Archive | July 10, 2025

The Day the Crayons Made Friends

Jul10
The Day the Crayons Made Friends

The Day the Crayons Made Friends

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Day the Crayons Made Friends

Drew Daywalt

Oliver Jeffers

HarperCollins, 2025

40pp., hbk., RRP $A24.99

9780008735517

Duncan’s crayons just can’t seem to stay put!

After convincing one group of crayons to go back to work after they wanted to quit and rescuing another group who got lost in the most inconvenient places, Duncan’s crayons have disappeared once more. He is devastated but then he starts receiving letters from them – from his bedroom!

They’ve gone there  to make friends. From Red Crayon, who fulfils his dream of driving a fire engine, to Blue Crayon, who meets a fashion doll desperately in need of a head, to fan favourite Esteban, who is off to tame a teddy bear (or as he would call it, a wild beast), each crayon has an exciting story to share about the new objects they’ve met, the strange places they’ve found them and the new adventures they’ve had. Who knew there could be such fun in one little boy’s bedroom!

This is the latest in this hugely popular series that is ideal for this year’s Book Week theme as little ones could imagine the friends the crayons could make as they match crayons, toys and colours, and the adventures they could have in their own bedrooms, as well as for staff looking for a unifying theme for the dress-up parade. 

Continuing the tradition, each letter is written ‘by’ a crayon using a font that might make this story difficult for the emerging reader to read alone, but it is a perfect read-aloud for many ages!  Jeffers’ illustrations have an authenticity about them – they look like they have been drawn and coloured by young children and the credits suggest that there has been significant input, either physical or intellectual, from them. This provides another level to the book – my experience is that children start to believe that their drawings are not worthy because they don’t have the realism they see around them or the professionalism of book illustrators, so seeing pictures that look just like theirs in such a popular book validates their efforts and hopefully encourages them to keep drawing.

Every time I donate a “crayons book” to the local preschool where I volunteer, it is greeted with joy and enthusiasm – and this will be no different. 

 

Detective Beans: Adventures in Cat Town

Jul10
Detective Beans: Adventures in Cat Town

Detective Beans: Adventures in Cat Town

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Detective Beans: Adventures in Cat Town

Li Chen

Penguin, 2025

208pp., graphic novel. RRP $A17.99

 9781761353406

Dressed in the traditional trench coat and fedora hat that are the trademarks of real detectives,  Detective Beans -known as Jellybean to his mother – is a tabby cat who takes his job seriously. He believes he is  “a hard-boiled detective cleaning up this city one case at a time” and he  is back on the job after solving the mystery of his missing hat.

This time there are many mysteries to solve in between playing Scrabble, having sleepovers and trips to the beach, including who ate Mum’s donuts, who has lost their handbag in the park, which pigeon stole King Chip, or even a burgled diamond ring.  Beans is ready for anything. He’s so ready that he’s even starting a detective school – if he can find any students . . .

It’s interesting to watch younger students gravitate towards the graphic novel section of a local school library searching for something in that format that is suitable for both their ability, interest and maturity.  Clearly they have the notion that this is the format that real readers read, but it is seldom that they find something to meet their needs, so they will be happy to discover this one which will appeal. A clever but funny cat who is also a detective who solves everyday crimes is much more suitable, particularly if they can solve the mystery before Detective Beans does.  

Told through the perspective of his friend Biscuit presenting a documentary featuring some of Bean’s more colourful jobs as well as his everyday life, there are over 30 short stories told in comic form that showcase a variety of Cat Town’s characters who need his help whether it’s a duck who has been burgled or finding Mr Kipper’s gloves, interspersed with some of his daily activities and his ambitions to be a graphic artist himself, so that he is a more-rounded personality that readers will relate to. Even though it is 208 pages, each adventure is a manageable entity making it a good pick-up-and-put-down entry into this format for younger reader, particularly as the text is not written in all upper-case as is usual with graphic novels.