I Am Cow, Hear Me Moo by Jill Esbaum, illustrated by Gus Gordon - book review

Nadine is a cow with character and she's isn't afraid of ANYTHING... at least that's what she tells her friends.

But when her friends challenge her to go in to the woods Nadine has to discover whether she really is brave, or if she was just pretending.

Nadine is hilarious and this is a funny, clever story about the lies and exaggerations we tell each other.

It is truly perfect for kids who are at that 'of course I can read by myself, but only in my head' exaggerating stage. Its also a nice way of gently talking about being scared and telling fibs.

I really loved the rhyming text - it definitely added to the hilarity although it was occasionally hard to read out loud because the rhythm of the text changes from page to page, which can catch you out on the first few read throughs.

Gus Gordon's pictures are an incredible mixture of drawing, painting and collage, that is so full of life and perfectly portrays Nadine's cheeky character!

Overall this book is just good fun and can be neatly summed up by the double page spread of Nadine and her friends, up a tree in the woods, and yelling at the top of her lungs... "I am cow, hear me moo!".

Who'll love this: 3 and 4 year olds will enjoy it the most but older kids will giggle too!
Price: $24.99
Publisher: Penguin Australia

These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner - book review

If you like the idea of Doctor Who crossed with an angsty romance (and I do) then this is the book for you.

Set in the future These Broken Stars is sci-fi but it is definitely not at the extreme end and you don't have to be a sci-fi fan to love it. Like in Doctor Who, humans are still humans, but we have discovered ways to travel the universe and of terraforming planets to make them inhabitable (and profitable).

In some ways this view of humanity's future is slightly depressing and I really hope that, by the time we have the capability of exploring the heavens, we are a little less superficial and wealth obsessed than the ruling class in These Broken Stars but it certainly provides an interesting background for the story.

Lilac LaRoux and Tarver Merendsen are both passengers on a luxury mock-Victorian cruising spaceship but their lives couldn't be more different. Lilac is the only daughter of the richest man in universe and Tarver is a hero returned from the brutal frontier wars. When they are suddenly thrown together on an uninhabited, mysterious and deadly planet sparks fly but they need to work together to have any hope of surviving.

It's a really entertaining and exciting story that I certainly found hard to put down.

If you were going to criticise this book I guess you could say that the romance is slightly cliched -Lilac is rich, beautiful and sassy, while Tarver is handsome, poor, heroic and unimpressed by her wealth but, and let's be totally honest here, there is a reason that model of romance is so popular and that's because it works.

And things are not as 'Mills & Boon' as they might seem, the further you get in to this book the more you discover that both Lilac and Tarver have unexpected depths, and there are certainly twists and turns that I never saw coming!    

One of my favourite things about this book is the way that each chapter begins with a short section that is clearly Tarver being questioned by some kind of official. It is intriguing and definitely keeps you turning the pages as you try to figure out what on earth is going on.

Teenage girls will love it!

Who'll love this: Teenage girls
Cost: $18.99
Publisher: Allen & Unwin

Max by Marc Martin - book review

I really wasn't drawn to Max (could be because I have a bit of a bird phobia...) but my kids loved it from the moment they set eyes on it. 

I'm not sure if it was the uncluttered cover, the bright colour or the idea of a story about something as familiar as a seagull but there was no way I was going to escape reading it to them and I'm so glad I did!

Max is a wonderful story about things that are familiar and every day but have so much meaning, and we have read it over and over again and found something new in the words or the pictures every time.

Max is a seagull and he is friends with the local fish and chip shop owner (good idea for a seagull, right?) until one day a large mall comes and the fish shop has to close.

Max misses his friend but will he be able to find him again? 

The story is quiet, heartfelt and lovely and the pictures are incredible, kind of old fashion collage in style but so much better than that sounds! There is a double page spread in the middle of the book that looks down on Max flying high above the beach which caused my 5 year old son to exclaim out loud when he saw it.

It's got great themes about development and change, friendship and loyalty. But mostly it is just a simple, moving story that easily meets the test of repeated readings.

Honestly, this one is a winner.

Who'll love this: Boys and girls aged 3 to 6 

Cost: $24.99

Publisher: Penguin Books Australia

  

Billy is a Dragon: First Bite by Nick Falk, illustrated by Tony Flowers - book review

Billy is a Dragon has seriously rocked our world!

The obsession started when Wild Man (aged 5) saw an extract of it in Mania magazine. We read the extract over and over and over again until I finally admitted that, even though we have more books in our house than we can manage, anyone who can get that excited about a single chapter of a book deserves to own the whole thing.

So Wild Man and I bought Billy is a Dragon (the children's marketing strategist in me was thrilled to see how well an extract can work as a marketing tool!) and settled down to read the first chapter.

We ended up reading the whole book in a single day. Pretty impressive because it is 16 chapters long.

A week later my aunt minded Wild Man and she read him the whole book in a SINGLE SITTING.

Even for grown-ups Billy is a Dragon is cool and really funny.

The premise behind the book is simple... Billy's Mum takes him to a mysterious pet shop (always a mistake) to choose something for his birthday and Billy gets bitten by a strange looking lizard. You can guess what happens next...

The most hilarious chapter by far (and the one featured in the infamous extract) features Billy, in the toilets at school, trying to hide the fact that he is morphing in to a dragon and desperately worried that he is going to end up naked in from of his class mates. It is brilliant.

The story is great - exciting, funny, fast paced, and totally crazy. The end of the book makes it very clear that this is just the first book in a series and all I can say is thank goodness for that.

This is definitely going to be our 'go to' birthday present this year.

I love the way the illustrations are part of the text and it is clear that Nick Falk and Tony Flower worked closely to get the mix right. That, plus the whole page illustrations throughout the book, makes the text much less visually intimidating than books with pages full of words and I'm sure that it would work well for reluctant readers.

Its also really great for motivating a 5-year-old who are learning to read...

Who'll love it: Boys aged 5 to 9 years
Cost: $12.99
Publisher: Random House Australia

To Get to Me by Eleanor Kerr, illustrated by Judith Rossell - book review

To Get to Me comes from a very, very simple idea but it is so cleverly executed that the end result is brilliant.

Everyone who has friends or family who travel or live overseas knows how hard it can be to explain to small children about the world, all the people and places in it, and the different ways of travelling around it. Well, it isn't hard any more!

From buses to camels, from a ferry to a chairlift, To Get to Me is a story about getting from one side of the world to the other, and all the things you would see along the way. It is very simple, with bright and engaging pictures that young kids will love.

This is the kind of book that, when you read it, makes you go "Oh, that's such an obvious idea, I could have thought of that' but the more you read it the cleverer the idea and execution become, and anyway you didn't think of it... Eleanor Kerr did!

Who'll love it: 2 year olds, and preschoolers who have family overseas.
Cost: $19.95 ((hc)
Publisher: Random House Australia