. I also knew to ask if I didn't know. And eventually I worked for a couple of years in the garden of a stockbroker who could easily have been Mr Brown, William's dad. The stockbroker employed a full-time gardener named Bert, a cook called Dorothy, and a succession of maids. I got on well with Bert and eventually I graduated from washing pots in the greenhouse to pushing the giant lawnmower back and forth across the immaculate lawns, but best of all were the coffee-breaks where we were admitted to the kitchen and sat with Dorothy and the maid while Dorothy, who was getting on a bit, lamented the state of the modern world. She was especially worried about the effect of the moon landings on the weather. She would have been a sucker for internet conspiracy theories today.

So, William's world, or a version of it, still lingered on in my neighbourhood, and I was able, just like William, to go off with my friends at the age of eight exploring the village and the countryside around it. We went to village fêtes where I actually heard a vicar once say, on a hot summer's afternoon, 'Phew, what a scorcher!' We attempted to dam the River Misbourne, collected frogspawn and sticklebacks, explored haunted houses and scrumped in the orchards. And at the same time as we were doing all this, I discovered the William books which have been part of my life and the lives of my children ever since.

My daughter was about eight years old in 1986 when we spent a couple of weeks in the summer holidays driving around France and camping. We crossed from Portsmouth to Caen and the weather wasn't that great so we decided to head south to look for the sun and we ended up driving a long way with Emily in the back seat. She didn't mind because she had with her a stack of William books and, crucially, a dictionary. One of the great benefits of reading William books is that it expands your vocabulary. Richmal Crompton was very fond of a long word.

And then there were the Martin Jarvis readings. In 2000 we were in Los Angeles visiting friends. We'd just picked up their children from school and were driving home when the story William Holds the Stage came on the tape-player. Within minutes everyone in the car, adults and children alike, were laughing so hard that we had to pull over and wait for the story to finish. This is the one, in case you're wondering, where William is cast in the school production as a non-speaking attendant but decides that he is going to play the part of Hamlet himself. The story is in William the Pirate (1933), a book which also includes the wonderful story William and the Triplets in which the Outlaws lose a baby they're supposed to be looking after (Henry's) and try to replace it with others that they find. William, being the youngest in his family, lacks Henry's experience with infants and is convinced that all babies look the same and 'You can't possibly tell any difference.'

'I can,' protested Henry. 'When you know them very well there is a difference, and I tell you, this one isn't ours.'

But my love of William isn't simply about nostalgia for that vanished world where babies were routinely left out in the street in their prams (as I was). What I love most is William's passionate engagement with the world around him. He's always trying to make the world a better place, whether it's by trying to save rats from extermination or campaigning for children's rights - like the right to work in coal mines or clean chimneys - or helping orphans and tramps. Who knows what he would have become if his creator had ever allowed him to grow up? But from the moment William made his first appearance in 1919 until his final bow in 1970, the year after Richmal Crompton's death, William never got a day older.

And, what's more, he never will.

A great overview of William's  career in publishing.

Ideas come ... Joan Lennon 2 Mar 10:29 AM (12 days ago)

The arrival of ideas is a very strange thing indeed, and no two show up in exactly the same way.

Sometimes it's like penguins - out of the murk and back again.

Different ideas, different routes - all you can do is notice them when they come and be prepared to pounce!

Joan Lennon website

Joan Lennon Instagram

HOW TO STRESS LESS by Penny Dolan 28 Feb 4:17 PM (14 days ago)

The start of March, and a quick post to finish off a couple of very busy weeks.
                          

Recently, I walked into town for some real-world shopping: not for the usual loaf and lunch items but for something that seemed far more stressful. I was after a gift for a very young relative and, as the present would be crossing to Canada, I needed to choose something easily packable.

Something soft and light, perhaps? A particularly sweet, fluffy teddy bear caught my eye for a while. However, I recalled an image from the last family party and how a menagerie of stuffed animals in all shapes and sizes ran along the nursery shelves already. Another furry teddy, no matter how cute, was probably not what was needed.

                                      
Clothes, maybe? I walked through the racks of cute outfits, and sighed. The designs and fabrics were all so much more beautiful now! Regrettably, delightful winter garments still seemed too small or too big for their particular age-label, and way too small to use as hand-me-ons after the autumn came around.

Besides, do children (or their parents) like bright primary colours or do they prefer pale neutral tones now? Do the children have to look as if they work, visually, with the décor in this social media age? It felt like a nightmare! The whole gift-shopping task was, as they say, stressing me out . . . 

And so I did the only wise thing possible. I went to, and deep into a good, nearby bookshop.              

As soon as I was there, standing among the quantities of books, I felt the tension fading away. Phew. Breathe out. Relax. That’s so much better! A bookshop - or a library - will do this for me every time.

Although I did enjoy all the looking, I ended up with a couple of well- beloved board-books whose stories should fit perfectly and comfortably, and also be welcome for far longer than one season. The books are usually a size that fits all, as well as being easily packable and postable too. Job done.

                     

What a pleasure it is to think of the two lovely books going halfway across the world to reach their destination, even if the parcel won’t arrive until well after the UK’s World Book Day on 6th March 2025.
                                                              
Happy reading, everyone, whenever and wherever you are! Onwards . . .
Penny Dolan

Tell a Fairy Tale Day by Claire Fayers 26 Feb 10:00 PM (16 days ago)

 What's your favourite fairy tale?

The 26th February is Tell a Fairy Tale Day and March 1st is St David's Day in Wales so this seems a good time to revisit my favourite Welsh fairy folk. These draw on British Goblins by Wirt Sikes, a nineteenth century American journalist and folklorist, but the fairy creatures of Wales go back much further than that, of course.

The Tylwyth Teg

Probably the best known of the Welsh fairies, their name means 'Fair Folk' or 'Fair Family.' They are ambiguous creatures, morally grey and known for their illusions. If anyone is stolen by the fairies, it's probably the Tylwyth Teg. They do seem to have a thing about kidnapping people. 

Elen Caldecott's Carnegie nominated THE BLACKTHORN BRANCH brings them magnificently to life.

The Pwca

Shakespeare's Puck possibly came from the same root. The pwca is generally depicted as a mischievous shape-shifter, often known to lead people into dangerous places by waving lights at night. I have an image of a man stumbling home from the pub soaking wet and saying, 'Sorry, dear, the pwca made me fall in the river. Definitely not because I'm drunk.'

See also the Cornish Bucca and the Irish Puka.

The Bwbach

This one is my favourite. The bwbach is a small goblin who likes warm places and pudding and so when people move into Wales, it moved into their homes with them. It'll even do some housework for you, especially if you leave it a slice of cake and a bowl of milk. But there are loads of stories about what happens when someone annoys a bwbach, and it never ends well for the humans.

The Coblyn

The word comes from the same root as goblin but I always have the Disney seven dwarves in mind. The coblyn lives underground in mines and tunnels and will often help human miners by alerting them to danger or leading them to the best seams of coal. There is a Pont y Coblyn (Coblyn's Bridge) in Caernarfonshire, though I haven't been able to find any stories attached to it.

The Ellyll

Wirt Sikes describes them as pigmy elves who dine on poisonous toadstools and fairy butter "which they extract from deep crevices in limestone rocks." Who knew limestone rocks could be so useful? In other accounts they appear to be interchangeable with the Tylwyth Teg, drawing people into their dances and taking revenge on any humans who annoy them.

Fairies in the Landscape

One of the things I love about these stories is the way they are so deeply embedded in the landscape. If you'd like to waste an hour or two, go to the List of Historic Place Names in Wales You can search for specific words or pick an area and study the place names. If you type in any of the fairy folk names you'll get a list of places that are associated with them.

This could be a great world-building exercise. Choose a location in your work in progress and attach a folktale to it. It doesn't even have to be tied into the plot, it can just be there to add a sense of depth and history.

Welsh Giants, Ghosts and Goblins by Claire Fayers is Waterstones Welsh Book of the Year.

I know we could all argue about the implications but... 24 Feb 9:00 PM (18 days ago)

... it's an interesting thought

Michael Cunningham (The Hours) came to Amsterdam several years ago to give a reading. After he was finished, he invited questions from the audience. I asked whether there were any subjects a writer should avoid; anything that just shouldn't be tackled.

His answer was no.

Except, he went on, the repetition of dull clichés long past their sell-by date. He offered as examples, silly women who go all panicky and collapse in times of stress. Limp-wristed, useless gay characters. Men for whom no challenge can't ever be met. And so on.

Keep away from them, he said. But otherwise, nothing's off the table.

The Hunt for the Golden Scarab, by M G Leonard 23 Feb 10:30 AM (19 days ago)

Creative empathy in a dangerous world – by Rowena House 20 Feb 3:30 PM (22 days ago)

What have witch trials and Donald Trump got in common?

Horrifically, I think it’s perfectly possible we’ll learn about a direct link via his so-called Christian supporters before his presidency is over. But short of that ghastly prospect, there have this past month been deeply uncomfortable parallels between fervent belief expressed in ‘alternative facts’ – e.g. whether the USA or Europe has given more to Ukraine – and seventeenth century English witch beliefs, which are the subject of my novel-in-progress.

Outside politics, which I don’t want to talk about here, there are also extraordinary parallels in terms of the psychology of belief, or more accurately disbelief, and how people – some people, anyway; let’s call them us – deal with unbelievable change, denial being one of our first ports of call.

As in, I can’t believe this is happening.

One of the best expressions I've read about how this manifests was in The Guardian last Monday, February 17th 2025. (Yup, that’s the kind of us I mean. Sorry if that offends).

In it, Zoe Williams discusses the paralysing shock that for her accompanied evidence of fascism within Trump’s Administration and her deep unwillingness to name it.

‘You’re dumbstruck for ages, not wanting to call the thing what it is. It starts off feeling like embarrassment or coyness – what kind of hysteric runs around shouting “fascist”? A very silly one, surely.’

For her, this feeling morphed ‘into something more superstitious – don’t call the thing what it is because that will only embolden the thing.’

I haven’t felt that superstition personally, but I do understand her sense of mental paralysis.

As she says, ‘If you can’t respond to the news, you can’t look at the news ... When you’re averting your eyes, you can’t even think your way into next month’ because that ‘feels like asking for trouble. Frozen feels preferable to adapting to a new reality.’

So, what has all this to do with writing fiction?

The connection is creative empathy and the use of extreme experiences as research into character – characters like us.

Firstly, with such horror in the world, a caveat.

I would say that the loss of post-WW2 certainties that the USA and Europe share fundamental values does count as an extreme event, one that causes deep psychological disturbance. It is nothing, nothing, nothing like the suffering in Gaza, the West Bank, Sudan, DRC and Ukraine etc. But even listing those war-torn places illustrates how much suffering we are exposed to these days - all of which will be impacted by the altered reality of the world order implied by Trump.

For those of us off the front line, it is valid, I believe, to monitor how I, we, you (as in Zoe Williams) react to this change. Do we freeze. Deny. Look away. Have nightmares. Lose hope. Most of all, do we disbelieve?

For several years now, I have attempted to empathize creatively with a real person from seventeenth century London who believed in witchcraft in an effort to understand and recreate the (fictional) conditions in which he (actually) wrote about a series of witch trials as necessary and just.

It’s very hard at times to think positive thoughts about him. Instinctively I ask, how could he have been so irrational and cruel? How could he have been so gullible? 

Currently, I’m giving him a horrible shock to his profound Protestant faith when King James I/VI had his Catholic mother re-interred in Westminster Abbey, with an elegy claiming she and not Elizabeth I was the rightful heiress to the English throne. His reaction? Paralysis and disbelief.

But analysing ‘our’ reactions to comments by Trump and his Administration which totally contradict everything we ‘know for a fact’ – AKA our most profound beliefs – I am trying to find ways into my protagonist’s mindset that I couldn’t have explored without the existential threats from Trump.

Such creative empathy can also be turned on its head: Witch trials happened. James I/VI did that weird stuff. Trump and Vance are going to act on what they believe. The world just changed. Reality flipped. It ain’t about to flip back any time soon...

Cumulatively, I think this sort of thinking can help lessen the power of I-can’t-believe-this-is-happening and open us up to the reality of change.

As I’ve waffled about on ABBA before, neuroscience and behavioural psychology tells us that human minds aren’t very good at objectivity. We perceive what we expect to see. We map new information onto existing knowledge. We rely on experience. Hence, we feel lost when experience fails us as a guide.

Thus, if all fiction is at some level about human experience, reading it and writing it with imaginative empathy might/will/should help us adapt to altered realities.

Yay. Now back to hating on ‘them’. [Only kidding.]

Still on Twitter @HouseRowena

Still on Facebook Rowena House Author

A waste of time - by Lu Hersey 18 Feb 4:00 PM (24 days ago)

 My last post was about trying to get my book out in time for Christmas, so I could give a copy to my dad before he died. Turns out it was a really stupid thing to do. Debbie (editor at Beaten Track) had to jump through hoops to finish editing in time, my print copies hadn't arrived and I ended up ordering him one through Amazon - but hindsight is a wonderful thing. 

What was I trying to achieve anyway? It's only now I realise it was vanity on my part, a final attempt to make my dad proud of me, which was totally misguided. Close to the end of life, as he opened the present, painfully and slowly, I think he was hoping for a gripping crime novel he hadn't read. He spent a good few minutes staring at the back cover trying to read the blurb, before handing it back to me, disappointed. I understand. When you've only got a few weeks left to live, reading something that doesn't interest you is a waste of very valuable time. 

What he really liked was the photograph album I'd compiled for him, and fair enough. In your final days, you're far more likely to want to look at the story of your life in photographs, so you can remember things, family and friends in happier times, than read anything at all. And so at his funeral this week, I've arranged a tribute montage of 40 photographs of his life as part of the service. I think he'd have liked that. 

 

PS. It's not a crime novel. 

Lu Hersey

🦋: luwrites

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Admiring 'Lessons in Chemistry'. Steve Way 16 Feb 7:00 PM (26 days ago)

It’s funny isn’t it that sometimes themes go in waves? Last week one of my Spanish students who is learning English told me about how his daughter is part of a group of girls who are participating in STEM based projects, such as making robots and designing apps. Later in the week I was speaking with another student who is a Vice-Chancellor of one of the universities in Barcellona.* She talked about how the number of women in senior roles has gradually increased from practically zero to a few during her career as a palaeontologist. Progress has been made but clearly much more needs to be done to achieve parity.

In between times, I stood in for a colleague and found myself teaching three young women who work for a cosmetics company. The first student arrived several minutes before the others and on introducing herself and her role as a training manager for the company said, “It may seem strange that I work for a cosmetics company because my background is in chemistry.” However, I could see the connection and it sounds as though the industry is doing more to develop products that work in harmony with the natural chemistry of the body, which seems encouraging. Asking her about her interests, she told me that she loved cooking and then emphasised that part of the attraction of cooking for her is that the process is essentially practical chemistry in action.

I could hardly believe it! She sounded like a modern-day version of Bonnie Garmus’s wonderful character, Elizabeth Zott, in her novel, Lessons in Chemistry!  I had only just read the book a week or so before! All the way through reading it, I kept telling my wife how brilliant and original the book is. Apparently this is Garmus’s first novel. If she keeps going like this then phew!

The novel is set in 1960s America, in an environment largely unsupportive of a determined and brilliant female chemist. However, despite inevitable challenges Zott progresses unstoppably and unpredictably, most notably by becoming the unlikely presenter of a cooking programme, in which, you’ve guessed it, she focuses on the chemistry underlying the cooking process. Not only is Zott an inspiring, formidable character but she is accompanied in her absorbing journey by a diverse cast of supporting characters, including her laser sharp daughter, an exceptionally intelligent dog (named Six-Thirty), a neighbour locked into an awful marriage and her agonised producer who is initially desperate for her to conform to the stereotypes of the time.

I think anyone with even a smidgen of interest in science and women’s roles within it would absolutely love this book. It might particularly inspire older teenagers to consider the idea of a STEM career, which would be wonderful if it sometimes succeeded in doing so. However, I also think it would reinvigorate interest in anyone, who for whatever reason lost interest in science. Having taught maths and science in the past, as well as English, I think nearly everyone has had negative experiences at some stage in either or both of these subjects, with girls especially being told that, ‘this subject’s not for you’. I went to university to do a biology degree and couldn’t have been more inspired after completing my A levels. Three years of generally awful teaching squeezed every ounce of enthusiasm from me and was only restored after, thankfully, someone asked for some help with the subject, which gradually revived my interest, so I know how powerful the negative experiences can be. (Also I gave up chemistry as soon as I could at school because the teacher knew my dad and picked on me.**)

As you may have gathered, I highly commend this remarkable book! I hope you enjoy it should you decide to read it.

*I know! She could of course run rings around me on most topics but has the humility to take lessons from a simpleton like me, who’s only advantage is being a native speaker of English!

** To be fair, I pushed back strongly so gave as good as I got – he was probably pleased I gave up the subject too!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus. Penguin Random House UK ISBN 978-1-8049-9092-6

The Bicycle, written by Mevan Babakar & Patricia McCormick, illustrated by Yas Imamura, reviewed by Pippa Goodhart 16 Feb 4:17 AM (26 days ago)

This is a very special book; one which I think children will remember forever. Why? Because it shows the very worst and the very best of humanity. It shows those things particularly powerfully because this story is true.

Mevan and her family had lived in Kurdistan for generations. It was a place 'where figs fell from the trees and the air smelled like honeysuckle'. It was where Mevan's family and friends were. My four-year-old grandson was particularly interested in the grocer who gave Mevan a sweet!

                But then the Iraqi government forced Kurds like Mevan and her family to flee their                    homes.

Mevan and her parents travelled to Turkey, on to Azerbaijan then Russia, unwelcome and with poor Mevan feeling smaller and smaller. 

But they found kindness in the Netherlands where  Mevan was fascinated by all the people riding bikes. She'd never seen bikes before. She longed to ride one, but she had no bike until ...

 ... Egbert, caretaker of the building she was living in, gave Mevan a red bike that 'made Mevan feel a hundred feet tall'.

A year later, Mevan and her parents were told that there was a new home waiting for them 'in a country where they would be safe, where they would never have to leave. Mevan and her family had to leave in such a hurry that she never got the chance to say goodbye to Egbert.' 

They settled in the UK, and Mevan 'never forgot the man who taught her how big a small act of kindness can be.'

In a heartwarming Epilogue we learn that Mevan grew up and visited that land of figs and honeysuckle, seeing grandparents but, poignantly, 'the grocer was gone', as were many others.

Grown-up Mevan also visited the Netherlands, and she asked if anybody knew of kind Egbert who had 'seen her when others hadn't' and give her that important red bike? They did ... 

What's Mevan doing now? She's doing important and positive work towards a better world for everyone 

It's an astonishing story, as you can tell beautifully told and illustrated. Highly recommended.

Authors (and illustrators, and musicians) v. AI bros — Anne Rooney 13 Feb 4:07 AM (29 days ago)

 The UK government is holding an open consultation on copyright and AI. This might seem an esoteric bit of government faffing that most people don't need to pay attention to, but it's far more than that. It's potentially a fight to the death between British creative industries and the techbros who are currently tearing the US state machinery apart in defiance of US law and the constitution. Do they look like people we can trust?

This is the issue: creative work is protected by copyright laws. This makes it illegal for one person to copy the work of another without their permission and distribute it or make a profit from selling or licensing it. The livelihood of the creative industries and individual creators relies on this. You can't steal creative work in the same way that you can't steal beans from the supermarket. It's simple. But the AI bros say they want an exception so that they can 'scrape' high quality creative works to train their AIs. And for some utterly bizarre reason, the government is up for this. The creative industries are worth £126 billion and employ 2.4 million people in the UK. Latest UK government figures show AI generated only £14 billion and employed 64,500 people. But the government sees potential for growth (even at the cost of die-back in the creative industries).

The argument the AI bros make is that they are not really copying anything. They are scraping the works and generating new works from patterns they have identified in them. Yet if you tried to publish a 'new' Harry Potter story, you would find Bloomsbury and Warner Bros suing you within seconds. If you copied all Disney's 101 Dalmatians and made a new cartoon in which they did something else, you would be sued. So where's the difference? If AI has been trained on, say, the works of an illustrator, someone can ask it to produce a particular image in the style of that illustrator and then they don't have to pay the illustrator, even though the new image would not exist if it were not for their years of training and practising and developing their style.

The government and the AI bros are trying to get away with this by ignoring the distinction between generative AI (like ChatGPT or, more recently DeepSeek) and the more useful (for humankind) AI that will help develop new medications, identify cancer cells, decode degraded documents, and so on. Yes, we can benefit from AI's input in many fields. No, we don't need AI writing poor quality stories, or copying the artwork or musical styles of talented professionals. AI needs to be trained to recognise cancerous cells by looking at cancerous and non-cancerous cells, not by scanning images by illustrators or literary novels. It works out new protein structures by looking at the molecular configuration of known proteins, not by listening to all the work of Mick Jagger or scanning photos from a picture library. The point of training AI on high quality creative work is ONLY to replace those creators and their livelihoods. ChatGPT can already write coherent sentences, so if someone wants to use it to write their in-house reports, marketing documents, etc, it can do that now. It won't be improved by having scanned the latest prize-winning novel.

Here's a suggestion. The government could licence for AI scraping any text written at the expense of the tax-payer. So any government documents, anything published by people who are paid for their work in the civil service, research papers from research funded by the state, and so on. And they can leave the rest of us alone. If a particular organisation wants to use AI to write their reports or whatever, they can get an LLM and train it on all their previous in-house work — that is, the text they own.

As for those people who would like to write a novel but don't have the skill — just don't. There are lots of people who would like to be professional footballers but don't have the skill. They can't do it. That's life.

And finally... While this consultation has been ongoing, DeepSeek has stolen OpenAI's work to make its own cheaper and better model. Those of us whose work has been stolen think this is pretty hilarious. It also means the UK consultation is probably a complete waste of time as the baton has already passed to China and no one is going to invest confidently in UK-based AI anyway. But please, if you want actual writers and illustrators to survive, tell the government we don't want the AI bros to have access to our work. And make sure you don't buy or endorse materials based on IPR theft.

If you want to respond to the government consultation, you can write to your MP or respond individually until 25 Feb. The consultation document is here. It includes specific question you can respond to. It's long. Of course. To discourage you. Don't let the bastards grind you down.

Anne Rooney

website

Coming later this year: The Essential Book of AI, Arcturus Publishing, November 2025

The Process of Making ‘The Old Cow in the Kitchen’, by Lynda Waterhouse 10 Feb 10:00 PM (last month)

Here is the film.

This is how the project took shape.

https://www.londonsscreenarchives.org.uk/title/22456/

Rewind to the late 1990s, a piece of graffiti on a wall in the Elephant and Castle said:

A fungus grows on our collected Dickens

Back home I took the line and added one of my own to make a poem.

The soil of the Elephant makes rich pickings

Like a demented Cassandra I wailed on and on about how the developers will move in and destroy/sell off the area and that opportunities must not be wasted.

I never finished the poem to my satisfaction. It languished in my unfinished drawer.

In the 2010s I began a poem, ‘The Marmalade Ladies’, inspired by two older sisters, Marian and Jessie, who made tons of delicious marmalade to sell every year at West Square Summer Fete.

 I never finished this poem either. It also languished in my unfinished drawer.

Fast forward a decade or so and, as part of a campaign group set up to protest at the high rise land grab by off-shore developers, I met Marian who was now in her 90s. She told me she was leaving to move into sheltered accommodation.

There was no time to waste languishing or otherwise. Her memories needed to be captured.

Encouragement

So many people offered encouragement and support. There was a neighbour, John, who had lived in the area all his life, and was a treasure trove of stories, photographs and connections. There was Ludmilla, a film maker and housing co-op member. We’d recently worked together (with no funding) to make a short film about housing co-ops: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irrF_AdbaKI&t=513s

Our Local councillor, Maria Linford-Hall, encouraged me to apply for some funding from Southwark Council’s Neighbourhood Fund. A local historical society agreed to vouch for me and manage the funding. We started visiting and recording Marian and John began to write down his memories.

The End Goal

At first our goal was simply to make a short film capturing memories, put on an event, and stay in budget.

Experimenting in style

We began by recording conversations loosely based around a theme but trying to capture the feel of a conversation between friends rather than a specific interview. We did experiment with a more traditional question and answer approach but it just didn’t work.

The idea changes shape and the End Goalposts shifted

John kept on writing, Marian kept sharing, AND we discovered Marian’s father’s photographs and felt that his work needed to be exhibited at the event.

I invited some people to sing and for local poet, Paul Taylor, to recite some of his poems. I finished the ‘Marmalade Ladies’ poem and dared myself to read it. We made John’s writing and photos into a booklet. There was a memory table for people to share their memories. The End Goal had shifted.

Celebrating is not showing off

By nature I am an introvert. I am also a product of my northern working class background where any attempt to push yourself forward was considered ‘making a show of yourself.’ This had to be worked on.

So, during this process I learned that ideas can take a long time to shape and form and sometimes they are developed in unexpected ways. It’s always good to have an End Goal to work towards but, once you start writing, expect it to change in surprising ways and embrace that change. Experimenting in style is a good thing because you can tell what doesn’t work as well as what does, and always take time to celebrate your achievements! 

THE SECRET LAKE by Karen Inglis (a review) by Sharon Tregenza 9 Feb 7:38 AM (last month)

There is a second and third book in the series.

Members' News 6 Feb 10:00 PM (last month)

 Congratulations to  Susan Quinn on the publication of MY MUM from Quarto Books on February 27th. 

The story celebrates the bond between mother and child and follows them as they take on life's big and small adventures - together. From sailing a ship around the garden and exploring forests, streams and meadows, to telling stories in a cosy den and cuddling before bedtime, a child reveals all the simple yet amazing things she loves to do with her wondrously adventurous mum.

https://www.quarto.com/books/9780711296688/my-mum

The Welsh language edition of Miriam Halahmy's YA novel, BEHIND CLOSED DOORS is coming from Graffeg this February. The novel was originally published by Holiday House Books in America and Firefly Press in the UK. It won the Manchester Metropolitan University great student giveaway in 2018, "the clear and popular choice."

https://graffeg.com/products/pan-fydd-drysau-n-cau

Karen McCombie’s latest MG novel – ‘World of Wanda’ – was one of The Observer’s Children’s Books of the Month for January. The story was partly-inspired by her son’s ADHD diagnosis, which coincided with her developing the dual-voice story of Wanda and Margot. ADHD very quickly and naturally became part of Wanda’s character. 

Twelve-year-old Wanda doesn’t go to school, because she and her mum are too busy back-packing around the world. The trouble is, Wanda is homesick for a home that doesn’t exist. When she finds out a secret her mum has been keeping from her, Wanda decides it’s time to have an adventure of her very own. Meanwhile, back in the UK, 14-year-old Margot isn’t prepared for the shock that’s about to land on her doorstep…

https://uclanpublishing.com/book/world-of-wanda/

Gathering the Glimmers, written and illustrated by Ffion Jones was published on January 30th, from Tiny Tree Press.

Glimmers are brief everyday moments that spark a sense of joy by reminding us of the beauty in simple things.

A little girl called Wren is on her way home through a dark forest when she gets lost. In the forest there are many triggers, which evoke her fear and anxiety. Yet through the darkness, Wren is able to notice glimmers all around her; in the leaves, the sunlight, and ultimately within herself.

 https://www.ffijones.com/

https://tinytreebooks.com/gathering-the-glimmers/

 Julie Pike's Flamechasers has been shortlisted for the Portsmouth School Libraries' Book Award in the Year 5 category. Congratulations, Julie.

https://fireflypress.co.uk/authors/julie-pike/

Barbara Henderson is celebrating the launch of I DON'T DO MOUNTAINS this month. Despite the official publication date of 17th March, readers at the Fort William Mountain Festival will be the first to get their hands on this adventure story set in the Scottish hills. It is Scottish Mountaineering Press's first children's book, following their 2023 win of Small Press of the Year, Scotland, at the Nibbies.

https://www.barbarahenderson.co.uk/

Congratulations to all, and to everyone else who has a book out this month. The next news shout-out will be on March 7th. Get your good news items to Claire Fayers by the end of February to be included.

Celebrating the Lunar New Year by Eva Wong Nava 5 Feb 10:00 PM (last month)

*Credit: Natelle Quek

I've been celebrating the lunar new year since I was a babe. I am one of the millions of people who are part of the Chinese diaspora. When I go to schools to give talks about the festival, this is what I tell the children:

 

Eva Wong Nava was born on a tropical island where a merlion protects its inhabitants from marauding pirates. Her ancestors braved monsoon winds sailing from the Middle Kingdom across the Southern Seas to plant roots in British Malaya. They brought ancient traditions and rituals with them and have practised them in Southeast Asia since the 13th century. When the winds changed, her relatives sailed north, braving hailstorms and snowfall, taking familiar traditions and rituals to America, Europe and England, where they formed new homes and families, and continued practising these traditions in the Western Hemisphere. Eva writes stories for children inspired by her childhood and heritage. She lives in London with a goat, dog and tiger.

There are books galore helping children and their parents, caregivers and teachers celebrate the lunar new year, which is called Chinese New Year by the Chinese and its diaspora, Tet by the Vietnamese and its diaspora, Seollal by the Koreans and their diaspora, and Tsagaan Sar by the Mongolian and its diaspora. While some books are IP (Intellectual Propery) created in-house by publishers, there are also ones written by own voices authors with lived experience of celebrating the lunar new year. I will focus on the ones published in the UK.

For children aged 6 - 9, Eric Huang's debut duology, Guardians Of the New Moon (Little Tiger), is a fun and pacy read, introducing children to the myth behind the legend of the Great Race and various gods and goddesses of the Chinese pantheon.

 

*Author's Instagram

Maisie Chan's Tiger Warrior series (Hachette) makes for a great close companion. These are good for children 8 plus.

 

*Author's Instagram

East Asian Folktales, Myths and Legends (Scholastic) is a collection of stories good for children from nine plus. I had fun researching and retelling the many familiar stories of my childhood. I grew up in a family of storytellers and like the many children of the Chinese diaspora, stories like the Great Race, were passed down orally from one generation to the next.

 

Also from the same publisher, there is I Love Chinese New Year. This is picture book, with illustrations by Xin Li, a China-born, Norway-based illustrator, is a celebration of the festival for readers from three plus. It gives teachers, who are keen to teach their classes about the festival, tips on how to do this within the story, explanations about the symbolisms in the back matter, and fun facts on why the dragon is still the most revered and favourite animal in the Chinese zodiac. [Hint: the dragon is the only celestial animal in the Chinese zodiac.]

In the UK, there is a dearth of books that explore the Chinese diaspora experience, culture and heritage for children. While there are many editors focusing on Christmas, Eid and Diwali, there are others who understand that often times, books on the lunar new year written by own voices authors are missing.

A new book, Dancing Dumplings For My One And Only (Walker Books), has twirled its way to your kitchen.

 

This book celebrates family bonds, traditions and a heritage food -- the dumpling or jiaozi -- and it was released on January 2 in the UK. The publisher had planned it for the 2025 lunar new year market, even though this picture book isn't strictly about the lunar new year. An author's note provided by me explains why jiaozi are eaten during this special time of the year.

 

*the inside cover of Dancing Dumplings For My One And Only

Dancing Dumplings For My One And Only was illustrated by Natelle Quek, a UK-based illustrator of Malaysian-Chinese heritage. I'll be honest and admit that Walker and I decided to wait for Natelle. Hence what was suppose to be my UK debut became the fifth book in my writing career. by the time it was released. 

The Art Director from Walker, Nghiem Ta, said, "After so many years designing children's books, this is the first project I've worked on that fully showcases my heritage."

This echoes the reality of East and Southeast Asian representation in the UK publishing market. While the Chinese New Year celebrations are gaining traction and becoming more familiar and popular in the United Kingdom, the Vietnamese, Korean and Mongolian lunar new years are barely mentioned and invisible in books and media. But things are changing as the Year of the Snake promises to bring in good omens for those who are patient, stategic and willing to embrace the Snake's wisdoms. "Slow. Firm. Focused" is the way to go! Like in my favourite Aesop's tale - slow and steady wins the race.

Lawrence of Arabia by Paul May 3 Feb 9:00 PM (last month)

It's several years now since I wrote on this blog about the publishers called World's Work Children's Books. You can read that post here but, to recap, I'd always been intrigued by this publisher who produced high quality illustrated children's books throughout the 1960s and 1970s, mainly reprints of US editions, and then disappeared. 

I finally got around to doing some proper research back then, and among the things I discovered was that The Windmill Press where the books had been produced had been established in the 1920s by the publisher F N Doubleday. Everyone called him 'Effendi" because of those initials. Doubleday wanted to set up a press in the healthy surroundings of the Surrey countryside. He found a suitable site after some searching and apparently took the architects and a couple of friends for a picnic of smoked salmon and champagne in bluebell-carpeted woods on the hillside above the planned location. Those friends were TE Lawrence and Rudyard Kipling.

RIBA Ref No RIBA72832 The Courtyard Windmill Press, Kingswood, Surrey. 1929 Photo: Sydney W Newbery If you enlarge the photo you can just see Kipling's fishpond. Check out the Google link below to see the courtyard today.

Lawrence suggested that the windows on the ground floor should go right to the ground to provide maximum light and a lovely view for the workers inside. Kipling suggested a fish pond and later provided fish from his own pond at Batemans. Back when I wrote about this I was planning to travel across London and see what was left of Effendi's vision, Lawrence's windows and Kipling's pond, but I somehow never got around to it.

Then one day last autumn I noticed that the film of Lawrence of Arabia was on the TV and I watched it. It's very entertaining if you haven't seen it, what with Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif and Anthony Quinn racing around on camels with thousands of extras. And shortly afterwards I was thinking about where we could go for a birthday weekend in January and I remembered that during the pandemic we'd been planning a trip to Weymouth that had never happened and I started looking at hotels. When I came across The Lawrence of Arabia Hotel (sea-views, Arabian breakfast!) how could I resist?

And, having booked the hotel, I remembered my plan to visit The Windmill Press. After a bit of searching on the map I found the spot and learned that it was now occupied by an investment management company called Fidelity International. I couldn't work out if the old buildings were still there and decided not to call and try to arrange a visit in case they said no. Instead, I got my folding bike and caught a train. 

It was a very cold and misty day in early January. I arrived at Epsom Downs station and cycled past the racecourse with the grandstand looming out of the mist. Tamworth and Kingswood were villages once, but London has overwhelmed them. I cycled through suburban streets and then through a vast, up-market private housing estate where the houses are planted in the forest and surrounded by trees. I finally emerged by the road that led up to the Windmill Press, or it did once. Now it led up to security barriers. I could have just ridden past them but as I hoped to get a close look at the buildings I pressed the buzzer and spoke to the security guards.

They sounded puzzled. They would speak to their boss but they thought it was unlikely. I got cut off. I called back. 'Oh, yes. My colleague is on his way out to see you. He'll explain.'

The front of the old building, 2025. Nice to see that the windows are the same.

Looking away from the entrance towards countryside

I saw a man in a hi-vis vest approaching and I pushed my bike towards him. He said he'd had a word with his boss and I couldn't come in. I suggested I could take some photos from the entrance and he replied that he couldn't stop me. It was a public right of way. I tried a bit of chat about Lawrence and Kipling but he didn't seem to know who they were. He walked away quite slowly. I pushed my bike past the barriers and there was the original building at the end of the driveway. As I fiddled around with my camera I kept catching sight of the security guard trying to keep a covert eye on me, presumably to make sure I didn't approach too closely. Lawrence's windows are still there, but Kipling's pond is gone. Happily, someone has posted a photo of the current arrangements in the courtyard inside the building on Google Maps. Effendi would have been astonished, though he'd probably have been even more astonished by the multi-storey car-park that has recently been constructed in the grounds. And in those grounds the fund managers stroll at lunchtime, presumably very much as those lucky workers at the Windmill Press used to do.

At the beginning, the workers had to catch the train to Kingswood and then walk a couple of miles, but many later moved out to the suburbs, helping to drive the growth of Kingswood and Tamworth. But the tide of London housing stops short of Effendi's workers' Utopia and the site still feels as if it's on the edge of the countryside, despite the fact that Reigate and the M25 are only just out of view. 

A week later we made our way to Weymouth. The Lawrence of Arabia Hotel is a kind of shrine to TE Lawrence. The hosts are extremely knowledgeable and the breakfasts and sea views are excellent. On the way there we stopped for lunch at Kingston Lacy, where the National Trust property naturally has a second-hand book shop. I went in and almost the first thing I saw was this copy of Under Black Banner by Geoffrey Trease. I opened it and discovered that it was published back in 1951 and printed in Great Britain by The Windmill Press Ltd at Kingswood, Surrey.

More on Geoffrey Trease next month . . .

Building a Library - Joan Lennon 2 Feb 4:30 PM (last month)

About a year ago, I posted about books From Back When. I have a library of favourite books that were read to me when I was little, and that I read to my boys when they were little, and now we're building a library for my grandson who is little. (He's 3 now.) We've found copies of some of the (very) old favourites. And every week, on Thursday morning, he and I go to the local public library and trawl through the overly-packed boxes in the picture book section. And we are finding treasure! Here are just a few of the books that we found and are gradually buying for Arran to keep for when he has children of his own.

(These are of course just what's home from the public library at the moment and therefore available to be photographed. There have been many more!)

In no special order:

I am Bat written and illustrated by Morag Hood, simply for Bat - 'I am ferocious like a lion. (But smaller and with wings.)'

And one more Morag Hood - Teapot Trouble - because I am in love with Tiny Horse and his irrepressible enthusiasm

On the Night of the Shooting Star written by Amy Hest and illustrated by Jenni Desmond, if for no other reason than it includes the sentence 'The cocoa is hot, the biscuits sublime.'

Who knows what we may discover next Thursday! Meantime, any suggestions for Arran's library gratefully received.

Joan Lennon website

Joan Lennon Instagram

A STORYTIME SELECTION, OR NOT? by Penny Dolan 31 Jan 3:00 PM (last month)

Here, for February, are a selection of the picture books that I might use for my next Under Five’s Library Storytimes. I am not ‘reviewing’ these five titles here: I’m thinking through why I chose the books from the Book Boxes, why I might use the stories, why I might not and what I need to remember as I use them, both my first and second reading thoughts.  I'll ignore for the moment, and out of kindness to you, any accompanying 'musical' input.

Are you sitting comfortably? If so, here we go . . .

FREDDIE AND THE FAIRY by Julia Donaldson and Karen George.

 

Thoughts: The illustrations, with their slightly wobbly lines, are gentle, and the muted colours are softly attractive. Julia’s titles can be easy to read aloud because they are grounded in her experience as a performer., which adds when you are reading it aloud for real. Sometimes, though, despite the simplicity of the rhyming verses, she throws a complication or development into the plot which needs a bit of extra voice energy, and maybe a moment’s pause and audience interaction.

Plot: Freddie rescues a Fairy, but unfortunately Bessie-Belle keeps misunderstanding his mumbled wishes. A frog arrives, not a dog, and a bat instead of a cat. Grumbles and tears! The Fairy Queen, appearing, reminds Freddie that Bessie Bell cannot hear very well. She gives Freddie three rules: don’t mumble, turn away or cover up your mouth. Freddie tries out the advice, learns, gets his wishes and all ends amusingly.

Second thoughts: Depending on the age of the children in the audience, this may be too complex an idea to use. Will it work if I introduce it by chatting about ‘hearing’ before I read the story? Demonstrate the Rules? Nevertheless, living with someone hard of hearing, I know that the message in this book is important. I’ll read it through a few more times, and decide on the day.

THE BUTTON BOOK by Sally Nicholls and Bethan Woollvin. 

Thoughts: Though the illustrations, with line drawings and a basic colour palette, look a little odd to my old eyes and the drawn characters are not immediately sweet or ‘feely’, that does not mean that children would see them the same. (Don’t pre-judge, Penny!) And very much for the younger children, to my mind.

Plot: The ‘story’ is simple: in fact, the reading is almost playing. Each spread has a ‘button’; not the usual plastic button that soon stops working, but a drawn button so the book can be re-used as much as you want. The reader – adult, child or children – are the ones that have fun by supplying the sound. The round red button ‘beeps’, the orange triangle button is a ‘clapping ‘button, another is a rude noise – of course – and it ends with a song and turning out of the light.

Second thoughts: All that’s needed is a sense of fun and imagination and – for children - an adult to show how the book works the first time round. Until I try this out, I don’t know how it will go. Also, I suspect that, at the end of a busy day, the adult involvement needed might stop this being a first choice for a goodnight story. (nb. I found this, with two damaged spreads, on the Book Sale table. Mended, the book will go into my reserve collection at home.)

LITTLE CLOUD by Anne Booth and Sarah Massini.

 

Thoughts: A very happy book. The art work is gently beautiful; the colours create a sense of open air and a world where the people are gazing up at the sky. As a fictional place, these first pages feel very much where I’d like to be. The story has an interesting character angle pov too: a cloud rather than person and the page layouts might not make this a straightforward read. Will it work? Certainly, the words on the first pages read lightly and just poetically enough to be charmed. ‘Once there was a dream of a cloud. Waiting, hiding, in a blue sky, which became a whisper of white . . .’

Plot. The main character, a little white cloud, floats around in the sky, observed and admired by everyone on the ground. Among the watchers are three anonymous children - a girl, a boy, a younger child in a dinosaur hoodie - and a friendly dog. However when the little cloud changes from one shape to another, people don’t want to see it anymore. Only a pretty flower, a farmer watering his thirsty plants, fish in the streams and river, and the three children and dog, splashing about in the puddles, are still happy to see the cloud now. Needless to say, there is a rainbow at the storm’s end.

Second thoughts: This story is lovely but it could definitely one where, reading to a largish group, I need to expand and demonstrate the story with gestures, and comments on what’s happening. Also, what weather songs and rhymes do I have that might fit with this – or any of these other titles? (Little Cloud is another repaired book for my collection too.)


THE BIG ANGRY ROAR by Jonny Lambert 

Thoughts. Aha, a book about feelings, which is almost a picture book genre in itself. However, the fact that this book is about a tiger cub and the real world animal world, unlike my other book suggestions, gives ANGRY ROAR a nice straightforward energy. Maybe because the author is both the illustrator and writer? Though anger is the theme, the book has plenty of calming white pace on the page, the grey/green/sand range of colours feel satisfying and Lambert uses an interesting perspective in the spreads. As always, I wish I had a larger version of this book to show everyone. I could walk around with the book, but the young audience often feels like a bundle of puppies around my feet.

Plot: A lion cub, still angry about the way his little sister behaves, stomps off from the pride, so full of anger he could pop. Other animals show him how they let out their anger. The zebras tramp and stamp, which hurts his soft paws., the hippo and rhino crash and splash which makes him smelly, and so on, until at last with a young elephant, they cause trouble. Fortunately, Baboon is a wise old thing and shows the two how to let the anger out safely – and there’s a kind moment to end with too.

Second thoughts. I like this ‘telling’, because of the message that comes through behind the story. I am also curious about how I could play with and expand this story through action and sounds. However, I’ve noted that the book drops straight into the African context, so the title will definitely need some moments of introduction to make the most of it.

Last of all, we have
SMELLY PEGGY by Helen Stephens. 

 Thoughts. I like this book, which is another single writer & illustrator title, specifically because the story is about the reality of rescue dog ownership rather than a fantasy relationship.

Plot: A young girl, Pie, narrates the story. She talks about how Peggy, though cute, is also cheeky. She jumps on beds and people, steals clothes, and rolls in all sorts of smelly stuff when they take her out for walks, and then spread the stink around at home. Then, when Peggy’s been showered clean, she shakes her wet coat out over everybody. And when Pie and her family are all cuddled up on the sofa, Peggy can still surprise them – stinkily!

Second thoughts. This strength of this book, as well as being about the practical problems of dog ownership, is that the story also suggest that animals – and people – can be loved despite their faults. I am not yet sure how or if it will work as a Storytime read, nor whether the story would be more for the parents and carers than the younger listeners.

                                              
Finally, I’m hoping my first and second thoughts on these books make some sort of sense to you. As always, I often wish I had larger versions of whichever book I’m reading so everyone could enjoy the art work during  the session. 

In practice, though I could walk around with each picture book, showing all the spreads and page turns, young audiences can sometimes feel like a bundle of puppies around one’s feet. There are times when everyone, big and small, needs to be kept safe! 

Have a great February.
Penny Dolan

Folly Farm - sort of by Claire Fayers 26 Jan 10:00 PM (last month)

This would normally be my Folly Farm post. Friday got off to a great start with a quiz from Jo Franklin, lots of relaxed chat and so many boxes of chocolates we could barely see one another over them. Saturday started in traditional fashion with early morning stretches led by Camilla Chester, followed by the world's biggest cooked breakfast, and the ever-popular Tracy Darnton writing bootcamp.