Alex Neptune (series)

Oct15

Alex Neptune (series)

Dragon Thief

9781474999236

Pirate Hunter

9781474999274

Monster Avenger

9781474999298

David Owen

HarperCollins, 2022-2023

250+pp., pbk., RRP $A15.99

Alex Neptune lives in Haven Bay, a town whose history and currency is intertwined with the sea, and particularly the legends of the Water-Dragon and the pirate, Captain Brineblood, But Alex hates the sea because he is convinced it wants him dead and besides, strange things have happened to it since a mysterious factory was built and it is now so polluted that visitors no longer come to the town, let alone support the family gift store Neptune’s Bounty. And what’s happening with the long-closed aquarium at the top of the hill which mysteriously glows green at night time?

This is new series for independent readers (best read in order for story continuity) that contains all the elements of relatable quirky characters, sea creatures that can talk and adventure that has been described as perfect “for fans of Percy Jackson and Dragon Realm”. With his tech-genius best friend Zoey, legend-lover Anil, and a sharp-shooting octopus, Alex discovers that he actually has power over his nemesis , the ocean, and embarks on a series of escapades that feature the town’s two legends, as he tries to save it from whatever is bringing it doom.

Full of action and embedded humour to lighten the mood, this is an entertaining read that has a powerful underlying message of how the ocean is being used by the unscrupulous for their own greed without regard for the consequences. From hating and fearing the ocean, Alex comes to appreciate and value it. An eye-opener…

A Footy Tail

Oct13

A Footy Tail

A Footy Tail

Alex Johnston

Gregg Dreise

A & U Children’s, 2023

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

9781761180316

A fluffle of Bunnies play at the park.

They sprint and they tackle from dawn until dark,

They always train hard, but it’s never enough . . .

the other teams are just bigger and stronger. It’s tough!

Dispirited and disheartened, the bunnies fear the opposition who have sharp teeth, loud barks, can fly high and even breathe fire. But then along comes Crow with wise advice, encouragement and the vision and means to introduce some new players – a croc called Alex, a goanna called Cody and a kangaroo named Trell…

Inspired by the South Sydney Rabbitohs, written by NRL star Alex Johnston and illustrated by celebrated First Nations artist Gregg Dreise, this rhyming picture book about an underdog team of bunnies who are up against the stronger teams of animals is a wonderful story of unity, togetherness, resilience and teamwork.

This is a picture book for any young Rugby League fan, not just Rabbitohs supporters, particularly those whose own teams need a boost if they haven’t reached the heights they have dreamed of. While they may not have a Russell Crowe to swoop in and rescue them, nevertheless there is a strong message of the importance of practice and self-belief so they approach each game with a can-do attitude. Importantly though, it also offers opportunities to discuss not just the feelings of winning and losing, but also how to win and lose. Our elite sports people are role models of behaviour both on and off the field for so many of our young students so they can learn so much about accepting defeat (something parents often try to protect them from) and being generous in success (is win-at-all-costs the best mantra) by watching our their heroes behave. How did the bunnies think and feel before and after each game when they were losing all the time and how did that change when the other creatures joined them? What is the meaning of the saying “There is no I in TEAM?” What is Alex Johnstone trying to teach them by writing this story? How can they take what they have learned from it and share that with their teammates?

The Turtle and the Flood

Oct9

The Turtle and the Flood

The Turtle and the Flood

Jackie French

Danny Snell

HarperCollins, 2023

34pp., hbk., RRP $A24.99

9781460762974

Myrtle the Turtle loves by the creek, swimming in the waterholes and eating the little creatures in summer, and sleeping in the dry leaves under a log in winter. If the creek dries up she buries herself in the silt and the sand to keep cool, and if it rains and the creek flows swiftly, she swims with her strong legs and claws.

However, every now and then she notices a slight change in the water level and the air pressure on the back of her neck, and she knows that that is the signal to move to higher ground. And so she begins to walk uphill… Like the Fire Wombat, her long-evolved instincts, “more accurate than the weather bureau” tell her disaster is coming and it is time to act. But Myrtle is not only saving herself from the impending flood – the other creatures of the bush know that if she is on the move then they must be too.

In a country of frequent fire and flood, our wildlife is often seen as the first and most frequent casualty as so many are estimated to perish. And the statistics can cause great distress to many, particularly our little ones, so as well as telling the story of Myrtle and how her instincts and actions are the triggers for others to act too, this is a story of reassurance that not all is doomed during disasters. While those who know Jackie’s stories for little people most commonly think “wombats”, her home in south-eastern NSW is a haven for all wildlife, including Myrtle and her companions who live in the creek that usually meanders through the space but which can become menacing…

Used with Jackie’s permission…

But there is some peace of mind in knowing that many animals can sense rain, storms and floods well ahead of the event itself and do escape.

Once again, Jackie has used her knowledge, experience and observations of her surroundings to create a story of wonder and hope, and Danny’s illustrations bring that alive symbiotically. But while Myrtle’s story will offer comfort to younger readers, older readers might want to explore further… How do creatures like Myrtle sense the changes? Do humans have the same capacity? Is the Bureau of Meteorology our only warning system? How do our First Nations people predict the weather and what can we learn from them? Does the land need floods in a similar way to its need of fire? And then, on another tangent, how has the impact of humans on the environment increased or reduced the likelihood of the survival of native species during such events? Do structures like roads and fences impede their escape?

I have often said that the best picture books operate on and across many levels, they are never an end in themselves. This is one of those.

Don’t Disturb the Dragon

Oct8

Don’t Disturb the Dragon

Don’t Disturb the Dragon

Rhiannon Findlay

Siân Roberts

Puffin, 2023

32pp., pbk., RRP $A16.99

9780241562314

On Wingbeat Island, the princess’s little brother has learned to crawl and now she can’t find him. So she sets on a quest to discover where he has got to but danger lurks on the journey…

Somewhere near, a huge beast lies,
with giant claws and great big eyes . . .
DO NOT DISTURB THE DRAGON!

From the author of the enchanting Ten Minutes to Bed series, this is a new adventure that takes little ones on a trek around the island, following the map and encountering things that may be the dragon – or not. It’s an opportunity to talk about what they already know about dragons so they can examine the pictures to see if one might be nearby as well as learning that sometimes things might not be as they seem at first glance… The princess takes her anti-dragon kit with her so using their knowledge of dragons they might speculate on what they would add to it to be safe and sure.

The rhyming language and the repetitive text invite them to join in both the fun and the storytelling, as they help the princess on her mission through the forest replete with all the elements that spark the imagination like castles, stepping stones and toadstools, while the island itself has gloomy caves, rapid rivers, enchanted fortresses and smouldering volcanoes, each offering an opportunity to suggest a new adventure in the future – as does the ending!

Like Ten Minutes to Bed, this is a vibrant, engaging story that ticks all the boxes for engaging our youngest readers with the fun and joy of stories and because it is in print, they can return to it again and again.

What to Do When You’re Not Sure What to Do

Sep30

What to Do When You’re Not Sure What to Do

What to Do When You’re Not Sure What to Do

Davina Bell

Hilary Jean Tapper

Lothian, 2023

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

9780734422088

Remember a time when you have had to attend a function or a meeting and everyone else seems to know someone, but you know no one? Or you’ve built up the courage to do something new and different but you don’t know where or how to start?

Imagine what that might be like for our little ones as they navigate the big and not-so-big situations that they encounter for the first time as they have so little previous experience to draw on.

This is the companion to the highly-recommended What to Say When You Don’t Know What to Say and it is just as gentle, encouraging and positive as its predecessor. Whether it’s stepping on to an escalator for the first time or into the waves at the beach, these situations can be confronting but the constant message is to have a go, even if it means finding a “you-shaped space” to catch your breath and then reflect on your bravery.

As with the first, the cover of the book depicts the idyllic freedom of childhood that we all imagine for our children, but the front endpage is more realistic. Getting on to a bus and there is only one seat left and that’s next to a stranger, but then, the back endpage shows that a simple act of kindness can go a long way to making things feel safe and welcome. And so it is with the rest of the book, whether it is the child in the new circumstance or the one reaching out to make another feel safe.

Preparing our little ones with strategies for what they might encounter in a particular situation is essential if we are to help them build resilience and empathy, and have the courage to tackle the world beyond the family with confidence and this book goes a long way to help us as the adults as well as the children to do and be the best we can.

Not Here to Make You Comfortable

Sep28

Not Here to Make You Comfortable

Not Here to Make You Comfortable

50 Women Who Stand Up, Speak Out, Inspire Change

Puffin, 2023

176pp., pbk., RRP $A22.99

9781761340581

In the vein of Shout Out to the Girls: A Celebration of Awesome Australian Women, this is a collection of one page vignettes of 50 women who ” did something brave. Something disruptive. Something exceptional.”

Featuring familiar names from the Australian landscape such as Ash Barty, Celeste Barber, Grace Tame, Turia Pitt, Julia Gillard and Tayla Harris, as well as a host of contemporary women from around the world, this collection was inspired by the way that Grace Tame’s unsmiling face at a reception with then prime minister Scott Morrison was shared world wide and her behaviour dissected and demeaned around the world, diminishing both her and what she had fought so hard for. Once again, just as with Tayla Harris, it was a female’s appearance and demeanour that became the news story rather than their accomplishments.

And so the women at PRH Young Readers publishing section have put together this compelling collection of stories of real young women, famous and not-so, who have had the courage to stand up for their beliefs, to be bold and true to themselves, “a celebration of assertiveness and certitude”. Each entry begins with the phrase, “There was that time when…” and continues with a description of the incident, its impact, a thumbnail sketch of the person and a full-page sketch from a new or emerging illustrator.

Each is an affirmation of empowerment, often taking great courage, but resonating with today’s girls and encouraging them to be just as bold if needs be.

The activities of women in both World Wars I and II as they stepped into men’s shoes made great strides in changing the attitudes of men towards women, the activists of the 60s continued that and there have been decades of trail-blazers and game-changers since then, yet still 50% of the world’s population is subjected to irrelevant judgements, continual media coverage focusing on their appearance rather than their accomplishments, social media trolling, and toxic behaviour that is inevitably claimed to have been “consensual”. So while a book of this nature inspiring girls to be more than a pretty face and affirming their right to be so is still required, it is a grim indictment of society that it is. While the treatment of women in countries like Iran and Afghanistan, is of huge concern as it should be, it is appalling that even in Australia in the 21st century, it is clear that misogyny is still alive and flourishing and our girls need role models like those in this book to tell the world, “We’re not here to make you comfortable. We’re here to celebrate being ourselves.”

My Especially Weird Week with Tess

Sep17

My Especially Weird Week with Tess

My Especially Weird Week with Tess

Anna Woltz

Translated by David Colmer

David Dean

Rock the Boat, 2023

176pp., pbk., RRP $A14.99

9780861542963

Sam is a deep thinker – his older brother, Jasper, calls hum ‘the professor’ – and since attending the funeral of a schoolfriend’s father recently, many of his thoughts have been centred around death, particularly its impact on those left behind. And it is his questions about the loneliness of the last dinosaur that leads to a chance meeting with 12-year-old Tess who seems to be on his wavelength and turns a run-of-the-mill holiday on the Dutch island of Texel into a life-changing time for both of them.

Within minutes of the meeting he finds himself learning to waltz in a carpark, offering to bury an old man’s canary and then discovering that Tess, who has never known her father, has found out who he is and has hatched an audacious plan to bring him to the island so she can observe him and decide whether she will disclose her identity. Through the filter-free conversations that kids have when life is still about them and theirs and not impinged by what others might think, they share their thoughts and do things that help them work through Sam’s fear of the loneliness caused by death and Tess’s relationship with her father that is completely credible for any reader who is the same age or who knows how that age group thinks and works. The setting, the situation and the characters are authentic and I binge read it in one session!

Made into an award-winning Dutch film titled My Extraordinary Summer with Tess ,translated into 13 languages and awarded The Times Children’s Book of the Week in March 2023, this is a heart-warming story of friendship and compassion for independent readers, even a class read-aloud, that will envelop the reader like a warm hug. Loved it in the same way as I loved The Girl who brought Mischief.

The Sideways Orbit of Evie Hart

Sep13

The Sideways Orbit of Evie Hart

The Sideways Orbit of Evie Hart

Samera Kamaleddine

HarperCollins, 2023

288pp., pbk., RRP $A17.99

9781460762653

Evie Hart likes rules and routines. A lot. But as she embarks on her very last year of primary school, it feels like all the rules around her are being broken and the routines are definitely being upset, starting with mum not eating dinner with the family any more.

Then she discovers her mum, a journalist, is the author of the horoscope page for the local newspaper, and because it has her photo, her friends and their families know too, and they don’t hold back letting Evie know they think her mum writes and tells lies. To make things worse, she learns her beloved stepdad Lee is moving to Dubbo for at least a year, perhaps splitting the family in two forever! So when Evie’s class starts learning about the Earth’s place in the universe, it makes Evie think about her own place in the world and where she belongs.

But the more Evie learns about the sky and the stars, guided both by her kind, compassionate and knowledgeable teacher Miss Owen and her mother’s insights, the more she learns that changes in the world can’t always be controlled. And maybe that’s not a bad thing as she starts to make sense of and map out her own life as a more confident person.

Even though the title is The Sideways Orbit… there are many parallels to the lives of the readers that this book will appeal to, and so it will resonate with them as they make that sometimes tricky transition from tween to teen and young adult. While so much of her life so far has focused on the here and now, as she becomes more independent, bigger questions raise their heads – questions whose answers seem bigger and more complex than the universe – and Evie, like her readers, has to learn to navigate these in the context and boundaries of their own lives. And that doesn’t even include puberty! Straddling the reality of the day-today while contemplating the huge world of what-ifs and what-could-bes that is opening before her, including high school on the horizon, can be overwhelming but there is comfort in knowing that there is a path forward and a way through. So even if you feel like you’re going sideways in an endless spin, there is hope…

Many who write for and work with very young children talk about helping them understand and navigate “big feelings”. This story helps those who are at a different transition navigate theirs.

Lily Halfmoon: The Magic Gems

Sep7

Lily Halfmoon: The Magic Gems

Lily Halfmoon: The Magic Gems

Xavier Bonet

A & U Children’s, 2023

80pp., graphic novel, RRP $A16.99

9781761180354

It’s Lily’s birthday and she has moved to a new village, a new house and now it’s time for her to start a new school. She has all the same trepidations about it as other children do but when she gets there she finds things are a bit different from her previous school because this one is especially for witches to learn their craft! Lily had no idea she had magical powers but now a lot of things in her life start to make sense.

And now, in The Royal Academy and Library of Magic Studies, Creatures, Potions and Spells (aka The Library) she must learn magic, and find her animal guardian and gemstone, while keeping her new identity a secret -even her family can’t be told. With her friends Gigi and Mai she is part of a group of witches who have to protect the people of Piedraville from evil, tricky when there is a dangerous creature on the loose. And she’s found a rare and unique gem that no witch has ever had before – what does it all mean?

There are so many stories in this vein for emerging independent readers to choose from, and this one appeals because it can be both a stepping stone to more complex reads like Harry Potter as well as to the graphic novel format because it combines the new-to-some format with elements of a traditional layout. There are the familiar panels and speech bubbles of the former, although the text is written in the usual way with capital letters, lower case and punctuation, as well as the conventions of the latter for introductions, instructions, maps and other diagrams.

Those readers who are verging on independence often view “real readers” as those who can read thick books or graphic novels and that is the yardstick by which they measure their success, so this is the ideal bridge for them capturing their imaginations through a popular theme but putting it in a setting that they can relate to. Genius.

The Daring Tale of Gloria the Great

Sep4

The Daring Tale of Gloria the Great

The Daring Tale of Gloria the Great

Jacqueline Harvey

Kate Isobel Scott

Puffin, 2023

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

9781761043284

This is a tale of a chicken who wasn’t chicken. In fact, Gloria was the opposite…

She was brave, she was bold, never did what she was told…

She ran her own face, she got in your face,,,

Then, one night she disappeared without trace! Although the family searched high and low when Gloria did not take her place on the perch, and feared the worst when they saw a no-longer-trim hawk circling, the other chooks were quite glad she wasn’t there because they didn’t really like her. However, after a week they started to miss her and began accusing each other of being the one to scare her away. Will Gloria ever grace the henhouse again, or was that hawk not-so-trim for a reason?

This is an hilarious story from the versatile Jacqueline Harvey (Kensy and Max, Willa and Woof, Alice-Miranda and Clementine Rose)made even more special by the glorious illustrations of Kate Isobel Scott, the second time the two have partnered to produce a picture book. Young readers who also march to the beat of their own drum will resonate with Gloria as will those who can be intimidated by such leadership potential, while adults of a certain vintage will appreciate the reference to, perhaps inspiration for, Gloria Gaynor’s immortal song, I Will Survive.

Because, thankfully, Gloria does survive and lives to rule another roost!!!

The Bottom Shelf

Great books for little people

Archives

Alex Neptune (series)

A Footy Tail

The Turtle and the Flood

Don’t Disturb the Dragon

What to Do When You’re Not Sure What to Do

Not Here to Make You Comfortable

My Especially Weird Week with Tess

The Sideways Orbit of Evie Hart

Lily Halfmoon: The Magic Gems

The Daring Tale of Gloria the Great