Cracking yarns
With the Easter holidays on the horizon, CHARLOTTE HEATHCOTE chooses the best new books to keep children entertained
QUICK QUACK QUENTIN
by Kes Gray and Jim Field
Hodder Children’s Books, £ 11.99 Quentin is a duck with a tooquick quack that comes out as “Quck”.
He asks all the animals on the farm if they can spare a letter “A”. But only the aardvark can help in this fun and colourful tale.
I’LL WAIT, MR PANDA
by Steve Antony
Hodder Children’s Books, £ 11.99 Mr Panda is baking but only one animal is willing to wait for the mouth- watering results. A tribute to the virtues of patience from the award- winning Steve Antony.
WOLFIE THE BUNNY by Ame Dyckman, illustrated by Zachariah OHora
Andersen Press, £ 11.99 Dot the Bunny is horrified when a baby wolf joins the Bunny family. “He’s going to eat us all up!” she shrieks but her smitten parents won’t listen.
An amusing tale of sibling rivalry with stylish, retro illustrations.
ARE YOU SITTING COMFORTABLY?
by Leigh Hodgkinson
Bloomsbury Children’s Books, £ 11.99 “When I want to read / What I really really need / Is a place to sit / Just for a bit.” Our little reader seeks out a cosy spot for a read in a rhyming book that is a homage to the joys of books.
GIRAFFE ON A BICYCLE
by Julia Woolf
Macmillan Children’s Books, £ 6.99 When Monkey finds a bicycle, Giraffe cycles off through the jungle picking up a menagerie of animal passengers along the way.
Young readers will learn about team spirit in this fun and colourful read.
FICTION FOR YOUNG READERS 5+ POLLY AND THE PUFFIN: THE STORMY DAY
by Jenny Colgan
Little, Brown, £ 5.99 Polly is stuck indoors on a rainy day waiting for her father’s fishing boat to come in. Then her pet puffin Neil flies away. Will they both make it home safely?
A gentle seaside tale from the bestselling author with striking black- and- orange illustrations plus fun activities based on the story.
7+ KNITBONE PEPPER GHOST DOG AND THE LAST CIRCUS TIGER by Claire Barker, illustrated by Ross Collins
Usborne, £ 9.99 Friendly ghost dog Knitbone Pepper haunts Starcross Hall, home to the wonderfully eccentric Lord and Lady Pepper.
Down on their uppers, they open the hilarious “best worst tourist attraction in the country” at Starcross and their next money- spinning wheeze sees the circus roll into the grounds, setting the scene for more entertaining adventures.
Funny, wonderfully imaginative and beautifully illustrated the Knitbone Pepper books are highly recommended.
8+ HAMISH AND THE NEVERPEOPLE by Danny Wallace, illustrated by Jamie Littler
Simon & Schuster, £ 6.99 Hamish and his friends stumble upon Otherearth, a world full of everyone’s opposite halves, where the evil Scarmarsh is trying to take over the world using his brainblanking zap.
Even the Prime Minister has fallen victim! Can Hamish stage an intervention and save the world? A follow- up to bestselling, award- winning debut Hamish And The Worldstoppers, this is equally lively and gleefully silly.
BEETLE BOY
by MG Leonard
Chicken House, £ 6.99 Darkus Cuttle’s dad has mysteriously disappeared from a locked room in the Natural History Museum so Darkus moves in with his uncle Max whose neighbours have a major beetle infestation.
But these are magical beetles fighting for survival against evil fashion designer Lucretia Cutter with her penchant for living jewellery.
She also holds the key to finding Darkus’s dad. Roald Dahl meets 101 Dalmatians in a rollicking ride, full of adventure with vivid characters. THE PERSON CONTROLLER
by David Baddiel HarperCollins, £ 6.99 For twins Fred and Ellie, computer games are a blessed escape from the school bullies. Then a mystery man gives them a video- game controller that allows them to dramatically transform themselves.
A fast- paced and funny novel from an author with a gift for tapping into children’s wildest fantasies. 9+ THE MYSTERY OF THE JEWELLED MOTH
by Katherine Woodfine Egmont, £ 6.99 From the author of The Mystery Of The Clockwork Sparrow comes a second Edwardian mystery starring shop girls and amateur detectives Sophie and Lil.
The Jewelled Moth brooch is stolen and our young heroines’ investigations among the aristocracy lead them to a terrifying criminal mastermind.
With layers of mystery and evocative period detail this absorbing novel will delight fans of Philip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart books and Chris Riddell’s Goth Girl series.