Video Review: Pink!

Join Yvonne Mes for a short and snappy video review of Pink! A picture book for children aged 2 - 5 years old. Written by Margaret Wild and illustrated by Judith Rossell.

Title: Pink!
Author: Margaret Wild
Illustrator: Judith Rossell
Publisher: HarperCollins Children's Books
Publication Date: 8 July 2020
Format: Hardback
ISBN: 9781460757499
For ages: 2 - 5
Type: Picture book

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Meet The Illustrator: Fruzsina Kuhari

Name: Fruzsina Kuhari

Describe your illustration style in ten words or less.
Warm, whimsical, natural, traditional, detailed.

What items are an essential part of your creative space?
My digital drawing equipment. Colored pencils and pens with clean white papers, I always find this combination inspiring. A window for natural light to come in, and a cup of tea that always gets cold by the time I remember to drink it.

Do you have a favourite artistic medium?
Simple graphite pencils and charcoals on good quality artist’s paper.  

Name three artists whose work inspires you.
Neesha Hudson, Stacy Ebert, Rob Justus 

Which artistic period would you most like to visit and why?
I would stay here and now, or go to the future out of curiosity. I like seeing and browsing the big picture of the world of art built so far. I like art history and all the mystery that lingers around an art piece from the past. We could get answers by visiting these eras, but do we want to kill the magic? 

Who or what inspired you to become an illustrator?
I can’t remember any time in my life when arts and crafts weren’t the main drive of my being. Even when my grandmother read me picture books, I was focused on the art. She told me I can be someone who draws the pictures in the books, and from that point I feel like it was decided. My family took their little girl’s decision seriously and gave her all the support they could. That was and still is inspirational on its own.

Can you share a photo of your creative work space or part of the area where you work most often? Talk us through it.
I have my own room for work. Since I’m taking versatile commissions like graphic design and animation besides illustration, my work area needs to be versatile too. Here, it’s possible for me to work with many tools from traditional mediums to digital techniques.

What is your favourite part of the illustration process?
The middle - when you feel you made the right choices and you are on the right path. It’s exciting, your work is coming along but there’s still enough left to keep you curious and many decisions are left to be made. Like you are halfway through a riddle. This is also the most dangerous and scariest part.

What advice would you give to an aspiring illustrator?
If you are just like me, then you always have an idea on what and how to improve. But do not forget to be satisfied and celebrate your success! Try to find balance. You need both mental states to keep things rolling!

Fruzsina is currently a Montreal-based illustrator, graphic designer, and animator from Budapest, Hungary. She has been in love with art from the first time she held a white crayon. Her most recent works include The Mighty Head of Moustafa and the Wisdom Stories. Apart from her art, she likes spending time on creative crafts such as baking, cooking, sewing, crocheting…

For more information, please visit Fruzsina's website or follow her on instagram

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Review: Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather

Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather is a new large format book written by Stephanie Owen Reeder and illustrated by Tania McCartney.

Australia, a continent of many climates, certainly does have wild, weird and wonderful weather.

There are fires and floods, dust storms and hail storms, along with scorching hot heat, and freezing snow.

Talking about the weather is something we've all done, and probably with regularity. Perhaps that's because the weather is always with us, around us. 

A quote about just that introduces a section of the book. Each section has its own relevant quote, taken from Australian newspapers, and they set the scene for what follows.

Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather is packed with snippets of trivia about the weather, covering everything from coud farming and the different kinds of clouds (like the vertebratus), to extreme weather (the wettest town in Australia is Tully in Queensland with more than 4,000 mm of rain each year).

Did you know that butterflies can't use their wings when it's too cold? Or that watching spiders could help you predict rain because they change the length of the threads in their webs? You'll learn that and more by reading this book.

The impact of climate change is explored, as are some of the ways you can research weather and resources to look for.

I discovered plenty I didn't know, and young meteorologists in training, and children who want to know more about weather, will find lots of trails to follow, including using the glossary of weather words, the index, and the list of useful books and websites. 

Illustrations in the book add a touch of humour with things like a hamburger (large raindrops look like hamburger buns), and a horse with a frizzy mane (showing how humidity can make curly hair change) likely to draw you in.

Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather is a great book for children young and old, and would make an excellent gift.

You can download teachers' notes for Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather from the National Library of Australia's website.

Title: Australia's Wild Weird Wonderful Weather
Author: Stephanie Owen Reeder
Illustrator: Tania McCartney
Publisher: National Library of Australia, $ 24.99
Publication Date: October 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9780642279637
For ages: 5+
Type: Junior Non-Fiction

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Review: Aster's Good Right Things

Eleven year-old Aster is different. She goes to a school for gifted children, something she denies being. She is small, unattractive in people’s eyes, and tends to become invisible in others’ presence. Aster believes her insignificance to be the reason her mother left.

Dad and Aunt Noni are the only people who believe she is special and understand the monsters of anxiety, insecurity and self-doubt that plague her.

She always accommodates others in her life, never asking for what she really wants because it’s the good, right thing to do. This mantra dictates her daily rituals, which must include one good, right thing for someone or else her world will shatter, a situation with which Aster is intimately acquainted. 

A brown notebook, always with her, keeps record of all the things Aster does, wants and never gets.

School is a struggle each day due to the venomous Indigo, who projects her own internal anger, hatred and frustration onto Aster who refuses to retaliate.

It is at the bottom of the schoolground one solitary lunchtime, that Aster finds the rabbit and meets Xavier, a boy who wars against the black dog the controls his life. Different and home schooled, he enters her life bringing hope and friendship with him.

This new beginning heralds more unexpected and miraculous shifts in Aster’s life.

Through intriguing and expressive thoughts, Aster opens up her internal world to us. We come away humbled by the lessons learnt, but also bruised by the reminder that degrading words to children by children, can be as destructive a force as words by adults to children, if not more.

This emotive and person-centred novel has many layers. It addresses family breakups and its effect on children, the magic influence of friendship, that being different shouldn’t be a stigma, and the life-saving value of books.

Title: Aster's Good Right Things
Author: Kate Gordon
Publisher: Rivited Press, $ 14.99
Publication Date: 1 November 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9780648492573
For ages: 11+
Type: Junior Fiction

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Review: Fearless Footsteps

In this crossover publication, thirty-six writers leave their footprints in true travel stories that capture the spirit of adventure. These are not travel guides in any form, but strong narratives that inspire and expose each story’s sense of daring verses independence, an overcoming of fear and challenge that travel has initiated, and the euphoria in executing a challenge.

The title of the book, Fearless Footsteps, perfectly portrays the journeys depicted in the collection. For me to choose a standout is impossible for every story is outstanding in content, presentation and tone.

The stories incorporate travel from and to, around the globe. They begin with helping boat people come ashore in Greece, to continue with hiking in North Wales to extinguish depression, sisters travelling through Europe – their fears and experiences,

as bartender in the Amsterdam underground culture, adventures on horseback or on foot, down river, and descending into a crater after an uphill trek.

These are merely examples of the variety contained in this brilliant collection that educates through the narrative without ever being didactic, informing about countries, traditions, customs, approaches to travellers, and difficulties and joys experienced.

Intrepid Times has succeeded in producing another spectacular compilation of personal experiences about travel. Readers will be impressed with the quality of the work which will send them to their computers to seek out their own next travel adventure.

Title: Fearless Footsteps
Author: Various
 Publisher: Exisle, $29.99
Publication Date: 23 November 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781925820577
For ages: 16+
Type: Young Adult Non Fiction

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Guest Post: Skye Huges on How We're All In This Together

12 Curly Questions with author Sharon Davey

1.Tell us something hardly anyone knows about you.
I once dressed up as a clown for a week (for charity).

2. What is your nickname?
My family are very big on calling people things other than their name. My favourites are pickle, sunshine, blueberry and duckling.

3. What is your greatest fear?
Ladders. I really don’t like being up high on something wobbly.

4. Describe your writing style in 10 words.
Big characters, small sentences. Always leave people wanting more…

5. Tell us five positive words that describe you as a writer.
Lively, jolly, inquisitive, creative, tenacious.

6. What book character would you be, and why?
That’s a tough question. I sometimes think the Mad Hatter for all thing crazy things I make and do.

7. If you could time travel, what year would you go to and why?
2120, because I am super nosey, and I want to know how it all works out.

8. What would your 10-year-old self say to you now?
Can you do a cartwheel yet? (No, no I can’t)

9. Who is your greatest influence?
Quentin Blake. I love him. The freedom and expression in his work wriggles off the page and I admire him so much.

10. What/who made you start writing?
My mum is a master storyteller. Even if she’s simply telling me about a trip to the post office there will be drama and tension, funny characters and a brilliant ending. I listened to so many stories before I started writing my own.

11. What is your favourite word and why?
Discombobulate. Which means to be confused. I am discombobulated most of the time.

12. If you could only read one book for the rest of your life, what would it be? 
The Giraffe, the Pelly and Me by Roald Dahl. It’s such a gorgeous story. Full of quotable positivity.

Sharon Davey is a children’s illustrator based in Surrey, England. She loves to draw grumpy kids and collecting plastic dinosaurs. Sharon has worked for a variety of clients, including David Fickling Books, Oxford University Press and Bloomsbury. Bears Don’t Wear Shoes is Sharon’s first ever author/illustrated book. For more information, see www.sharondaveyillustration.com.

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Review: Santa Jaws

Santa Jaws is a fishy, festive, rhyming story of a shark and a squid, set in the deep sea on Christmas eve.

When a clever Christmas loving shark named Shelly sets out to share some cheerful fun with the other ocean animals, they steer clear, assuming it is a trick or a trap; after all Shelly is a shark. Then, a wide-eyed squid named Sid who also loves Christmas is lured into Shelly’s dark cave by the temptation to meet Santa Claus, many moments of anticipation prevail. 

It’s safe to say that this isn’t a Christmas disaster, and while there are a few pages of concern, everything works out jolly fine. The new and unlikely duo work together to give their fellow ocean creatures a very ‘Merry Fishmas!’ and a nice message about sharks not being as scary as they seem, stands strong.

Gorgeous artwork with Christmas colours and illustrations which show swift, floaty movement set the ocean environment wonderfully. I loved looking at all the gorgeous creatures and discussing what they are with my children. We were particularly interested in the cheerful-looking anglerfish and the cute shellfish, we even researched their species later.

Santa Jaws would be a splendid gift, and Christmas season read. Mark Sperring and Sophie Corrigan are also the creators of Mince Spies which is another fabulously fun Christmas story.

Title: Santa Jaws
Author: Mark Sperring
Illustrator: Sophie Corrigan
Publisher: Bloomsbury, $14.99  
Publication Date: 3 November 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781408897812
For ages: 0 – 5
Type: Picture Book

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Review: Tree Beings

Tree Beings are people who love trees. Photosynthesis – sunlight, air and water, is food that keeps trees alive and helps them grow new wood. 

This book leads us through the life of trees and the people that love and protect them, past and present. Trees have a language of their own that connects them to all living creatures.

This knowledge is made available to us.

A tree’s life is mapped out from how they breathe, fight climate change, help make rain, care for soil through their roots, clean the air and provide homes for wildlife. Their secret strength is made of a tough coat of bark, phloem, cambium, xylem, and heartwood.

This is a life-changing look at the power of trees. Its structure is four Big Ideas, held up by inspiring stories of people who fought and suffered for years, in many different ways, to protect trees. This spectacular production – for that is what it is, celebrates these people of all ages that warred against the destruction of forests.

The rare Foreword by Jane Goodall that covers her experience with forests and trees and her relationship to them, leads the parade of personalities and tree warriors. Her club, Roots and Shoots, inspires young people to care for our living planet.

Known and unknowns are profiled. Julia Butterfly spent 738 days up a giant redwood to stop it being chain-sawed. Professor Wangari Maathai became known as Mother of the Trees due to her life-long passion to protect and plant trees. Richard St Barber Baker travelled around the world for 70 years extolling the power of trees. There are many more warriors and their causes for trees.

Stories and myths extend to John Seed in Australia, who was one of those that fought to save the Daintree rainforest in Queensland. 180 million years old, it is the oldest rainforest on our planet.

Stunning illustrations full of light fill the pages. The cover is cloth-like and end pages are mazes of tree tops and roots spread into the earth feeding and protecting countless colonies of living things. There are lists of creatures to find hidden in countless puzzles and mazes, and much more.

For those looking for something extraordinary full of facts, figures, challenges, information and education that will change their view on living things, here it is!

Title: Tree Beings
Author: Raymond Huber
Illustrator: Sandra Severgnini
Publisher: EK Books, $ 34.99
Publication Date: October 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781925820539
For ages: 7 – 12
Type: Non Fiction

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Review: Grow: Secrets of Our DNA

What is DNA and how does it work?

Grow: Secrets of Our DNA is a simple explanation of this scientific concept which is responsible for the growth of all living things.

Written by Nicola Davies and illustrated by Emily Sutton, it's pitched at early primary aged children (although also suitable for all ages) and explores size, speed and change, amongst other things.

For example, the speed of growth differs from species to species. Some plants and creatures grow fast, while others are super slow (Quahog clams can take up to 500 years!).

After starting with broad environmental examples, the book moves onto the growth of human beings, and how the instructions for our development (from the time we're as small as a tiny dot) are written in the code of our individual DNA.

DNA can be complex, and Grow offers a basic description of DNA and the four kinds of 'steps' that come in many and varied orders to create our spiral shaped DNA ladder.

Grow shows how our DNA creates our different looks, and connects us to our ancestors going back over many years.

An excellent book for children and adults, Grow: Secrets of Our DNA offers a great introduction that makes sense to those with or without scientific background. 

Title: Grow: Secrets of Our DNA
Author: Nicola Davies
Illustrator: Emily Sutton
Publisher: Walker Books, $24.99
Publication Date: April 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781406382778
For ages: 5+
Type: Junior Non-Fiction

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Giveaway: Awesome Aussie Kids on Holiday Prize Picnic Pack!

Video Review: All in a Drop

Join Yvonne Mes for a short and snappy video review of All in a Drop: How Antony van Leeuwenhoek Discovered an Invisible World. A non fiction chapter book for children aged 8 to 12 years old. Written by Lori Alexander and illustrated by Vivien Mildenberger.

Title: All in a Drop
Author: Lori Alexander
Illustrator: Vivien Mildenberger
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Publication Date: 6 August 2019
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781328884206
For ages: 8 - 12
Type: Non Fiction Chapter Book

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Review: Who is at the Zoo?

A delight to look at and to read, this highly entertaining book turns daily situations on their head. Imaginative, humorous and creative, and with charismatic characters, everyone who opens this book will discover a magical world whose reality is limited only by their imagination.

Rhyme and rhythm make it the perfect book for reading out aloud, for laughs and entertainment. The stunning, expressive illustrations by Suzanne Houghton, fill the pages with unexpected situations appearing like everyday occurrences. 

A young girl wakes to a house full of animals.

She goes in search of answers. She finds a tiger on the toilet; another animal in the tub. In fact, a parade of animals has invaded their house. But that’s not all.

A Zebra cooks in the kitchen while a leopard watches sport on the television. A bear is in the laundry doing its washing. The squatters feel like the new residents!

Outside a deer mows the lawn as a squirrel tries driving the owner’s car.

They have taken over not only the house but all the street. A turtle is the lollipop person at the school crossing; penguins are seen painting a front door.

The further into town the girl goes the more animals she discovers in roles that humans held. The baker, the marketplace, the timber yard, the library, the café and in all the other businesses, positions have been replaced by animals.

A voyage of discovery begins. If the animals are everywhere now, what has become of the town’s occupants?

This is a brilliant picture book overflowing with hilarious situations and questions without answers. A curious challenge for children is to ask and find out why animals have replaced humans and where are the humans?

Title: Who is at the Zoo?
Author: J Boyce
Illustrator: Suzanne Houghton
Publisher: Larrikin House, $24.99
Publication Date: 1 October 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9780648804963
For ages: 3 – 8
Type: Picture Book

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Junior Review: Trials of Apollo: The Tower of Nero

Review: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dangerous Animals

Deadly and dangerous these animals may be, but each one contributes in some significant way to the natural environment.

Award-winning author and illustrator, Samy Bayly, has created a unique and stunning encyclopedia in The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dangerous Animals, from its impressive covers with indented title and pen and ink end pages, to everything in between.

It’s a fantastic collection of more than sixty animals from all over the world, from tiny insects to huge and heavy animals and things that crawl, fly and swim.

The Contents page is a detailed introduction of what to expect, presented in tiny grey, shadows. It’s when you come to the main attractions, that you discover gold. Each exquisite poster-like image is better than the last. 

The Alligator Snapping turtle, Australian magpie, Bibron’s Stiletto Snake – Atractaspis bibronii, the Black-legged tick, and the Bloomslang are just a few of the portraits and their biographies.

Life-like and pulsing on the page, they are accompanied by their scientific name, with layouts in blocks that inform and instruct about description, diet, danger factor, location/habitat, conservation status and lots of fun facts such as those for the Ostrich.

The Ostrich’s eyes are bigger than its brains. They can live for fifty years. One Ostrich egg is equal to twenty-four chicken eggs.

Included is the length of time each animal/insect lives and its collective noun name.

There are lethal and non-lethal subjects and invasive and toxic species which prove very interesting. It explains how each one collects or activates its toxins such as the Hooded Pitohui, Pitohui dichrous.

Found in Australia are: The Coffin Ray, Australian magpie, Crown-of-thorns starfish Irukanjdi jellyfish, Red-headed Mouse spider, Red kangaroo, Southern Blue-ringed octopus and Tasmanian Devil and Cane toad. 

An ideal reference book for lovers of the unusual in facts and figures. It surprises with the amount of creative work that has gone into it and the learning that is offers. An ideal gift for the curious and animal lovers, and an absolute essential for home and school libraries.

Title: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of  Dangerous Animals
Author/Illustrator: Sami Bayly
Publisher: Hachette, $ 32.99
Publication Date: 29 September 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9780734420015
For ages: 8+
Type: Non Fiction

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Review: How Do You Make A Baby?

Guest Post: Kate Forsyth & Belinda Murrell - Part Two

We continue our mesmerising interview with Kate Forsyth and Belinda Murrel, on their collaboration for Searching for Charlotte: The Fascinating Story of Australian's First Children's Author

How long did the book take to write and were there any obstacles encountered that you can share?
B: The book took over two years to write, including many months of intense research. While we were working on this project, we also had to deal with deeply stressful family dramas, other work commitments and our busy everyday lives. For me the greatest obstacle was probably self-doubt. Could we do Charlotte’s story justice? Would the final book reflect the vision we had imagined? How should we weave in our own personal experiences and thoughts into the narrative?

K: For me, the biggest difficulty was finding the time we needed to do such intensive research and writing, when I had such a heavy publishing and touring schedule. The book took far longer than we had expected, and so I was working on the road while on a publicity tour for my most recent book while I also had to ask for an extension on my latest novel-in-progress, something I hate to do. It was exhausting and stressful and – like Belinda says – we were also dealing with a lot in our private lives.

What was the most rewarding aspect of this travel and research?
K: For me, it was definitely writing this book with my sister. It was definitely a challenging experience, but also exciting and joyous and beautiful. I particularly loved out trip overseas with our daughters – that was one of the most special experiences of my life!

B: It was such a joy to collaborate with my sister on this book – we spent endless hours discussing how we should write it, what to include and what to leave out, and sharing the thrill of making new discoveries. Travelling to the UK with our daughters was an absolute highlight and walking in Charlotte’s footsteps brought her to life. We even had the chance to study at London University together! Our family has always been tight-knit but sharing this project has brought Kate and I even closer together.

This journey of discovery was not only about Charlotte. You discovered you had another sister. Can you share this with us?
B: While we were writing this book, our father confessed that he had been keeping a secret for 37 years – that we had a half-sister called Emma Jane (coincidentally her name is made up of Kate’s and my middle names). After our parents’ divorce, Dad met a Scottish nurse, and Emma was born, although Dad had only met her a handful of times. The news was a huge shock at first. I contacted Emma and asked her if she would like to meet us. Since then we have developed a lovely relationship with Emma and her family. It has been a warm and wonderful experience for us all.

K: When Belinda rang me to tell me about Emma, I had just finished writing a chapter about our father and his work as a scientist, so it was quite eerie. We have now built a close relationship with our half-sister, and have been very glad to welcome her into our family.

Readers recognise the great connection to the landscape and place that you both have. Was this originally there or was this magnified by what you experienced and learnt?

B: The importance of place and landscape has always been an integral part of my writing and my values, perhaps inspired by the beautiful stories we were told as children about where our family came from. Yet, this connection was magnified when we were exploring the places where our ancestors were born, where they lived and worked for generations, where they loved and died and grieved. These places sang to us.

K: My answer is the same as Belinda’s!

You learnt a lot about Charlotte but also about yourselves. Can you expand on this for us?
B: Writing this book was a huge challenge in many ways. It was incredibly time consuming and much of it was written when we were facing very stressful family and personal challenges. For me, Charlotte’s determination and courage were a huge inspiration, helping to make us stronger and more resilient.

K: When we began this journey of discovery, some of our fear was that there was nothing left to find about Charlotte, and that our lives were not interesting enough to turn into a memoir. I remember saying to Belinda, ‘all we ever do is read and write and look after our families. We’re so ordinary!’ But what we discovered is that even ordinary lives have meaning. Charlotte’s life (and our own) strike such a chord with so many women, partly because she (and we) are just women fighting to look after our families and create a space for ourselves where our voices can be heard. Her struggle is the struggle of so many women.

You have a strong family line connected to literature and artistic endeavour. Do you feel your talents were inherited, or do you see them as the result of a nurturing environment combined with the oral history passed down to you?
B: Nature vs Nurture! I do feel that our raw talents were inherited from our forebears. Yet I also believe that talent cannot shine unless it is encouraged, practiced, trained, and valued. Kate and I were incredibly lucky to grow up in a family which encouraged us to aim for the stars, to follow our passions and which made great sacrifices to give us the best education they could.

K: I’ve always said that I was born wanting to be a writer – I knew from a very young age that it was my dream. So, I feel that it must have been inborn in me. Yet both of us received so much support and encouragement along the way, and both of us have worked so hard to make our dreams come true. Both of those things – our support networks and our years of toil and effort – are just as important a part of our story as our family inheritance.

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Review: Santa and the Sugar Glider

It’s Christmas Eve and the rainforest animals cram against one another to see an incredible sight. Santa and his reindeers have landed! A catastrophe has occurred on their special night! Comet has collided with an albatross and sprained her ankle.

Santa needs help!

He announces to the animals that an audition for a temporary replacement will take place at sunset. His Christmas magic can make anyone fly. But only a special kind of animal will do.

 

Snap the sugar glider, small though he is, decides this could be his time to prove his worth; to reach his full potential.

But so do all the other animals. Bouncy Warren the wallaby believes he is the one. Rufus the owl, who claims to own the night sky, scoffs at this assumption. He was definitely the one!

Snap shows off his gliding expertise to reinforce his talent. Everyone laughs. He is too little for the triple twist; to pull the sleigh. In fact, too little for anything much.

The auditions see Cass the Cassowary dance, Gemma the goanna glide, and Colin the crocodile snap and roll. Each animal takes their turn to show off their skills.

With auditions almost over, and as Santa calls for anyone else, Comet stretches out to pick a leaf of a stinging tree.

Snap soars and glides, twists and drops right onto Comet’s back, causing him to eject the leaf from his mouth in surprise.

Santa sees Snap is just what he needs. With a finger movement, and his Christmas magic, Santa has the sugar glider floating in the air. He becomes the littlest animal to pull Santa’s sleigh!

Festive front end pages in green leaves and coloured baubles welcome you into an Australian Christmas delight.

Looping text matches Snap, the sugar glider’s preference of movement. Expressive animal body language speaks louder than words. Hooray for a wonderful Aussie Christmas tale!

Title:  Santa and the Sugar Glider
Author: Alexa Moses
Illustrator: Anil Tortop
Publisher: Hachette, $19.99
Publication Date: 1 October 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9780734419521
For ages: 3+
Type: Picture Book

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Review: The Midnight Guardians

What if there was a place where our childhood imaginary friends came to life? 

A place where not just our private imaginary friends resided, but where the collective fantastical characters of mythology lived too?

Col no longer believes in his imaginary friends. He had three of them when he was younger – a tiger, a badger and a miniature knight, his guardians, all sworn to protect him. 

But now he’s too old for that, so he is as puzzled as he is wary of their sudden appearance in his life.

Unfortunately, Col needs protection. 

Set during World War 2, Col has been forced to flee his home in London and take refuge in the country with his cantankerous old aunt. 

He misses his adult sister Rose, particularly now that they have become orphaned. 

He is determined that they should spend Christmas together, so he runs away to London to find her. 

However, a vision of London being bombed and reduced to fiery rubble galvanises him – the quest has upped a notch to saving Rose.

His guardians join him on his quest. But the problem with his imaginary friends being able to breach the barrier between worlds means that mythical creatures are able to as well – so not only doe Col have to contend with the very dangerous events in our world, but also the eternal struggle between timeless enemies: the evil Midwinter King who would have our world permanently frozen, and the Green Man, the embodiment of spring and rebirth.

And this time, the Midwinter King has a plan to overthrow the Green Man for good.

Overall, this story is a fun adventure. With so many elements included, it could have ended up disjointed and messy, but Montgomery does a great job in drawing the threads together and giving readers a fun journey and a satisfying ending.


Title: The Midnight Guardians
Author: Ross Montgomery
Publisher: Walker Books, $18.99
Publication Date: 7 October, 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781406391183
For ages: 8-12
Type: Junior Fiction

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Guest Post: Kate Forsyth & Belinda Murrell - Part One

Searching for Charlotte: The Fascinating Story of Australia’s First Children’s Author has just been released. 

Multi-award winning writers and sisters, Kate Forsyth and Belinda Murrell, descendants of writers and artists, have co-authored an exquisite documentation of their research journey, undertaken to uncover unknown aspects about the life of their great-great-great-great-grandmother, Charlotte Waring. We welcome and thank them as they share with us, a little about this epic undertaking.

What inspired you to start this research together?
K: We have often been invited to tell our great-great-great-great-grandmother's fascinating life story at literary festivals and events, and we are always mobbed by people telling us we must write a book about her. Next year is the 180th anniversary of the publication of her book, A Mother's Offering to Her Children by a Lady Long Resident in New South Wales, and so it seemed the perfect time to celebrate her achievements.

B: Both Kate and I have been intrigued by the story of Charlotte’s life since we were young. As children, we grew up on romantic family tales about Charlotte’s life of love, grief and violence – and about her struggle to assert an independent spirit.

Our grandparents would take us down to Sutton Forest in the Southern Highlands, and we would peer through the tangled hedges at Oldbury, the beautiful sandstone house built as a wedding present for Charlotte in 1828. It was this lifelong fascination which inspired me to write my children’s book, The River Charm, about the Atkinson family. I had done months of research into Charlotte’s life and discovered so many enthralling details, but there was still so much we did not know. It was such a joy to collaborate with Kate, and work together to dig up the details of Charlotte’s extraordinary life and ultimate triumph.

Family stories have been handed down to you since birth. How familiar was Charlotte’s life to you before the research?
B: The stories from our grandparents were romantic and inspiring tales, and I suspected that her real life might be more ordinary than we’d been told. Yet in fact, the truth was far more mysterious and tragic than we had imagined. Although we knew the broad facts, we had no idea how many amazing discoveries there were still left to find.

For me, an absolute highlight was finding Charlotte’s 1848 sketchbook, buried in the archives of the Mitchell Library, which had been misattributed to her son. This included a beautiful self-portrait of Charlotte as a young woman, wrapped in James’ plaid cloak, on the journey to Australia when she became engaged to the love of her life. There were also several unknown family portraits, including a tender sketch of her 19-year-old daughter Charlotte, our great-great-great grandmother, on her wedding day.

K: We also discovered that Charlotte was probably the author of two other books, including one which contains the very first children's story set in Australia. That was so exciting! We found the first clue in a handwritten note by the literary bibliographer Marcie Muir, buried in the archives at the National Library of Australia. She had scribbled down the name of another early colonial book: P & P's Tales. As I was wondering why Marcie Muir had included such a notation in her file on Charlotte, Belinda found a reference to Charlotte being the author of ‘several’ books in the archives she was reading. So, we wondered if Marcie Muir had perhaps been conjecturing that Charlotte was the author of that book too. I did some investigative work and found a collection of stories that had been published in London in 1832 called Peter Prattle's Tales. The Mitchell Library had a copy of this very rare book, and so I examined the book and found very compelling evidence that it may have been written by Charlotte. It was a kind of linguistic forensics!

Following in Charlotte’s footsteps must have been very rewarding to you and your daughters who accompanied you. Can you please expand.
K: It really was! Such a special sister-mother-daughter-cousin expedition. We went on literary pilgrimages to the houses of Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters, went hiking on the moors, discovered our ancestors' long-lost graves, and listened to the girls reading each other Pride & Prejudice out loud as we drove all over England. It was such fun, and very poignant. My daughter was 15 - the same age that Charlotte began work as a governess. It really helped me understand our great-great-great--great-grandmother as a young woman!

B: By the time we went to England with the girls, we had been intensively researching Charlotte’s life for over a year. Visiting the places where Charlotte had lived and worked transformed the dry facts of her life and made her seem very real to us, as though we could see into her thoughts and motivations. Both Emily and Ella embraced the trip as an enthralling treasure hunt, sharing our excitement. It truly was a life highlight for us all.

A tremendous amount of research was demanded of you both. How did you recognise what to keep and what to ignore for the purpose of this book?
B: That was the difficult part! To me, the research was addictive and fascinating, but I began to feel like I was getting lost down rabbit holes, chasing tiny details. Yet sometimes it was when we were lost checking endless newspaper articles or dusty archives, that we made our best discoveries. In the end, Kate and I learned so much information, that we just could not include in the final book. We had a mantra which helped asking ourselves ‘It’s interesting but is it relevant?’ In the end, we both had to cut out whole chapters because the book was too long.

K: For example, we had always been brought up on stories that the Waring family was descended from a Norman knight called William de Warenne who fought with William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. I’d always been fascinated by this romantic history, and spent far too long investigating it. In the end, we decided that all we needed for the book was a paragraph or two! But sometimes you need to do the research to know what you don’t need …

When learning about the predicaments Charlotte faced as a woman in Colonial times, is there any comparison to be made with women in the same situations in today’s society?
K: Absolutely! Charlotte had to struggle to make her own way in the world, she had to fight against a patriarchal court system to keep custody of her own children, and to find a way to support them. She suffered sexual violence and domestic abuse, a problem that is still far too prevalent in our world, and still find the strength to care for her little family. And, like many women, she had to find some way to balance her own artistic aspirations with the need to make a living. She is a woman for our times!

B: Life for colonial women, was tough, violent, and unfair. Yet we discovered there were so many similarities to the concerns of modern women – the love of family, raising and educating children to be the best they can be, dealing with life’s setbacks, finding your passion, being resilient and determined, and the importance of standing up for what you believe in. Charlotte was a fiercely independent woman and an early feminist who was derided as being abrasive and a ‘she-dragon’ because she fought to keep her children! Kate and I joked that even now, a man who stands up for himself is called a leader, while a woman who stands up for herself is abrasive. So sadly, there are some things that haven’t changed at all.

We invite you to re-visit the site on Wednesday 2 November for Part Two of this mesmerising interview with Kate Forsyth and Belinda Murrel

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Winner: When This Bell Rings

Our lucky winner is...

Joseph Spagnolo, NSW

Congratulations! 

You have won the page-turning mystery middle grade novel,  
When This Bell Rings by Allison Rushby.


Thank you to ALL who entered. 



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Review: Nightshade

It's twenty years since the first Alex Rider story was published, and Nightshade is the thirteenth Alex Rider book.

In Nightshade, as Alex arrives in England by plane, a retired politician dies.

Soon after, the head of MI6's Special Operations is called to the office of a high ranking government official who has just discovered fifteen year old Alex has worked for MI6. 

She's hauled over the coals and ordered never to use Alex again. 

What follows is an unofficial operation which will see Alex put in the most difficult position he's ever been in. 

Someone from his past resurfaces in a most unusual way, and Alex must grapple with a dangerous new enemy known as Nightshade. 

They have unexpected resources ready to do their nefarious bidding. Alex must uncover their latest target and he’s completely alone.

I won't say much else because I don’t want to spoil the plot, but it involves a secret prison in Gibraltar, kidnapping, a cult, parachutes, and deadly poison.

Bestselling author Anthony Horowitz has created another fast-paced story filled with mind-bending situations which Alex, the teenage spy who would rather be at school, must overcome to save both himself and those around him. 

There is a resolution to Alex's deadly adventure, but Nightshade ends on rather an onimous note, which readers can only hope signals there's another book in the Alex Rider series to follow.

You can watch the official launch of Nightshade on YouTube, with Anthony Horowitz reading an extract, talking about writing and reading, and answering questions. It runs for about one hour.

Download teachers' notes about the Alex Rider series from Anthony Horowitz's website.

Title: Nightshade
Author: Anthony Horowitz
Publisher: Walker Books, $ 16.99
Publication Date: April 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781406395877
For ages: 10+
Type: Young Adult Fiction

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Video Review: Climate Change for Babies

Join Yvonne Mes for a short and snappy video review of Climate Change for Babies, a nonfiction board book written for children aged one year and up by Chris Ferrie and Katherina Petrou.

Title: Climate Change for Babies
Authors: Chris Ferrie and Katherina Petrou
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Publication Date: 1 October 2020
Format: Board Book
ISBN: 9781492680826
For ages: 1+
Type: Nonfiction 

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Review: An Artist's Alphabet

An Artist's Alphabet is an imaginative and whimsical book.

It takes a particular way of looking at the world to see the letters of the alphabet in the world around us.

Norman Messenger takes that to the next level with his illustrations.

A cat curled up in a ball, with its tail held high, becomes a lowercase letter d. 

A much larger and rounder cat whose tail is held close to its body, becomes the uppercase D.

A carefully placed chain and a string of pearls, depict the letter s; while the long ears of a rabbit form a v. 

And an acrobat with legs akimbo standing on the back of a horse forms the uppercase letter a.

There are no words in this book. It's artistic and could be used when talking with young children about language and letters, or as a kind of puzzle for older readers.

How many alternative letter designs can you or your children come up with?

Grab a copy of An Artist's Alphabet to tempt children into language activities, try their hand at their own art and design, or simply marvel at the beauty of the pictures.

Title: An Artist's Alphabet
Author/Illustrator: Norman Messenger
Publisher: Walker Books, $17.99
Publication Date: March 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781406392784
For ages: 5+
Type: Picture book

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Review: The Ultimate Animal Alphabet Book

Award-winning, Tasmanian writer and illustrator Jennifer Cossins’ most recent book, was the small format picture book about baby animals and their fathers, The Daddy Animal Book.

Her current release, The Ultimate Animal Alphabet Book, a companion book to The Ultimate Animal Counting Book, is another stunning offering featuring over 400 animal species.

Beautiful illustrations of living things close up in vivid colours, and alphabetically arranged are a delight to discover.

 

 

Animals, fish, birds, butterflies and others, are accompanied by short facts and trivia about most of the entries. 

They all reflect her love of animals and nature.
These are not common animals. They are from all over the world, large and small, with strange exotic names like aardwolf, the black and rufus elephant shrew, degu, Diard’s trogon.

Interesting unknown information such as the douroucouli, also called the night monkey, is the only truly, nocturnal monkey in the world.

Did you know that orcas sleep with one half of their brain at a time? This enables them to be able to surface to breathe.

Elephants sharks are also known as ghost sharks, or plownose chimaeras.

Why are flamingos pink?

Amazing in all aspects, this book will thrill young and interested zoologists with its incredible amount of information. Encyclopaedic in presentation, adults as well as children will find it fascinating, informative and highly educational.

These are the types of books children long to find on library shelves and in schools.

Cossins’ talent doesn’t stop here. Her creativity extends to designing homewares, textiles and stationery with which she fills her shop Red Parka. Behind everything she does is her endeavour to encourage and foster love and care for the natural world.

Title: The Ultimate Animal Alphabet Book
Author/Illustrator: Jennifer Cossins
Publisher: Hachette, $ 29.99
Publication Date: 27 October 2020
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9780734420091
For ages: 5+
Type: Non Fiction

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Cover Reveal: Oswald Messweather by Dimity Powell

Dimity Powell's writing style is often described as powerful and emotive, laced with humour and lilting language to soften the often sensitive subject matter she tackles. 

The meme, ‘Don’t let your ice cream melt as you count the sprinkles’ resonates strongly with Dimity and not just because she loves ice cream! 

She too shares a tendency to obsess over minutiae, often losing sight of the bigger beautiful picture, which might explain where the idea for her latest picture book came from.

Oswald Messweather, due out mid March 2021 with Wombat Books, is not a picture book that focuses intently on the educational perspectives of children with OCD but rather more on the emotional aspects associated with this debilitating condition. Oswald is caught in the grips of needing to be in control of the messier aspects of his life and like many young children suffering from obsessive worrying and anxieties, wants to stop but can’t. Maybe Oswald's crayons hold the answer. 

By allowing Oswald to take control of his anxieties and employ them with purpose, Oswald gains room to breathe and awareness that they need not govern him. 

Master of crayons (aka the illustrator of Oswald Messweather) is Siobhan McVey who's unique style and carefully considered colour palette allow children to absorb the complexity of this condition in a fun relatable way that both she and Dimity hope will buoy and enlighten. And now...you can see for yourself! We present, Oswald Messweather.

Pre-order your copy of Oswald Messweather through Wombat Books. Available mid March 2021. 

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Guest Post: Video Review by Kaavya Prasad

Today we welcome a dedicated book lover all the way from India. Kaavya Prasad reviews her favourite reads and shares this collection of classics with us with precision and enthusiasm. Enjoy!

Title: The Naughtiest Girl
Author: Enid Blyton
Publisher: Hodder Children's Books, $19.99 
Publication Date: 2012 - 2015
For ages: 7+
Type: Junior Fiction

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Meet The Illustrator : Patrick Shirvington

Name: Patrick Shirvington

Describe your illustration style in ten words or less.

An amalgam of traditional techniques coupled with new possibilities.

What items are an essential part of your creative space?

Being surrounded by pencils, paper, paint and ink in my bushland studio, with natures sounds emanating all around.

Do you have a favourite artistic medium? 

I use all the mediums I can get my hands on. However, I have to say watercolours are hard to beat.

Name three artists whose work inspires you.

Van Gogh, Arthur Boyd, Charles Blackman 

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

Late 1800’s – 1920.The nexus between impressionism, expressionism through to abstraction, is a wonderful launching pad for any art today.

Who or what inspired you to become an illustrator? 

My Nan and a science teacher in high school, who, knowing I wasn’t to be a nuclear physicist, asked if I could do some illustrations for the school annual….. Which I still have.

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 situated quite a distance from my house, in a peaceful bush setting. I have recently added approx 20 sqm to the original size. As you can see in this first picture… ‘ it is clean ‘,unlike the area behind the door .. 

What is your favourite part of the illustration process?

No favourite part…..all one big adventure.

What advice would you give to an aspiring illustrator? 

Like anything in life…just do it and enjoy being who you are. 

Patrick Shirvington started his journey as an artist in 1975, attending the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris, and later receiving a UNSW MCDArtDes. Patrick has received many awards for his work including being listed for CBCA Notable book, nominated for a Crichton Award and shortlisted for an Australian Wilderness Society award for children’s literature. 

For more information, please visit Patrick's website.

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Review: Remind Me Why I'm Here

This is a fun, sweet-level teen romance. It starts off with a misunderstanding. Maya, an American teenage girl, flies halfway across the world to what she thought was a home-stay vacation in the trendy Sydney suburb of Barangaroo.

Wrong!

She’d actually booked and paid for a home stay in a dry and dusty sheep farm in Barangaroo Creek. Oops.

Her host-brother Gus is less than impressed to have to show her around as he had been bulldozed into helping her to tick-off experiences on her very cliched Australian to-do list.

He’s so unimpressed that he tries to spook her with a variety of scary creatures that Australia is renowned for, in the hopes that she will run away screaming back to the city and finish her holiday there...thereby freeing him to spend his summer doing what he wanted to do.

Luckily for him, it’s easy to scare the animal-phobic Maya.

But she proves to be quite resistant, despite his childish pranks. As the story unfolds, it seems that Maya is more than a clueless tourist. There is a sad story behind her motivation to holiday in Australia, and as they get to know one another, Gus and Maya find they have more in common than they thought.

This is a story about both finding meaning in grief and moving on from guilt.

Overall, an easy and sometimes humorous read, with lots of clash-of-cultures, prank-wars and opposites-attract moments to enjoy. But in its attempt to tackle more profound issues, a whiff of ableism taints the sweet novel with a sour undertone.

Older brother Patrick supports Maya when Gus is being a jerk to her, but this wheelchair-bound person exists in the narrative to give Maya a problem to solve. No question of a romance there! How lucky for him that not only is Maya a mechanical whizz-kid, but her guilt being parallel to Gus’s means that Gus can come to terms with it, and finally allow Patrick to access the mobility aid he needs to fulfil his ambition.

Otherwise, Patrick is an inoffensive nice-guy with no depth, no ownership of his own backstory, no grief or PTSD and ultimately, no agency. Patrick only appears on-stage when Maya and Gus’s story requires this of him and obligingly remains back-stage otherwise.

Sweet and fun, but a missed opportunity to include and celebrate a diverse voice.

Title: Remind Me Why I'm Here
Author: Cat Colmer
Publisher: Rhiza Edge, $16.99
Publication Date: 12 Auguat, 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781925563924
For ages: 12+
Type: Young Adult Fiction

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Review: Beyond Belief

Little is known or written, about the Grand Mosque of Paris, and how Muslims saved countless Jews during the Second World War. 

Dee White draws us into the story with details and revelations about the dedication, purpose and sacrifice shown by the Muslims in the mosque, in order to keep the children safe.

Jews all around Paris have been rounded up and taken away on buses never to be seen or heard of again.

It is during one of these raids that eleven year old Ruben is taken by his mother to the mosque in the city, after escaping their hiding place in a friend’s cellar. Her intention is to keep him safe while she and her husband try to find their daughter. 

Arrangements are made for the Fox to see Ruben safely to Spain when the time is right.

Against all that he believes, Ruben becomes Abdul. He must now fit into the surroundings there, learn to read Arabic to recite prayers, and be shown how to pray. He must act like a Muslim and put his Jewish life aside temporarily. 

 He finds it is not easy to become something other than who you are.

He is a good student but is not accepted by all the children there. He learns patience, forgiveness, kindness, courage and faith by following the other children’s examples. This transition means survival; his reunion with his family. The whisper of his mother and father’s words keep him strong and focused.

It is an adventure that Ruben embarks upon, a rite of passage; a maturation process full of life lessons. Nothing is easy. But difficult situations make the best lessons.

When the mosque is raided, Ruben flees through the sewers, guided by the heroic, nameless people of the Resistance, in order to reach the safe house where the Fox waits to secret him to Spain and safety. Many surprises lay in store.

Another exceptional book in the Heroes of the Holocaust series that produces wonderful stories from which young people can learn history.

Title: Beyond Belief
Author: Dee White
Publisher: Scholastic, $ 17.99
Publication Date: 1 April 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 97817606612516
For ages: 11 +
Type: Historical Fiction

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Guest Post: Sandra Bennett on Holidays Sparking Ideas!

I always wanted to write an adventure series to encourage readers to fall in love with books just as much as reading books like The Famous Five had done for me. I have been an avid reader since my early childhood, literacy is my passion. When I grew up, I naturally leaned towards teaching and soon found my love of books lead me to write stories for the kids in my class and my own three growing boys.

Many years ago, we were on a family holiday in Bali. After the exhausting but exciting adventure of each day, we would snuggle into bed with our boys to read another chapter of Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks. It was a fabulous adventure story, one that made my boys ask ‘one more chapter’ before they would fall asleep. I was so intrigued, I had to read ahead. This bonding experience was so wonderful for our family that I wanted to write a story that would have families sharing it just like we had shared Indian in the Cupboard. 

Bali inspired me; the smells, the culture, the lush green rice fields and everywhere we explored. I searched Kuta and Ubud to find an adventure story written for kids set in Bali but came up empty handed. I decided to write a pirate treasure hunt around the exotic island that took kids on a journey of thrilling adventure from Kuta, to Tanah Lot Temple, Ubud and up into the volcanic mountains. I became an Indonesian LOTE/ESL teacher shortly after that holiday. Secrets Hidden Below the Adamson Adventures 1 evolved from there. In those early years it had a different title and was intended to be a stand-alone story. It wasn’t until I found a publisher nearly 20 years after that first draft, that I was asked to make it a series.

This was an exciting prospect for me, I had already begun a story inspired by our annual camping holiday down on the NSW South coast. It was set among the remains of an old ruined lighthouse that inspired ghost stories around our campfire at night. Kids love a good spooky story, and one set around camping at the beach, made it even more relatable than the story set in Bali. All I had to do was finish writing it. I changed the characters to become the same as the three siblings in Secrets Hidden Below, titled it A Lighthouse in Time and the Adamson Adventures was born. My publisher then asked me for a blurb for book 3 to put at the back of A Lighthouse in Time. That too, was inspired by a holiday.

I had always wanted to visit Winton in Queensland. My eldest son grew up with a passion for rocks and fossils, naturally some of that has worn off on me. After all, what’s not to be intrigued about? Australian dinosaurs and their fossils are fascinating and all kids love dinosaurs at some time in their childhood. Four years ago, we finished a two-year working stint in Darwin and planned to drive the car we bought up there home to Canberra. The obvious route for me was via Mount Isa, down the centre of Queensland through Winton and Longreach. It was a fabulous holiday in the outback.

From the minute I visited the Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum, I knew a story had to be set in the area. I immersed myself in research while I was there and later, on my return home. While there we toured the information centre, the working research lab and the surrounding escarpment. Learning about Banjo and Matilda, the two fossilised dinosaurs that had been discovered together sparked a thread of an idea that would eventually become Fossil Frenzy; the Adamson Adventures 3.

Sandra Bennett's desire to write continued to grow throughout her teaching career until one day when she decided it was time to leave the classroom and focus on writing full-time. Through her writing, Sandra hopes to help parents and teachers improve literacy in our children. Sandra is devoted to writing stories that engage and entice readers with excitement, adventure, a bit of mystery and a whole lot of fun.

Sandra’s chapter book Secrets Hidden Below was long listed in the Sisters in Crime 2019 Children’s Category, Davitt Awards and Shortlisted for the Speech Pathology Book of the Year Awards 2019. Fossil Frenzy is the third book in her Adamson Adventures series, following A Lighthouse in Time and Secrets Hidden Below.

Website: https://sandrabennettauthor.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GingerbreadAliens

Twitter: https://twitter.com/SandraBennettAu

 

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