Children’s book reviews
Hopefully by the time you read this our shops will be back in business and normal shopping can be resumed. Fingers crossed, for there are gifts to buy and shops to support. Books give such a lot of pleasure – if you match them with the right person. Buying one for a child aged five or under is easy and there are beautiful picture books and great stories to choose from. Choosing a book for an older child is not always so simple if you don’t have children of your own, but you can always take advice from a mum or dad. With so many to choose from, here are a few ideas for your shopping list from children’s book reviewer CAROLINE FRANKLIN
TO help the very young understand the meaning of Christmas, there’s the big board book of The Christmas Story (Dorling Kindersley £7.99 HB). The colourful pages have everybody smiling (except that regretful innkeeper), even the camel and the donkey look happy. A perfect way to introduce two- to three-year-olds to the story of the birth of Jesus. You couldn’t have more of a contrast to the gentle Christmas story than David Walliams’ Little
Monsters (Harper Collins £12.99 HB). Young Howler, a werewolf with a squeaky voice, is expelled from Monster School because he’s not nasty enough.
It’s only when he joins a troupe of children dressed up as spooks and knocking on doors for Hallowe’en that he makes a lot of friends and finds he can do something very well indeed. For those children aged 4 plus who don’t mind their stories spooky, this is a laugh a page.
Bang up to date there’s Eoin McLaughlin and Polly Dunbar’s While We
Can’t Hug (Faber £6.99. PB). Dedicated to ‘all the children who can’t hug the ones they love’, it follows on from The Hug by the same authors. Simple and charming, this second book may help to explain to very young children what they can do to show grandparents they are still loved, even without that big boisterous hug. I always had a bit of sympathy for Rumpelstiltskin, the greedy gnome who helped the miller’s daughter become a queen and then held her to her promise to give him her first born child if she could guess his name.
His story is one all children enjoy and the Usborne Young Reading Series One has a neat little edition – Rumpelstiltskin (£5.99 (HB). Now over 200 years old, the rascally chap, invented by the Brothers Grimm, has retained his popularity. A well-priced, attractively presented book.
Seven stories will thrill children aged
eight and over in the Illustrated Stories of Dragons (Usborne £12.99 HB). Dramatic illustrations by Khoa Le enhance the tales of the enchanted creatures, which include the mighty Jormungandr who ate so much that his body circled the world, and a dragon whose tears caused tulips to bloom. Colourful, magical and exciting, this is a book to delight the boy or girl who receives it. The story of the volcano which devastated an Italian city in
AD79 is well told and illustrated in
Pompeii (Usborne £5.99
HB). Karen Ball vividly captures the tension which led from early rumblings to the final inexorable flowing of molten lava by showing its terrible impact on the lives of ordinary people and their animals. A small book with a big story which children of eight-plus will find fascinating.
Two collections of tales to delight bookworms are the Tamworth Pig Stories (Faber and Faber, £6.99 PB) and The Puffin Book of Christmas Stories (Puffin Books, £7.99 PB). Two long stories of “the very fine pig, the best you’ll ever see” make up the captivating tales of how Tamworth goes on the campaign trail, with the help of his friends, Tom and Blossom. Written by Gene Kemp there is something for the eight- to nine-year-olds to smile about on every page. The Puffin Book of Christmas Stories is a glorious mix of 13 stories which are as Christmassy as they come, from names such as Jacqueline Wilson, Alison Uttley, Malorie Blackman and Gillian Cross. Charles Dickens has a mention, too, with Marley’s Ghost from A Christmas Carol. Compiled by Wendy Cooling, the stories range from the origins of the Christmas Rose and Christmas with Auntie May to a retelling of Baboushka, a Russian fairy tale. With its bright red Christmassy cover, this book is sure to be a favourite Tales of Brave and Brilliant Girls From Around The World (Usborne £12.99 HB) brings together stories of girl folk heroes. These are tales which have long been shared whilst people clustered around a fire. Some are fairy tales, but others are about real girls, in many cases based on stories handed down through hundreds of years. The glossy pages and beautiful illustrations bring the girls to life. Amongst them are a dragon fighter and a brave warrior queen – as well as a girl who is given frog feet to help her follow a rather nice young man through some tricky situations. Exciting tales for the nine- to 10-yearolds – male or female. Once we are free again, how good it would be to show a 10- or 11-year-old some of the impressive buildings which feature in Castles (Dorling Kindersley £16.99 HB). From our own Windsor Castle to the dungeons of Chillon Castle and Mehrangarh Fort which
‘glows orange in the sunlight’, there are more than 20 ancient buildings situated all over the world included to stimulate a child’s imagination and bring history to life.
Packed with information about what went on in castles, from cannon attacks to the revolting peasants and the man who had to clean the toilets, this is a book which will fascinate all the family.
Perhaps my favourite is
Stone Age Sentinel
(Usborne £6.99), a glossy tabloid ‘newspaper’ covering the news in a time long, long ago. There are headlines such as ‘Cave dwellers in graffiti battle’, ‘Mammoth Shortage Causes Concern’ and ‘Cave Shortage Prompts Hut-building Spree’. Written by Fergus Fleming and Paul Dowswell it’s fun, lively throughout its 32 pages and the good news for those of 10-plus is that there are more in the series.
The big beautiful A Clock of Stars; The Shadow
Moth (Harper Collins £12.99 HB) is a debut children’s book from Francesca Gibbons. It has magic in abundance and tells the tale of sisters Imogen and Marie who break all the rules by going through a door which they find in a tree. What lies the other side of the door is a wonderful fantasy world introduced to them by a spoiled prince.
Of course there are enemies in this new world – the evil skrets are on the attack and will the sisters ever get home safely? Can they trust the shadow moth? The first of a trilogy, this first book promises exciting reading in the future for the 10- to 11-year-olds.
And finally: I must mention a character whose books lit up my Christmases when I was a child for he has an important birthday.
I still have several dog-eared, battered Rupert books, the sort the Bargain Hunt team call “pre-loved” and my goodness they were. Rupert Bear is 100 years old this year and what a good job he and his chums have done in entertaining millions of children. (I occasionally still find myself wondering odd things such as ‘why was he given white shoes to wear?’ Thank you Rupert for all those stories topped up with a puzzle and such delights as how to make a paper kettle. The 2021 Rupert Annual (Egmont £9.99) has an awful lot of friends wishing him a happy birthday.