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Something Special

Jul18
Something Special

Something Special

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Something Special (40th Anniversary Edition)

Emily Rodda

HarperCollins, 2024

80pp., pbk., RRP $A17.99

9781460766415

In the spare room, the second-hand clothes hang in rows, stirring in the sunlight. Sam walks through the rows, brushing velvety sleeves, touching lace, sensing memories and magic and wondering about the stories they could tell if their previous owners were there to tell them. 

The clothes all have neat price tags. They’re ready to be sold at the school fete on Saturday. Sam knows that some of them are special. Her mother, who is running the stall at the fete, has told her so. But she is soon to find out just how special they really are…  But is Sam’s experience a dream or was it something else?

Forty years ago, this debut novel from Emily Rodda hit the shelves and quickly became a favourite not only because it was a gentle introduction for young readers to the fantasy genre but because it marked the beginning of the outstanding contribution to children’s literature by Emily Rodda. What began as a bed time story for her daughter morphed into an amazing collection of stories for young readers, most notably the Deltora Quest and Rowan of Rin series, still favourites today.  (In fact one of the most successful lunchtime activities I offered involved students reading and responding to a series of activities based on each of the Deltora Quest 1 books,  as they worked towards being awarded a gem to complete their own belts. )

While there are classic picture books that are shared through the generations, there are not that many novels, particularly those for young emerging readers, that hit milestones like 40th anniversary editions, and so it is testament to the quality of the story and the skill of the writer, that Something Special has fine new livery and is all set to engage and enchant a new generation of readers.

Indeed, as Children’s Book Week draws closer, this is the perfect time to showcase her works, not just because this year’s theme lends itself to exploring fantasy as a genre, but because  Rodda has won the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s Book of the Year for Younger Readers Award a record six times, as well as receiving many Children’s Choice awards and the Aurealis fantasy award. Whether it’s a series like Deltora, Rondo, Monty’s Island, Fairy Realm or a stand-alone like  Eliza Vanda’s Button Box  His Name was Walter,  or The Shop at Hooper’s Bend, there is something that will delight your fantasy readers as well as honour this remarkable author. 

And the icing on the cake?  There’s a new series coming in October!

Mr McGee and his Hat

Jul2
Mr McGee and his Hat

Mr McGee and his Hat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mr McGee and his Hat

Pamela Allen

Puffin, 2024

32pp., hbk., RRP $A24.99

9781761345050

Morning, and it’s time to get out of bed and get dressed.  So Mr McGee did just that- pulled on his trousers. his socks and his shoes, and lastly, his hat.  But suddenly, along came the strongest gust of wind and blew Mr McGee, his hat and his cat, even his bed and table and chairs high in the sky!  And while they landed safely when the wind stopped, Mr McGee couldn’t find his hat.  Where could it be?

It’s over 35 years since we first met Mr McGee who lives under a tree, and 25 years since his adventure with the biting flea that exposed his genitals and sent teachers, teacher librarians and parents racing for the whiteout so such “disgraceful” images had no place in a picture book for our youngest readers. 

But rather than corrupting young minds, it showed a generation of young readers that stories could be fun and energetic and real, and sent them looking for more books by this prodigious author who has been entertaining us for decades with more than 50 books, eight of them with Mr McGee as the key character.  Now in her 90s, Kiwi Pamela Allen says that she wrote this latest adventure to to escape the ‘prison of death’ following the passing of her husband last year, aged 100.“I had to re-establish my mental health among the living … And the way in which I could do that was to write a book. And I consciously put myself as a first priority, after his death, to re-establish my sense of worth. Because you lose all contact with the living drive that exists. But if death is forever a prison, you’ve got to climb out of it. So that’s why Mr McGee was a natural resource for me.”

And she hasn’t lost any of her touch since she first explained Archimedes principle in her first book in 1980, and still in print. With its rhyming text, and iconic illustrative style, little ones will delight in helping Mr McGee look for his hat while those who know will delight in telling him where to look because they know.  And while our youngest readers will delight in listening to the rhythm and the rhyme, their parents will be happily revisiting their own reading childhood, perhaps even seeking out some of Mr McGee’s earlier adventures to share.  

Through her stories with their sheer fun embedded in the plot, the words and the pictures, Pamela is up there with Mem Fox and Joy Cowley in contributing so much to the development of literacy and reading skills over the generations  She is one whose works I have used time and again over the decades of working with little ones both in New Zealand and Australia  and to revitalise her works and introduce them to a new generation of budding readers through the review of a new story is such a privilege.  

Discover and share all Mr McGee;s adventures...

Discover and share all Mr McGee;s adventures…

 

Boots

May16
Boots

Boots

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Boots

Elizabeth Pulsford

Krista Brennan

Wombat Books, 2024

32pp., hbk., RRP $A26.99

9781761111037

Those who know me know that I like to create things using my imagination and my amazing embroidery machine, including author kits that inspire children to write their own stories.  So when I saw a design that took me back to my school days when the class was set a task to write a story about a pair of old boots – a story I still recall writing even though it was about 65 years ago – I knew I had to make it.  Who else might discover the world of words because they were inspired by something similar?

 

Design C7574 Embroidery Library https://emblibrary.com/design/blooms-in-a-boot-c7574

Design C7574 Embroidery Library https://emblibrary.com/design/blooms-in-a-boot-c7574

Those who know me also know I believe in serendipity and so it really was no surprise when I opened my mail a day later to discover this book that so matched my memories.

In something completely different to the modern stories for children that I usually read, this one follows the journey of a pair of ordinary workboots as they sit on the shoemaker’s shelf to be purchased by a young farmhand and worn daily until he (and they) die.  Shining a light on the ups and downs of rural life in a perfect fusion of simple text and evocative illustrations, the boots are witness to the highs and lows of family, fire, flood, drought… offering an insight into a life very different from that led by the majority of today’s children.

Although I can’t recall the details of that story I wrote, it would have been quite different to this one, for this one is timeless – it could be about Grandpa’s boots or it could be about a pair purchased by a young farmhand today underlining the regular routines of rural life regardless of extraneous events, ruled by the seasons.  It is an entertaining and engaging way to focus the reader’s thinking on the differences between city and country life, as it celebrates that sense of community and connectedness that is unique to small towns and surrounds.  

Maybe this will be among the award winners in the future, but for me, and the memories it evoked, it is already a winner. 

The Tiny Woman’s Coat

Nov15
The Tiny Woman's Coat

The Tiny Woman’s Coat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Tiny Woman’s Coat

Joy Cowley

Giselle Clarkson

Walker Books, 2021

28pp., hbk., RRP $A24.99

9781776573424

A storm is brewing and the tiny woman realises she will need a coat to stay dry and warm.  But where will she get the cloth, the scissors, the thread, the needle, the buttons?

On the surface this is a lovely story about friendship and co-operation in the tiny woman’s community but to those who understand how little children learn to read it is so much more than that.

When I started my initial teacher ed course in New Zealand in 1970, Joy Cowley was the leading author behind the Ready to Read series, a collection of basal readers that was used in junior classrooms in every school in New Zealand for reading instruction.  In the 70s there would have been few Kiwi children who were unfamiliar with Early in the Morning , Grandma Comes to Stay and The Fire Engine, and the thrill of moving from red to yellow, blue and green levels before starting on ‘chapter books” like The Donkey’s Egg or The Hungry Lambs.  The series was revolutionary in its approach to teaching children to read because it used natural language rather than phonics or controlled vocabulary, drawing on the research on world leaders in early literacy like Sylvia Ashton-Warner and Dr Marie Clay. She then went on to be the talent behind the Storybox Library series with titles like Mrs Wishy Washy and The Kick-a-Lot Shoes.

And it is her knowledge and experience of how children learn that underpins this story so that they can experience “real reading” and consolidate their belief that they can be “real” readers. To start with the tiny woman wonders where she will get the cloth for her coat, focusing the reader’s attention of the sorts of things that will be needed to construct it so they can draw on their own experience to suggest the items that will be required.  Then each “chapter” starts with the repeated statement and question… “The tiny woman wanted a coat. “Where will I get some…” leaving the reader to suggest what the next word might be and possible solutions. All the while the sky is changing building the anticipation of whether she will get her coat completed before the storm hits.  

While there are hundreds of stories written and published for our youngest readers every year, there are few that are so deeply rooted in understanding those early reading behaviours and which consolidate our children’s expectations of being readers as well as those by this author.  While the world has clearly moved on from the scenario of Grandma arriving in a Vickers Viscount  (after 50+ years I still remember the theme of the stories) , the process of learning to read remains the same, and this is the perfect support to that. 

Millie Mak the Maker

Sep26
Millie Mak the Maker

Millie Mak the Maker

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Millie Mak the Maker

Alice Pung

Sher Rill Ng

HarperCollins, 2023

288pp., hbk., RRP $A22.99

9781460763773

Life has been pretty tricky lately for nine-year-old Millie Mak. As well as her family moving to a new neighbourhood to be closer to her mother’s parents, she has started a new school and being quiet and somewhat shy, she has found it hard to make friends, not made easier by being Scottish-Chinese with Asian features and flaming red hair.  Things come to a head when she and her Granny find an old dolls house put out on the street for Hard Rubbish Day collection, perfect for them to renovate, but which is also seen by the young sister of one of the mean girls who throws a tantrum when she does not get it.  

But Millie and her grandmother have been revitalising and renewing old stuff  together for a long time and now it’s in Millie’s nature to look for new ways to use old things, turning them into something beautiful and useful.  So when she sees her other Chinese grandmother who lives with them and takes care of the household, including two year old Rosie, making sleeve savers from an old pillowcase, she has an even better idea using her dad’s broken umbrella. She learns even more when she goes to the holiday program at the local community centre – not the expensive Awesome Kids workshops she was hoping for – and meets Veesa and Glee whose mums actually make the popular brand-name clothes that everyone, including those mean girls, are paying so much money for.  Who knew you could make a trendy skirt from some tea towels?

The second story also focuses on making something from almost nothing, as a new girl, Amrita, starts at the school and being Sikh, experiences the same isolation that Millie did.  But the two girls strike up a friendship that not only opens new doors for both of them but has them having the most popular stall at the school fete.

All the familiar themes and feelings of starting a new school are threaded through this story – isolation, bullying, racism, stereotyping – as well as having to grapple with issues at home like the rivalry between her grandmothers and her dad unable to work because of an accident, so it will resonate with many readers but its focus on recycling and upcycling will really appeal to those who love to do the same, particularly those learning to sew – made even moreso because there are clear instructions given for some of the projects at the end of each story as well as some other avenues to explore.  Who knew that fabric could come from animals, minerals and plants and we could be wearing all at the same time?

Both Millie’s family and the situations she and Rita, particularly, face will not only be familiar to those who have walked that path, but there are also lessons to be learned by those on the other side, particularly about making assumptions about how someone might feel or react.   Teaching notes offer other ideas for exploring the issues in greater depth – there is so much but a book review can only be so long.

When a friend recently offered sewing classes for children, she was so overwhelmed with the responses that she had to add extra sessions, and so there are many boys and girls who have an interest in this sort of creativity and this is the ideal book for feeding that interest as well as sparking inspiration for others.  Being one of those who sews every day and knits each night, I read it in one sitting and kept thinking of how I could share it with one of the little ones in Jane’s sewing classes because I know they would love it.  

 Luckily for those budding creators, this is just the first in the series and Children’s Books Daily has an interview with the author to share.

 

 

Hats Are Not for Cats!

Jun1
Hats Are Not for Cats!

Hats Are Not for Cats!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hats Are Not for Cats!

Jacqueline K. Rayner

HarperCollins, 2023

30pp., board book., RRP $A16.99

9780358731085

Who hasn’t heard of the cat in the hat – the Dr Seuss story that is a staple for all little people?  But what if hats are not for cats?

In this fun rhyming book for our youngest readers, a bossy dog in a very fancy hat is laying down the law to the cat that hats are not for them.  But the cat disagrees.  Who wins the argument? Or can there be a compromise?

Young readers can learn a lot about peaceful conflict resolution in this simple, silly story as they put themselves in the shoes of both the cat and the dog.  Perhaps they can figure out a win-win solution.  And then have fun designing a hat for a dog and a hat for a cat!

 

 

Jack’s Jumper

Jul17
Jack's Jumper

Jack’s Jumper

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jack’s Jumper

Sara Acton

Walker, 2022

32pp., hbk., RRP $A25.99

9781760654054

Jack’s jumper is special because it can be many things – a den, a hat, a hug – but most of all it is special because it belonged to Jack’s big brother, Paul. Jack wears the jumper every day, but when forced to take it off to have a bath, the cat sees a comfy new bed… Now the jumper is just a ball of wool!  But there are a couple of surprises in store for Jack. 

This is a charming story that many younger readers will relate to having a hand-me-down that is so much more than a parent being responsible and recycling.  Because as well as being so many things to Jack, most of all it is a tangible memory of a brother no longer living at home and which triggers many more memories.  

There are few of us who wouldn’t have a treasured memento of someone dear to us – I have my mum’s silver fern marcasite brooch – that instantly sparks reminders of special times together, and even though they are little, this offers an opportunity for even our youngest readers to share some of theirs.  Maybe, as adults, we need to think twice and ask first before we dispose of things. 

Sophia the Show Pony

Apr11
Sophia the Show Pony

Sophia the Show Pony

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sophia the Show Pony

Kate Waterhouse

Sally Spratt

Puffin, 2022

32pp., hbk., RRP $A19.99

9781761042492

Sophia is literally a show pony.  Not for her smelly, draughty stables and a manky horse blanket.  “She lived uptown in fancy Flats, the ritziest place on earth” and was “known for her stylish array of hats, paired with coats and designer gowns.”  But Sophia has a secret dream to actually  win the race that she and her friends dress up for.  Her friends discourage her saying that her destiny is being a fashionista and so Sophie settles for that until…’

Waterhouse has combined her fashion and racing backgrounds with her desire to write a book for her daughters which embraces ” all the lessons I want to impart ” about ” following your passion no matter what anyone says and finding your place in the world, and also embracing your individuality.” This message is a common one in children’s stories, but one which needs to be heard often so whatever story it is embedded in is worthwhile.  Choosing to tell it in rhyme can be tricky with both vocabulary and rhythm having to be manipulated but Waterhouse has done this creating a story that gallops along accompanied by illustrations which have all the characteristics that appeal to its target audience.  With its gold borders and pink roses, the book itself wouldn’t look out of place in the member’s area of the racecourse. 

 

A peek inside...

A peek inside…

 

 

Mr Bat Wants a Hat

Jun25
Mr Bat Wants a Hat

Mr Bat Wants a Hat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mr Bat Wants a Hat

Kitty Black

Laura Wood

New Frontier, 2021

32pp., hbk., RRP $A24.99

9781922326218

Mr Bat is largely content with his life, doing what he likes when he likes.  But one evening when flying above the local park, he discovers hats and decides that he needs one NOW!  His attempts to steal one from the adults is unsuccessful but a sleeping baby is a different story.  Yet, while he is proud of himself and thinks he is the grandest thing around, others are not so impressed…

This is a fun story for young readers about the impact their actions can have on others.  Even though taking the hat made Mr Bat feel good, how did the theft affect the baby? Starting these conversations starts the ripple-in-the-pond effect of our actions and helps develop the concepts of compassion and empathy, starting to move them away from their egocentric, self-centred world to understand and acknowledge the feelings of others.  

Even though this message is embedded in the story, on the surface it is bright and funny with a twist in the end that will offer lots of scope for predicting what might come next and what might happen when it does. 

The King’s Birthday Suit

Jun5
The King's Birthday Suit

The King’s Birthday Suit

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The King’s Birthday Suit

Peter Bently

Claire Powell

Bloomsbury, 2021

32pp., pbk., RRP $A14.99

9781408860144

King Albert-Horatio-Otto the Third
had SO many clothes it was simply absurd …

He had clothes for every occasion, even changing just to go to the loo, so when his birthday was on the horizon it was obvious he was going to need a new outfit.  But when fashion designers came from all over the kingdom with their finest collections, he could find nothing suitable. But then two arrived who declared they could  make an outfit of only the very BEST and most special cloth, one that only the most clever and wisest of all could see. So of course the vain king could not resist but the results were not what he expected…

This is an hilarious makeover of Hans Christian Andersen’s  traditional tale The Emperor’s New Clothes with Bently’s clever rhyming text and Powell’s illustrations bringing it to life for a whole new generation of readers.  It is rich, engaging and will have young readers utterly enthralled as they become engrossed in the details and they will love the risqué ending, because it is just a little bit naughty!  So much fun from cover to cover, yet offers so much to talk about whether “clothes maketh the man” and even the meaning of “sycophant”.