Reviews

The nutcracker by E.T.A. Hoffman

Ill. by Robert Ingpen. Walker Books, 2016. ISBN 9781922244550
(Age: all) Highly recommended. Christmas, Classic tale, The Nutcracker, Friendship. This wonderful edition of the well known story, the basis for Tchaikovsky's loved Christmas ballet, The Nutcracker, is given in its entirety, translated from Hoffman's original German story by Anthea Bell and given a brilliantly enticing new set of illustrations by the marvelous Robert Ingpen, to celebrate its bicentenary. Children and adults alike will thrill to the complete story offered here, set alongside seventy glorious illustrations, reminding them of Christmases long past, of half remembered stories of the nutcracker.
When her parents' good friend, Mr Drosselmeier gives Marie and her brother a nutcracker for Christmas, Marie loves the little figure. Her impatient brother throws it in the corner when one of his big teeth is cracked, but Marie cradles him and puts him in the special place with her other toys.
Unbeknownst to her, Mr Drosselmeier has given the figure to Marie for a reason, one he cannot tell anyone. He once built a mousetrap so well that all the mice in the town had been trapped and removed from the place. The mice then cursed his nephew and only he knows what can take away that curse.
When Marie is about to go to bed, mice invade the room with her toys, demanding she feed them or they will eat up her nutcracker. She complies but when she runs out of food, she turns to see the nutcracker and the other toys lined up to defeat the mice. She wakes the next morning, confused and upset to see that her nutcracker has gone. But Mr Drosselmeier returns that day with his nephew and Marie realises who he is and takes him as her friend.
This beautiful story of friendship is complemented with Ingpen's sumptuous illustrations, soft edged and glowingly detailed.
This is a beautiful story to read at Christmas, reminding children that love and friendship are precious and will outlive all the toys they are given. This edition includes a biography of Hoffman and celebrates his influence on fantasy writing, while the tale written in 1816, includes a story rarely seen, The story of the hard nut, which tells the reader how the nutcracker came to be.
This is a magical production and deserves to be shared.
Fran Knight

The anti-Boredom Christmas book by Andy Seed

Bloomsbury Publishing Place, 2016. ISBN 9781408870105
(Age: 8+) Highly recommended. The Anti-Boredom Christmas Book is full of activities to make sure readers do not get bored over Christmas. It has some hilarious activities and is full of jokes, facts, quizzes and other stuff. Each chapter is themed and readers can learn how to make some simple Christmas crafts, challenge their sister to a Christmas quiz or make dad laugh with some Christmas jokes. There are plenty of discussion pages as well which will make for some fun conversations. They include asking questions of family members and getting them to choose Christmas things they prefer. Readers can learn some new games like 'Table Tinker' where someone makes changes to the Christmas table and the other guests have to guess what is different. Try a game of Fangman (a take on the traditional Hangman) where players draw a vampire face to 'hang' the players as they guess the wrong letters. Highly recommended for all readers aged 8+. This book would make a great stocking filler and could also be used in the classroom. Students or teachers could choose an activity to do each day in the lead up to the end of the school year and Christmas.
Kylie Kempster

Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo

Six of Crows bk 2. Indigo, 2016. ISBN 9781780622309
(Age: 14+) Highly recommended. Fantasy. Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Young Adult Fantasy and Science Fiction (2016). The stunning sequel to Six of crows, see Kaz Brekker and his crew fighting for their lives. They have been double-crossed and Kaz is determined to have his revenge. In a series of daring heists, they are fighting for their lives and Kaz needs every bit of his cunning and intelligence to find out about the deadly drug known as jurda parem and to bring some peace to his team.
Once again the world building in Crooked Kingdom is outstanding. The city of Ketterdam is brought to life, with its canals, warehouses, merchants and people making a fabulous background to the adventures of the six young people.
The daring exploits of the crew keep the reader totally engrossed as they break into houses, fool dangerous people and fight off their foes. The action is breathtaking but so is the characterisation. Each chapter is told by one of the six characters and it is done so well that the reader has no problem following such a large group of main characters as well as a plethora of minor ones.
The characteristics of each person are richly elaborated, with details of each person's background and reason for being in Ketterdam gradually evolving as their story is told. Kaz of course is central to the story and Bardugo leaves us very satisfied with how he evolves. Of course with such a large cast and with so much danger to contend with, there are some casualties on the way and lots of surprising twists as well.
This is an excellent sequel to Six of crows and I look forward to reading anything else that Leigh Bardugo writes in the future.
Pat Pledger

Dog on a digger: The tricky incident by Kate Prendergast

Old Barn Books, 2016. ISBN 9781910646144
(Age: 3+) Recommended. Kate Prendergast draws from her transport industry background creating detailed images of machinery set against an urban landscape filled with heavy machinery. This wordless picture book with detailed black and white pencil drawings with highlights of yellow and blue is a story of friendship, loyalty and thoughtfulness.
Dog lives with his owner in a caravan surrounded by trucks, heavy equipment and building supplies. The panoramic front spread highlights the urban landscape at night; an owl flies by watched by a city fox. Morning comes and dog wakes his master up with licks to the face, time to start the day; meanwhile the food truck's owner and her little white dog open up ready to sell hearty meals to the workers. Dog joins his master in the cab of the big yellow digger ready to move all the building rubble into the truck. Both of them wear yellow safety vests. The digger's scoop is humanised - bolts become eyes and the large mouth opens and closes eating up the rubble and scrap wood.
At morning teatime, Dog plays with the small white dog sharing a bowl of food, while their owners chat over a cup of tea. In an instant, the little canine disappears and Dog sets off in a hurried search climbing the stairs of the building next door to see where his friend has gone. With the aid of Dog's owner, he guides him to rescue the lost animal stuck in a grate beside the canal.
Dog on a digger is an enjoyable picture book, when shared with a class; students can add their own narrative, writing text in sticky notes on each page, developing a class book. Pet ownership and being responsible are topics for discussion as well. For Art, explore pencil sketching, highlighting one element in colour; introduce expressive drawing and humanising inanimate objects like Thomas the Tank Engine and the yellow digger.
Rhyllis Bignell

Girl in pieces by Kathleen Glasgow

HarperCollins, 2016. ISBN 9781460751053
(Age: 15+) Recommended for mature readers. Charlie is really messed up. But so is everyone at Creeley, the health facility for girls who self-harm. Part One of Girl in Pieces chronicles their despair fuelled by anxiety or abuse of one kind or another. Charlotte (Charlie) is dealing with loss of her father in childhood and more recently, her best friend.
In Part Two, Charlie is thrust back into the tenuous reality of the outside world. She is not ready but both she and her counsellor, Casper, have prepared some strategies to avoid self-harm. Mickey, her childhood sweetheart, reaches out to her with a bus ticket and a new start interstate. Inevitably, Charlie's attraction to Riley, a musician and addict working with her in a coffee shop, can only lead to one thing.
The author, who has a history of self-harm, takes us on a journey of gradual understanding. Glasgow's insights into the thoughts of those who self-harm are palpable and full of wisdom. We come to know Charlie's own triggers for cutting and the horrific physiological consequences of cyclical self-loathing. The use of flashbacks confirm that she blames herself for attracting catastrophe.
Life keeps disappointing Charlie but in Part Three, the inclusion of her sketches in a local art show gives us hope that she can ultimately find peace in a world in which she has never felt welcome. The abiding message of this confronting First Person tome, is that you are not alone. You can choose self-annihilation of one kind or another and there'll be no shortage of company - or you can keep trying. Girl in Pieces provides insightful explanations for addiction of any kind, but the sub-text is the importance of mentors, artfully achieved from very well fleshed out and equally flawed but resilient characters.
Deb Robins

The song from somewhere else by A.F. Harrold

Ill. by Levi Pinfold. Bloomsbury, 2016. ISBN 9781408879337
(Age: 9+) Recommended. Fantasy. Bullying. Acceptance. Fear. Friendship. This is an amazing story of bullying and friendship, yet it also enters into the fantasy world that lives in parallel to our own world. Frank (or Francesca) is alone while her friend is away on holidays and her pet cat has gone missing. The story begins with an encounter with the local Junior School bully and his two goons while she is out putting up Missing Cat posters. Her fear rises and overtakes her until Nick, the big ostracised kid from her class, rescues her from another incident of humiliation. Unfortunately he is not a 'Prince Charming', but rather is the lumpish and large kid who is also the butt of everyone's jokes, and the one that everyone in class avoids because he smells. Without realising it, Frank becomes Nick's friend, and the connection between the two lonely kids is tightened by the mystical and magical music that floats from within Nick's house and which has a restorative influence on Frank, but is also part of the intrigue of the unusual Nick. This music entices Frank's curiosity, and she becomes acquainted with Nick's fantastic family secret. The tangles that this weaves are like shadows that creep around in the middle of the night, with the capacity to trip you over in the uncertainty of each step forward. Frank's encounters with the fantasy world raise her uncertainties about how to act; the moral dilemmas she has to face confront her with her selfishness and her struggles to be friends with the boy she formerly shunned. But the story ends well, despite her mistakes.
The black and white illustrations in this book are atmospheric and ethereal in some places, which adds a hint of mystery to the story. Although we have a fantasy tale at the heart of the story, it is also a 'real-life' tale of friendship, acceptance and the impact of fear. Frank's quirky family adds an element of humour to the otherwise dark mystery. There is nothing in here that would cause nightmares, but it is a moving tale of overcoming dark influences.
Carolyn Hull

The mountain who wanted to live in a house by Maurice Shadbolt

Ill. by Renee Haggo. Starfish Bay Children's Books, 2016. ISBN 9781760360030
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Humour. Mountains. Environment. Problem solving. As the mountain stares down at the people in the town, he is envious. People come to him to ski or have picnics, to climb and watch the birds in the trees, but he wants to be just like them and live in his own house where he would be protected from the cold and wind and ice and snow, and not be lonely. So one day with a yell, he begins to walk to the town. People become very anxious and drive away, or walk or paddle down the river. One boy, Thomas stands in front of the mountain to ask what he is doing, and finding that the mountain wants to live in a house, begins to discuss the problem with him.
He tells him about his mother sometimes washing his jumper only to find that it shrinks, so he heads off home for soap and water, but this doesn't work at all. Next he fetches a hammer and begins to chop bits off the mountain, but the mountain doesn't like this idea. At last the boy has a clever idea, and races back home to fetch his father to paint the mountain. In that way the mountain would fit into a house and be seen by everyone. So the mountain can stay where he is but also be in the house.
I really like this story of working together to find a solution to a problem. Readers could begin to discuss why things in the environment are where they are, and how we can protect them. They will enjoy the illustrations of the mountain's face peering out at the readers and could talk about how to go about painting a mountain scene. First published in New Zealand by Deep Creek Press in 2015.
Fran Knight

A dog like that! by Janene Cooper

Ill. by Evie Kemp. Starfish Bay Children's Books, 2016. ISBN 9781760360047
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Dogs. Pets. Comparisons. In this enticing book, each group of pages introduces a different dog and its owner and what it does best. Uncle's dog, a labrador, is clever and does what he is told, but the girl who owns the scruffy dog on the cover tells us that her dog is not like that. He does what he likes. Her Grandpa's dog is a watch dog, and keeps guard at night, but the scruffy dog sleeps. The neighbour's dog is fearsome, barking at all the other cats and dogs, but the girl's dog likes everyone and licks them all. Each dog is shown for something it does best, and the girl is told that all dogs should be like that. But as we read on we find that her dog is nothing like the other dogs: it sleeps with the girl, is happy to see everyone, is scruffy and rumpled, and unlike other dogs that leap and jump, her dog sits at the gate and waits for her.
Her dog knows when she is sad and licks her face, and stays in her room with her when she has done something wrong. And that is what dogs should be.
The bold illustrations have the reader looking straight into the face of the scruffy dog, comparing its behaviour with the other dogs and knowing which dog is the best. Each page uses one main colour with the dog prominently positioned by the words in a large font. It is a delight to read and look at the illustrations and I can imagine children reading it aloud, repeating the refrain, 'Dogs should be like that' with growing knowledge that the best dog is not like that at all. First published in New Zealand by Deep Creek Press in 2015.
Fran Knight

Why do cats have tails? by David Ling

Ill. by Stephanie Thatcher. Starfish Bay Children's Books, 2016 ISBN 9781760360085
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Cats. Pets. Problem solving. Surrounded by their family's cats the little girls ask their Grandpa why the cats have tails. Grandpa thinks up some wonderful reasons which will bring gales of laughter to the listening crowd. He suggests that they might use them to swing through the trees, but the girls tell him that this is the reason monkeys have tails. He then suggests that they could use them to swish away the flies, but the girls tell him that cows use their tails in this way. Perhaps the tail helps them swim faster, he says, but no, cats don't like to swim. Suppose the cat uses his tail as a warning, but no say the girls, rattlesnakes do that. Grandpa then asks the girls to offer a suggestion and this is one the readers will discuss as they finish the book. The pastel illustrations add warmth to the story, but are a little washed out in my review copy. I do like the cat's paw endpapers. First published in New Zealand by Deep Creek Press in 2015.
Fran Knight

Animasaurus: Incredible animals that roamed the Earth by Tracey Turner

Ill. by Harriet Russell. Bloomsbury, 2016. ISBN 9781408884850
(Age: 8+) Recommended. Animasaurus is a prehistoric compendium filled with fascinating facts about the plant-eaters, sea creatures, predators and creepy crawlies that once inhabited the Earth. Discover amazing information, their statistics, habitats, diet, size and weight and compare these with photos of modern day relatives.
Unusual dinosaurs not commonly known such as the Therizinosaurus lived on the Mongolian Plains 75 million years ago scared predators away with its metre long claws. The fossils of Gigantopithecus or giant ape were discovered in India and Southeast Asia. They grew to three metres in height, had big teeth just right for their vegetarian diet. Deep under the sea Cameroceras, nine-metre long shellfish with metre long tentacles and sharp beaks used a jet-propulsion swimming style to stalk their prey. Animals that are more familiar are included as well -Giant Kangaroos, Woolly Mammoths and Megaladons great white sharks.
Each double-page spread includes an introduction, exploration of the animal's features, a map, timeline and size comparison to a human. Centred on bold backgrounds of earth, sea and sky tones are Harriet Russell's simplistic creature drawings.
As part of the Earth and Space Science strand of the Australian Science curriculum, Animasaurus links to geological processes and history, the fossil record and past environmental conditions and changes over time. This non-fiction volume provides information suited to student research projects and enquiry-based learning. Fans of scientific encyclopaedias and budding palaeontologists will also enjoy this book.
Rhyllis Bignell

The last beginning by Lauren James

Walker Books, 2016. ISBN 9781406358063
(Age: 13+) Recommended. Clove Sutcliffe is determined to solve the mystery of Katherine and Matthew who vanished 16 years ago only to be reincarnated at every key point in history. As Clove follows her quarry from life to life, historical era to historical era, it seems that she too is being stalked. Ella is as enigmatic as the mysteries Clove must solve to unravel the past and secure her future.
The sequel to The Next Together, Lauren James's debut novel, The Last Beginning, is a fitting follow on. The characters are believable and the literary devices used at the beginning of each chapter add credibility and interest. The book also provides satisfying links with its prequel allowing for a truly satisfying conclusion.
Ros Lange

Hilda and the Stone Forest by Luke Pearson

Hilda series, bk. 5. Flying Eye Books, 2016. ISBN 9781909263741
(Age: 8+) Highly recommended. Luke Pearson's fantasy adventure series stars Hilda the lively, blue-haired young girl, her pet deerfox Twig and Tontu a house spirit who can walk through walls. In Hilda and the Stone Forest she is swept up into the magical adventures of her house spirit's world, chasing little nisse-sprites through the forest of trolls. Hilda's mother becomes worried at her disappearances and her dishevelled appearances and suspects her daughter is lying. Sent to her room as a punishment, Hilda sneaks out of her window to take an enchanting flight on the back of the magic raven with her friend Frida. Grounded, for three days, Hilda watches the world from her bedroom window as the troll fires burn on the mountain.
While trying to stop Hilda from escaping through the wall with Tontu, mother, daughter and Twig fly through the air and land in the strange, shadowy forest of the trolls. Their journey takes them deep into the mountain inhabited by trolls, where they learn to rely on each other's abilities. Fantastical creatures, trolls with two heads, a baby troll, worms with giant teeth and threatening landscapes with rock falls, dead ends and dark caves prove dangerous for Hilda and her mother. With the help of Twig and surprising assistance from an unexpected character, they finally return to the safety of their home in Trolberg.
Pearson's graphic novels are dynamic and fast-paced with his creative illustrations displaying his understanding of connectivity to space, time and movement. There is an energy created by images that wrap around, with the unexpected placement of action panels and diagonal lines, which burst across the page pushing the action forward. The characters move across, up, down, defy gravity and burst out from the scenes with minimal speech bubbles; the reader is immersed in the drama. Pearson's use of a muted palette is visually engaging with swathes of colours, greys, reds, earth tones, leaf greens, colouring the characters and their backgrounds.
Hilda and the Stone Forest ends with the assurance of more magical stories to come.
Rhyllis Bignell

Chronologica: the incredible years that defined history compiled by the Whitaker's Almanack team

Bloomsbury, 2016. ISBN 9781472932945
(Age: 10+) Highly recommended. This is exactly the kind of book I would have loved as a rather nerdy child. I had quite the obsession with books of 'general knowledge' and random facts and perused them for hours. Clearly, why I love trivia competitions so much now.
Since December 1868, the famous Whitaker's Almanack has been published in the UK chockfull of all the year's happenings. As an iconic publication, the work has been referenced in other literary texts from Stoker's Dracula to Fleming's Moonraker. This volume spans 100 years and devotes three pages to each year featured covering several topics. For example, 1789 - why was this year important? George Washington was elected as the first American president, sailors mutinied on HMS Bounty and the storming of the Bastille initiated the French Revolution.
I have had such fun 'dipping' into it over the past few days and I know that kids with similar tastes will love doing so as well.
There is something to fascinate all types of tastes from popular culture (when was Nintendo founded, the creation of the first pizza) to more serious historical events.
For your non-fiction reader, this would be a terrific addition to Christmas shopping and would certainly keep him/her absorbed for quite some time over the holidays!
Highly recommended for children from around ten upwards.
Sue Warren

Stealing Snow by Danielle Paige

Watch out for muddy puddles by Ben Faulks

Ill. by Ben Cort. Bloomsbury, 2016. ISBN 9781408867204
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Humour, Water, Rhyming story. English readers know well the author of this rollicking rhyming story, as he appears as Mr Bloom in the TV show for kids, Mr Bloom's Nursery. Australian audiences need not be concerned however as the story of a young boy splashing through puddles with his wellington boots, warned to watch out for what lies beneath the surface, will grab the readers' attention as he plays in the water. From crocodiles, to two frogs kissing, to pirates and polar bears, each thing lurking beneath the surface could be there to catch an unwary child.
But treading on the water sees the boy swirling down underneath the surface to find out what lies below. He goes through layers of all sorts of things including fossils and granite but the worst thing of all to find in a puddle is the big bad rubber ducky. The children run as fast as they can from this monster until they come to a puddle that is just their size, and splash around in it most unconcerned, but watch out for it may contain more than you think.
With rollicking rhyme to read aloud, great illustrations to ponder over, I can imagine kids calling out in anticipation of something that lurks beneath the surface of the puddle. And wouldn't it be fun to read this on a rainy day then go out with your boots and try it out.
Fran Knight