Booking in July

Picture Books

Rodney Loses It!, by Michael Gerard Bauer and Chrissie Crebs – a very funny and fun book to read with your kids; rhyming text is always a hit. This was the CBCA’s Book of the Year Winner in the Early Childhood category for 2018 and I’ll make the graceful segue into reminding people that next Friday, August 16th, the 2019 CBCA Winners will be announced. If you can’t get your hands on a copy of Rodney Loses It! you can now ‘read’ it on Story Box Libary.

This is a Ball, by Beck and Matt Stanton – This is a really fun series by a very talented husband and wife team. Created as more of a toy than a book, this is cleverly designed to have the adult and child interacting playfully with each other as they progress through the pages. If you have kids ages 5 and under, these are a must-read ‘books’.

My Heart, by Corinna Luyken – This is a brilliantly beautiful book that my kids did not appreciate for what it was: artwork.

We All Sing With The Same Voice, by J. Phillip Miller, Sheppard M. Greene, and Paul Meisel – sometimes I get nostalgic about books, songs and experiences from my childhood that I want to share with my kids. This is what lead to us borrowing Go Dog. Go! and buying Peace At Last. We All Sing With The Same Voice fits this newly created category. When I was a kid long childcare was not an option for us and we probably only did about 10 hours of 4-year-old kinder per week in the year before Prep, so there was plenty of time to watch Sesame Street. This book is one of the songs I have a distinct memory of from watching Sesame Street. The library copy we borrowed came with an audio CD of the song and my kids absolutely loved it. It was one of the songs that featured heavily on our school holiday soundtrack.

Mog The Forgetful Cat, by Judith Kerr – With the passing of the wonderful Judith Kerr I thought I had better give her books another go. We had The Tiger Who Came to Tea a few months ago and none of my kids ever wanted it read aloud. While we were able to read this one and enjoy it, I think we still have a way to go to genuinely become fans of hers.

Horse Meets Dog, by Elliott Kalan and Tim Miller – Toby and Odette loved this one. For some reason, I decided that Dog would be a bogan Aussie bloke and Horse a posh English lady so I had to read it that way each time. It was definitely fun.

Be Kind, by Pat Zietlow Miller and Jen Hill – I really the quietness and purpose of this book. The main character has a little failure at being kind and begins to wonder what kindness really looks like. When reading this you will have plenty of opportunities to talk to your kids about using kindness in a variety of situations.

Puddle Hunters, by Kirsty Murray and Karen Blair – Perfect for winter. This gave me the inspiration I needed to take a slow walk with Toby and two cousins and allow them the time to explore and jump in puddles.

Early Chapter Books

Freya is our emerging independent reader. She is capable of reading most picture books and the readers that come home from school. One of the challenges has been getting her to pick up a book in her spare time. She very rarely does it. She is more likely to be role-playing being a teacher or a mum or a librarian and trying to enlist Odette or Toby as willing children or students, or cartwheeling, or re-organising her room.

I’ve given myself the mission of trying to find a series that wins her attention. So here are a few we tried this month.

Lily the Elf series, by Anna Bradford and Lisa Coutts – This series was recommended in a post on Your Kids Next Read, but Freya didn’t really care for it. I didn’t get to read one myself, but skimming through it did seem to be a touch below the level of Billie B Brown, which Freya has conquered. So perhaps we missed the boat on this one. Unsuccessful.

Marge in Charge, by Isla Fisher – Freya received the first in the series for her birthday at the start of the month and did get herself into it. The good thing is that the structure is well suited to an emerging reader and the content is fast-paced and funny. I was also able to get the audio version, read by Isla Fisher herself, on Borrow Box and Freya listened and read parts of it simultaneously. Moderately successful.

Tiggy and the Magic Paintbrush series, by Zanni Louise – This was on my list for Freya and she was also gifted the first in the series for her birthday. She read it pretty quickly and seemed to really enjoy it so we straight away got the remaining ones from the library and she read them all, sometimes by herself, sometimes to a parent. They are shorter than Ella and Olivia and Billie B Brown, and are not divided into chapters, however, the level of the vocabulary and sentence structures is similar. Also where Billie B Brown and Ella and Olivia are realistic stories with situations, problems and solutions that might actually happen to kids, the content of Tiggy has much stronger fantasy and magic themes. Also the pictures are colourful and more frequent, and as such really help young readers. Hugely successful.

Middle-Grade Books

George and the Great Brain Swappery (Book 2) by Cal Wilson and Sarah Davis – I taught Jude to use my library account online and this is one of the first books he reserved. I reviewed book 1 for Reading Time and so Jude got to read that after me and he liked it enough to seek out the sequel.

Funny Kid: Slapstick (Book 5), by Matt Stanton – Recently released this is the fifth installment in what is becoming a solid series. Jude read it the say we picked it up from the library. He also got inspired to try his hand at some of the illustrations.

Grandma Dangerous and the Toe of Treachery (Book 3), by Kita Mitchell and Nathan Reed – Another series Jude has followed that he got started on via a Reading Time review.

Into the White: Scott’s Antartic Odessy, by Joanna Grochowicz – Given the topic of this book – antarctic exploration – I was really interested in reading it. Fortunately, the writing was superb, the level of detail was terrific and the whole vibe of the book really gives the reader an understanding of what it would have been like for Scott and his men. I couldn’t get Jude interested enough to give it a go, but then he isn’t a big fan of non-fiction (yet). Maybe in a few years.

The Creakers, by Tom Fetcher and Shane Devries – After Jude read the book and my kids became huge fans of the pop-rock song that goes with the book I had to read it myself. While I didn’t find it quite as good as his first book, The Christmasaurus, (click here for my review) I still did like this one. The main character, Lucy finds herself an unlikely leader of a town’s worth of parentless children. A sneaking suspicion tells Lucy that she is going to have to do something dangerous to solve the problem.

Is there any better way to get reluctant readers to give a book a chance than a really cool looking video clip like the one below?

And One for the Grown-Ups

Unnatural Causes, by Dr. Richard Shepherd – I did a little Instagram review about this extraordinary book. I’m not sure what more I could add to what I already said. It’s not accurate to say that I loved the book, more like it opened my eyes, educated me, enlightened me in many ways. FIVE BIG GOLD STARS.