Review: The Besties to the Rescue

Ruby and Oliver are best friends. They’re Besties! They live next door to each other and they love hanging out together.

But when they find a baby bird that’s fallen from its nest, they know there’s no time for play.

They need to help the bird — keep it safe and help it get back to its nest.

The Besties to the Rescue is book one in a brilliant new junior fiction series from dynamic duo Felice Arena and Tom Jellett.

It’s a fun, light-hearted read, packed with funnies and delivered in an easy-to-read format with large text, short chapters and Jellett’s funky illustrations on every page. 

This is a perfect book and series for kids starting to read independently. 

The characters are real and relatable for kids, as is the plot. It’s a fun and simple story, easy for kids to follow as they focus on reading the words. 

The back of the book is also filled with awesome extras, including how-to advice (for book one it’s about looking after baby birds), a copy of Jurassic Yard, a hilarious comic penned by Oliver, the musical chords and lyrics of Ruby’s song, Little Bird, and the Besties’ best jokes about dinosaurs. 

If you’re looking for a new series for your junior reader to get stuck into or you want to provide an easy first book for them to try reading independently, I highly recommend The Besties to the Rescue.

Title: The Besties to the Rescue

Author: Felice Arena

Illustrator: Tom Jellett

Publisher: Penguin, $9.99

Publication Date: 7 January 2020

Format: Paperback

ISBN: 9781760890971

For ages: 6 - 10 

Type: Junior Fiction

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Review: The Mouse Mansion: Sam and Julia

The Mouse Mansion is a storytelling concept that is built around dioramas created by Karina Schaapman.

She wanted to write the story of the mice, and to illustrate their story, decided to build and photograph the dioramas, which are made from cardboard boxes, papier-mache, fabric, and recycled materials.

In The Mouse Mansion: Sam and Julia, readers can enjoy a collection of 17 anecdotes about Sam, a shy young mouse, and Julia, who loves exploring.

Sam and Julia are great friends who complement each other.

They love discovering new things about where they live, like the perfect hiding spot for their box of treasures.

They help Sam's grandma make pancakes and his mum to do the laundry. Only child Julia learns what it's like to have baby brothers and sisters.

Sam and Julia have many adventures together, and it's the incredible dioramas of their home that really make this book and bring them to life. There is so much detail in the setting and lots to prompt young imaginations.

It took Karina Schaapman, who lives in The Netherlands, four years to finish building the first Mouse Mansion, which has 100 rooms, and she's since built another.

Visit The Mouse Mansion online to learn more (including how you can make your own). If you're in Europe, you can also see The Mouse Mansion in person on display in the Amsterdam public library and via The Mouse Mansion Shop and Studio.

The second Mouse Mansion (image credit: www.themousemansion.com/blog/)

Title: The Mouse Mansion: Sam and Julia
Author/illustrator: Karina Schaapman
Publisher: Allen & Unwin, $ 29.99
Publication Date: December 2019
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781760876760
For ages: 4--8
Type: Picture book




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Review: Nevertell

There are stories about magic, and then there are stories about magic. 

Old magic. 

Deep, dark forest magic. 

Magic with a kernel of truth that comes from the old stories — myths and legends that can be neither proved nor completely refuted.

This is Nevertell. 

Eleven-year-old Lina lives in a prison camp in the cold Russian wilderness. Her mother was taken there as a child with her brother and Lina's grandfather. Lina was born there and has known no other life.

But when an opportunity arises to break free, Lina and her best friend Bogdan escape into the cold night. 

They set out towards Moscow, hoping to find Lina’s grandmother, but what they find instead is a powerful magic that fills the wilderness and hunts them at every turn. 

Ghosts, spirits and other-worlds that try to capture them. Hidden fortresses, hungry wolves and dark magic. 

If Lina and Bogdan are going to make it to Moscow, they will need to be braver than they’ve ever had to be before. And as strange things begin to happen, all seemingly connected to Lina, they’ll have to keep their wits about them or risk being captured by the evil that inhabits the wilds.

Nevertell is a brilliant and addictive middle grade novel. It’s an action-packed and mysterious read that pulls you in from page one. It’s the kind of book that infiltrates your mind and leaves a strange and mystic feeling in your belly — a questioning feeling that makes you wonder if the myths and legends you’ve heard of might be real.

This is a story for kids who love mystery, adventure and fantasy. It’s for the kids who love listening to tales of Bigfoot, Baba Yaga, the Loch Ness monster and Stonehenge. 

Katherine Orton is a master storyteller. This is her first novel, and I’m excited to see what she pens next.

Title: Nevertell

Author: Katherine Orton

Publisher: Walker Books, $16.99

Publication Date: 1 November 2019

Format: Paperback

ISBN: 9781406385182

For ages: 10+

Type: Middle Grade Fiction

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Meet The Illustrator: Fiona Halliday

Name: Fiona Halliday

Describe your illustration style in 10 or less words:

a mix of traditional and digital techniques

What items are an essential part of your creative work space: honestly, just peace and quiet!

Do you have a favourite artistic medium: 

I start off with sketches which are invariably dreadful. I wring my hands for a while about that and then crawl into Photoshop - I like the perfect lines you can make.

Name 3 artists whose work inspires you: 

currently Errol Le Cain, Eyvind Earle, Beatrice Alemagna 

Which artistic period would you most like to visit and why?

I would love to have the opportunity to follow Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi around for a while through the late 15 – 1600s – just to watch them harness all the dark, traumatic energy! And then I’d skip forward in time to dally with Joan Eardley in the late 1950s-60. She lived and worked latterly just up the road from where I grew up, and she put such strange, dear magic into our wild Scottish seas and skies.

Who or what inspired you to become an illustrator?

My family are all very artistic, but I never started dabbling until my early thirties. I had just moved to Austria and couldn’t speak German, I think maybe that was the impetus. I really like creating characters and watching them move across the page. I don’t think I’d be an illustrator if it wasn’t centred around telling stories about characters. 

Can you share a photo of your creative work space or part of the area where you work most often? Talk us through it.

My studio is just a desk in the spare room, but my husband painted a wall in our kitchen with iron filings so it is magnetised, and it is great for doing dummy layout and just sticking up bits of artwork to see how it all looks together.

What is your favourite part of the illustration process?

I find beginning a project really, really tough! I love the moment when I get the character right and they kind of look back at you from the screen and say ‘hello! Are we going on an adventure?’ I also love when I just know where a picture is going. Sometimes I scrabble around for weeks trying to get the balance right and it doesn’t work at all, and then something suddenly clicks, and you get this sudden surge of elation.  

What advice would you give to an aspiring illustrator?

Find out what it is you love about illustrating and make that the fulcrum of what you do. For me I need to be in love with my character and the story. I can’t really draw a good picture without first knowing who my character is and what he/she is going through. Then the rest (kind of) falls into place. My only other advice is work hard, be steadfast and be true to yourself. 

Fiona Halliday is a Scottish Author- Illustrator with a passion for children’s books. She lives and works in Upper Austria. ‘Numenia and the Hurricane’ is her debut picture book. She has just wrapped up the illustrations for Zeena Pliska’s ‘Hello Little One,’ and is currently working on illustrations for ‘The Storm Goose,’ which she wrote. (All with Page Street Kids.) She is represented by Essie White of Storm Literary Agency.

For more information please visit Fiona's website and instagram or check out her wonderful book trailer here.

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Review: Wayward Son

Review: Bluey: The Beach, Fruit Bat & Time to Play!

Review: No Place for an Octopus

No Place for an Octopus is a whimsical and gentle picture book about a young boy’s encounter with an octopus. 

On the beach, exploring the rock pools at low tide, a young boy discovers an octopus. 

He wonders if it’s happy, if it’s lonely, if maybe he should take it home.

He wonders what it would be like to be friends with an octopus and all the things they could do. But is the boy’s home the right place for a sea creature?

This is a lovely and quiet tale about curiosity and wonderings. It has a lovely slow pace that forces you to read it slowly in a gentle voice. There are places to pause and explore the pictures and lots of questions to ask your audience as you read.

With a splendid die cut cover design that invites you to look in, this is a story about exploration and curiosity. It’s about having time to think about the possibilities and enjoying a moment of quiet reflection as the busy world rolls by.

It’s also about caring for others and respecting animals and where they come from. Expertly camouflaged within the story, there is a message there about leaving creatures be. Sometimes we think it would be lovely to take creatures home with us, but it’s important to put their needs before our own desires.

Known for her young adult novels The Sky is so Heavy and The Protected, No Place for an Octopus is Claire Zorn’s first picture book (as both the author and the illustrator). It is a loving and warm story, perfect for bedtime snuggles or quiet reading corners in classrooms. 

Don't forget to check out Claire's guest post on the necessity of nonsense.

Title: No Place for an Octopus

Author/Illustrator: Claire Zorn

Publisher: UQP, $24.99 

Publication Date: 5 November 2019

Format: Hardcover

ISBN: 978 0 7022 6260 9

For ages: 3 - 6

Type: Picture Book

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10 Quirky Questions with author John Flanagan

1. What's your hidden talent? 
I’m an expert shot with a bow, But I keep it so well hidden that I usually miss.

2. Who is your favourite literary villain and why?
Erich von Stalhein from the Biggles series of books by Captain WE Johns. He was a Gestapo officer who was always trying to force information out of Biggles by cruel interrogation methods. I just think it’s a great name for a villain.

3. You're hosting a literary dinner party, which five authors would you invite? (alive or dead)
 My two daughters, Katy and Penny, Kate McClymont, Michael Connelly, Kenneth Grahame.

4. Which literary invention do you wish was real?
Excalibur. 

5. What are five words that describe your writing process?
Always putting off getting started.

6. Which are the five words you would like to be remembered by as a writer?
He was a great storyteller

7. Picture your favourite writing space. What are five objects you would find there?
My desk is so cluttered that it’d be hard to find anything there.

8. Grab the nearest book, open it to page 22 and look for the second word in the first sentence. Now, write a line that starts with that word. (Please include the name of the book!)
Fernando was a mule – pig headed and stubborn like most of his kind. From Two Kinds of Truth, by Michael Connelly.

9. If you could ask one author one question, what would the question be and who would you ask?
I’d ask Shakespeare did he really expect to be remembered for hundreds of years.

10. Which would you rather do: 'Never write another story or never read another book'? 
Since I love doing both, neither. (Figure that out)

John Flanagan’s Ranger’s Apprentice and Brotherband adventure series have sold more than 15 million copies worldwide. His books are available in more than one hundred countries, are regularly on the New York Times bestseller list, and have had multiple award shortlistings and wins in Australia and overseas. John, a former television and advertising writer, lives with his wife in a Sydney beachside suburb. For more information, see www.worldofjohnflanagan.com.

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Review: This Book Can Read Your Mind

I’ve been waiting for this day. I knew it would come. I have to admit I thought it would be some kind of robot or machine or super human, but there is now a book that can read your mind!

This Book can Read Your Mind is a fun and funny picture book that can literally read your mind. 

You have to be careful because whatever you are thinking will appear on the page, and the book knows!

So don’t think about pink elephants or silly pants or unicycles, because, well, you know what’s going to happen. 

But don’t worry, there’s a super smart scientist to guide you through the mind-reading experience. He is there on every page to help you not think about the things you shouldn’t think about. He chats to you throughout, gives you advice and he’ll try to steer you in the right direction, away from the silly thoughts that might put you and everyone around you in danger. How nice is that?

This book is sure to get the kids giggling (thank you word master Susannah Lloyd), and Jacob Grant brings even more fun and funky to the book with bright and colourful illustrations throughout. 

This is a great one for a crowd or classroom as it gets the audience involved on every page. Fun, funny, funky. Just remember not to think about pink elephants!

Title: This Book Can Read Your Mind

Author: Susannah Lloyd

Illustrator: Jacob Grant

Publisher: Francis Lincoln, $22.99

Publication Date: 6 January 2020

Format: Hardcover

ISBN: 9780711241442

For ages: 3 - 6

Type: Picture Book

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Review: All Bodies are Good Bodies

A proud and positive book focusing on bodies and how body parts vary from person to person.

The story is told in rhyme by an energetic character with ginger hair and freckles, she shares her enthusiasm for body parts, from eyes to legs and tummies; ‘I love eyes! Blue eyes, brown eyes, eyes that are green – two different colours are sometimes seen.’

The illustrations are bright, bold and colourful, they work in unity with the text and further build on diversity, showing people with different abilities; wheelchairs, mechanical legs, glasses and more. I adore one scene which shows a variety of people washing and caring for a variety of dogs and one cat!

I love how books like this one plant a simple but important seed for acceptance, open-mindedness and diversity at a young age. This story was a joy to share with my children, we talked about how our own bodies were both similar and different to each other’s. A tickling prompt ending the story made it a better for lead on to energetic play rather than bedtime.

All Bodies are Good Bodies would be great to read in a group, promoting diverse mindset and conversation.

Title: All Bodies are Good Bodies
Author: Charlotte Barkla
Illustrator: Erica Salcedo
Publisher: Hardie Grant Egmont, $19.99
Publication Date: 1 January 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781760503932
For ages: 3+
Type: Picture Book




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Review: Rules for Vanishing

Abstract Articulations: Anastasia Gonis and The Coat

Revered KBR reviewer, Anastasia Gonis takes us on a brief journey that many of you will be familiar with. That curious moment when rather than stumbling upon our next read or searching for it, it finds us. 

Here are her musings about this magical moment, the first of our random abstract articulations; moments in time that crystallise and mystify a love of literature.

When a Mistake is not a Mistake!

How many people have told themselves and others that their lives have been changed by a book that has come to them, fallen off a shelf at their feet, found them in a time of need? I’ve heard this comment many times from various people.

It has happened to me repeatedly. Last week it happened again. I was looking through a publisher’s list at what I thought were new releases. I didn’t look at the publication date just sent off a request for the book, The Coat by Julie Hunt, illustrated by Ron Brooks.

Here I must tell you that Ron Brooks is one of my favourite illustrators, that’s why I chose the title. I felt this intense connection to his work when I first read The Fox written by Margret Wild.

For those who haven’t read it, it’s about the lies we are convinced are truth told us at a time of weakness or need, and the betrayal of friendship. I believe that is my most loved picture book or close to it. It was an epiphany for me as it forced me to examine happenings and words that were untrue and which I desperately wanted to believe.

There is no need for a dissection of The Coat or why I believe it came to me. Simply that it did. You can read the review of it if you choose. Next time a book calls to you, speaks in a language of words with a voice only you can hear, listen to it.

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Review: Heartstream

Review: Anna At War

Daniel’s 90 year old grandmother Anna survived WW2 but never spoke about it to him. When she is informed that MI5 are preparing to release her war files, it coincides with Daniel’s history lessons at school. Gran knows it’s time to share her childhood with him.

Anna’s life is happy in the modern, comfortable home with her parents. Hitler orders the destruction of all Jewish businesses. On Kistallnacht, nothing is left standing. Anna, with limited knowledge of English, is sent away to the safety of the English countryside and a foster family.

Rose, Bert and their children Frank and Molly, embrace Anna as their own and she does her best to fit in. Anna finds adapting to farm life and a dunny in the yard has its challenges.

Within two weeks, Anna learns three important things: the freedom gained by females with wearing trousers; that bath time is once a week with water warmed on the kitchen stove, and that the same water is used by everyone in turn.

Anna is determined to find work close by for her parents so they can join her. She finds a position for them at the Manor House and just as her parents prepare to set out, Germany invades Poland and Britain declares war on Germany.

Classed as enemy nationals, her parents’ papers are cancelled. Being a German Jew, she is considered a suspect spy at school. Anna is traumatised by these accusations, for they come with the risk of being sent to an internment camp.

Life takes a dramatic turn when the children find a wounded soldier hiding in their barn loft. Can Anna undertake the role secretly allocated to her by the Commander? She is intelligent and courageous. She has seen what Hitler’s minions are capable of. If her actions are misconstrued, her life will be forfeited.

This thrilling war adventure full of secrets, espionage and betrayal will keep the pages turning. Helen Peters, author of Evie’s Ghost and many others, has created a tension-filled, visual narrative, using Anna’s voice. A powerful portrayal of those traumatic years and the courage needed to survive is established early in the book, building momentum as the story progresses.

While revealing prejudices and fears that turn to spite and revenge, Peters unerring, displays the decline of social structures, and how poverty and lack changes people when their life as they know it, is brought to a halt.

Title: Anna at War  
Author: Helen Peters  
Publisher: Allen & Unwin , $14.99  
Publication Date: Allen & Unwin  
Format: Paperback  
ISBN: 9781788004718  
For ages:12+  
Type: Historical Fiction




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Bookish Places: Hobbiton Movie Set

The Kids' Book Review Bookish Places posts are a chance to celebrate museums, galleries and other places with a connection to children's literature and reading. The posts are compiled by KBR's Consultant Librarian, Sarah Steed, our intrepid traveller and hunter-gatherer of amazing places!

It was in the Shire where, 'in a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole ... it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.'

And it's in the rolling green hills of New Zealand's north island that you will find the Hobbiton Movie Set, a place where fantasy meets reality.

Photo: L. Hannan

The Hobbiton Movie Set was first created for Peter Jackson's movies of the classic JRR Tolkien novels, The Hobbit and the The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

It brings to life a small part of the Middle-Earth world, where the adventures of Bilbo Baggins began. You'll really feel like you've been dropped in the midst of the story.

Photo: L. Hannan

Photo: L. Hannan

You'll be able to walk through Hobbiton, see the life-size Hobbit homes (there are 44 of them!), take as many photos as you can fit in, and have something to eat and drink at The Green Dragon Inn.

Photo: L. Hannan

Photo: L. Hannan

Photo: L. Hannan

Visiting Hobbiton is only available by taking a guided tour, which runs for approximately two hours. Advance booking is essential.

Photo: L. Hannan

Photo: L. Hannan

The Hobbiton Movie Set can be found at 501 Buckland Road, Hinuera, Matamata. Visit the official website for details of ticket prices, opening hours, how to get there, and more.

Interested in taking a Bookish Places trip around the world with Sarah? Enjoy this sensational map, also created by Sarah, and check out our other Bookish Places posts here.

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