story time books

Not a new book, but a new edition of a book originally published in 2003, Mini Grey’s picture book turns the tale upside down by telling the old favourite of the Princess and the Pea from the pea’s point of view, which makes the story slightly different, as you can imagine. Obviously better if the child who has this read to them knows the original, but it will also stand alone. A nice twist, and great illustrations.

A picture book by Michael Rosen illustrated by Jonathan Langley, this is a variation on the classic story of getting what one wishes for and then finding it not what was really wanted. Cat and the other animals are cooling down in the shady barn, but Cat decides he wants it to himself, so chases all the others outside. When the others are outside they start a game of chase and Cat feels lonely. When they invite him to join the game they all have fun until the sun goes down behind a hill and it’s time for bed. Good fun and a moral shown rather than stated.

By Alan Durant, illustrated by Jo Simpson, this is a picture book about a very small dinosaur who is teased about his size but eventually becomes a hero when he rescues Tyro, the young Tyrannosaurus. Tyro has jumped so hard that the ground has cracked, so Tiny and his friend Archie the bird come to the rescue, because they won’t make things worse. Interesting pastel illustrations add to the story.

For November and December Story Time will be open on Mondays from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. So Monday to Friday 9-5, Saturday 10-4.

Terry Pratchett’s third tale of “the big wee hag”, Tiffany Aching, trainee witch, is now in paperback. Many lovers of the series will have already read it in hardcover, but it’s now available to those not prepared to pay the price of the original. Wonderfully inventive, wildly funny, wittily wise, it’s a true delight. Tiffany, despite warnings, joins the dark Morris dance which heralds winter, and the Wintersmith himself confuses her with the Summer Lady. Tiffany-shaped snowflakes appear, then other indications that the Wintersmith is seriously infatuated with Tiffany. Pratchett is so experienced that the writing seems effortless, the humour natural and the wisdom just part of the characters. The wee free men feature again, as do some of the other characters from the earlier books. If you haven’t read any of these, start at the beginning, with The Wee Free Men, go on to the A Hat Full of Sky, and enjoy them all.

This is the second volume of The Laws of Magic, by Michael Pryor, the sequel to Blaze of Glory. Set in what seems to be an alternative nineteenth century, with Albion and Gallia (England and France) in an uneasy alliance, the books are a sophisticated read. They are written in a style that allows the characters to be archly polite: “I say, old man”, while still saying exactly what they mean. A mix of politics, diplomacy and magic allows much scope for the author, and the characters, with a subtly developing love interest between our hero Aubrey and Caroline, but the books are also action-filled. This is very good fantasy writing, and I finished this volume hoping the next isn’t too far away. No content that means they can’t be read by younger readers, but the subtlety of the political (and magical) aspects means they’re a teenage read.

This is the ninth Jiggy McCue novel by Michael Lawrence. It’s a somewhat strange mixture of homage to the C.S. Lewis book with a similar sounding title, a rattling good yarn and humour, some of which is of the underpants/toilet type. I’m not usually a fan of that type of humour, but I laughed a lot at this. Jiggy ducks into the broom cupboard and finds himself in an alternate world where he is Juggy rather than Jiggy, he lives in a different house in the same street, and instead of planning for an outdoor adventure with the school, he has the expectations of a whole school resting on his ironing ability. Extreme ironing that is, as in ironing as a sport done while hanging in imaginatively precarious positions. He realises that he probably passed Juggy going the other way in the cupboard, and much of the humour and story is in his attempts to swap places again. There’s also some serious stuff in the relationships, both family and friend, and the realisation that even characteristics which are very frustrating can be missed when they’re absent. My only reservation is that at over 300 pages it’s quite a lot of reading, but those who can be encouraged into such an epic will laugh quite a lot. 9-12-year-olds, particularly boys.

Written by Mark Sommerset and illustrated by Rowan this was first published in hardback in 2005 by Primordi. The distribution was taken over by Random House earlier this year and now the paperback is published by them. It’s a story in verse of exactly what the title says. John McIntyre described it on National Radio as “quirky, philosophical, zen-like…absolutely delightful,” and it’s hard to better that description. The cork meditates on aloneness and togetherness, fear, balance and other qualities. My favourite quote is when a shark, used to being feared asks “Has it no fear of the deep?” and the cork replies ‘”I often look down,” the cork looked around,/ “And this I confess to be true,/ No more do I care for living in fear/ Than I care to be eaten by you”‘. Take that Osama and George W.

By Emily Gravett, this is now available in paperback. A wonderfully interactive retelling of the idea that home is often better than elsewhere if only we knew it, it features a meerkat called Sunny who decides that meerkat life is a little close and goes off to see the world. At each stop he sends a postcard home, cleverly hinged in lift-the-flap style so we can see both sides. As with her earlier Wolves there is lots to look at, point out, and discuss so that it’s difficult to imagine an uninterrupted reading of the book with any child who is more than half awake, but that is the glory of Gravett’s books. Wonderfully inventive and playful. If you love children’s books and haven’t discovered Emily Gravett, you should do so without further delay.

A picture book tale of sibling rivalry, Jessica Meserve’s Small is a book with few words, but an important story. Small is stuck in Big’s shadow, and in an act of frustration lets Big’s parrot out of its cage. Small turns out to be better than Big at climbing trees and returns her parrot to her, curing her sense of inferiority in the process. I love the illustrations and the spare text which works beautifully with the pictures. Many writers could learn from this how a story can be told in very few words, especially in this genre where much can be shown in the illustrations.