Reviews

Special Kev by Chris McKimmie

Allen and Unwin, 2008 ISBN 9781741755503
(Age 5-8) Highly recommended. Chris McKimmie has produced a whimsical and original picture book about a special little boy named Kev. Kev is so special that his mum 'planted red roses and rolled out the red carpet' when he was born. He is also special because he is the only one of his 'eleventy million cousins' who has curly red hair and freckles. When his favourite cousin Fatty Boombah goes to live in another town, Kev is lonely and hasn't a friend who plays football. However when he joins up with Nicky Bathgate, who wants to play Ned Kelly, things start to go wrong.
This is a heart-warming story about the love that Kev receives from his parents and extended family. Kev doesn't need expensive birthday presents to feel special because of the love that surrounds him. (His dad once made him a scrub turkey out of stuff around the house for his birthday and his mum named a special star after him).
Childlike illustrations bring to life the different characters of the family especially his cousins and Aunty Pav, and the cute talking cockatoo and small animal drawings will delight young children.
This book is a little gem because it will leave everyone who reads it feeling special.
Pat Pledger

Angel Boy by Bernard Ashley

The tomb of treasure: An awful Egyptian adventure by Terry Deary

(Horrible Histories Gory Stories)
Scholastic, 2008.
(Age 8+) This is one of a new collection of stories based on historical times and a welcome spin-off of the ever popular Horrible Histories. Others in the series are set in the Tower of London in Tudor times, Hadrian's Wall during Roman times and Victorian London.

The Tomb of Treasure bowls along cheerfully in a kind of Scooby Doo fashion with enough cliff-hangers and slapstick comedy to tempt even reluctant readers. Five unlikely characters are plotting the ultimate heist, the theft of treasure from Tutankhamun's tomb. Children will learn some history, and yes there are one or two satisfyingly gory bits. The Epilogue describes the facts on which the story is based, which makes you think, 'Wow, this could have really happened'.

A definite boy pleaser, but it will be interesting to see just how successful the series is. The children I talk to (especially boys) love Horrible Histories because of their bite size nuggets of information. A foray into the world of fiction may not be a popular move with all fans.
Claire Larson

Abela : the girl who saw lions by Berlie Doherty

Andersen Press 2008
(Age 11+) Berlie Doherty hits the jackpot with this compelling story of Abela's journey from Tanzania to Sheffield. It pulls no punches. We follow Abela as she tries to care for her sick mother in a filthy bed in a hospital devoid of medicine and doctors. After her mother's death Abela is smuggled to England by her conniving uncle who is planning to pass her off as his own daughter in the hope that this will give him the right to return to England and join his English wife. But the plan goes wrong and Abela finds herself alone in a strange country with her uncle's cruel and mentally unstable wife. Her escape and journey through the social services system is traumatic and offers no easy answers or cosy solutions.

This is rightfully Abela's story and the other main character, Rosa, plays a supporting role. Both girls are well portrayed. Rosa is a typical teenager, growing up in Sheffield and interested in fashion and ice skating and this makes the sharp contrasts between the lives of the girls particularly effective. Abela and Rosa don't meet until the final part of the book but when they do I felt a huge sense of relief that Abela had found love and stability again.

Doherty does not avoid difficult issues such as the AIDs crisis in Africa, the challenges of being a foster parent and the cruelty of other children. However I have one serious reservation about this book. Abela undergoes the ordeal of female circumcision and although this is described fleetingly I feel it is a step too far in a book that will be read primarily by eleven to fourteen year old girls. In fact the veiled language and vague description will only confuse and frighten young readers and make them demand to know what has actually happened to Abela. Perhaps I am old fashioned, but I think children should be protected from knowledge of this barbaric practice for as long as possible.
Claire Larson

The Buddha's Diamonds by Carolyn Marsden and Thay Phap Niem

Candlewick Press, 2008.ISBN 9780763633806
(Ages 9-13) The Buddha's Diamonds is a simply written but beautiful coming-of-age story set in a Vietnamese fishing village. 10-year-old Tinh is intrigued by the bright red remote controlled car that a rich uncle has sent a friend, and instead of securing the family's fishing boat when a storm strikes the village he takes and hides the car. In the days that follow he learns about the strength of his Buddhist traditions as he helps his family re-establish. The values of commercialism are contrasted with the traditional Vietnamese values that prove to be more satisfying and more useful. The car's batteries are of course dead, but Tinh is able to have the boat's propeller fixed and to restore the ancestors' graves. He has started the journey into adulthood. The characters are simply delineated but believable and reading the novel is a rich experience.
Jenny Hamilton

Missing girl by Norma Fox Mazer

Allen & Unwin, 2008. ISBN: 9781741752793
(Age 14+) A psychological thriller, Missing girl kept me reading, on the edge of my seat, waiting to see which girl would go missing and what would happen. The book opens with the words:
'If the man is lucky, in the morning on his way to work, he sees the girls. A flock of them, like birds.'
There are five Herbert girls: 17 year old Beauty can't wait to escape the poverty and the responsibility she has to shoulder; Autumn the youngest feels overlooked, Fancy has special needs; and then there is volatile Stevie and quiet Mim. When the girls' parents decide that they will lend Stevie to a relative to try and ease the financial pressures, Beauty is faced with carrying the bad news to the girls and then easing their worries.

Mazer's technique of having short chapters, each telling the story in a different voice, is very effective as the reader hears what is happening from different points of view. The voice of the middle aged watcher is particularly frightening and adds to the tension of the book as the girls go about their everyday business totally unaware of him. The characters of all the protagonists are finely drawn and each of the girls grows in strength through the trials that they face. It is a moving story about courage and family.

This story is not graphic, but the suspense is gripping. What is most memorable and haunting for me is how Mazer explores the aftermath of the situation.
Pat Pledger

Extraordinary Ernie and Marvellous Maude by Frances Watts

ABC Books, 2008. ISBN 9780733321924 $12.05 65p.
(Ages: 7-10) This delightful little chapter book, aimed squarely at middle primary kids, will raise a laugh or two, amid lots of chuckles, as Ernie, a less than athletic boy, applies to be a superhero. The Superhero Society has been told to attract new members, and Ernie is their only candidate. As an apprentice, he must find a sidekick and go out and do heroic things. And his sidekick, Maud, a sheep, along with Ernie manages just that. Their overwhelming the bullies in the school, saving Emma and her book, makes wonderful reading, and will attract the most reluctant of readers.

I thoroughly enjoyed this little tome, it has lots of ingredients beloved by kids, a reluctant hero, a hero who is ordinary, a boy standing up to the bullies in his school, characters who are believable and likeable, and a touch of the impossible. Both main characters are engaging and appealing, and I look forward to the next books in this series, Ernie and Maud.
Fran Knight

Message in a bottle by Valerie Zenatti

Bloomsbury, 2008. ISBN 9780747590446
Unless you have recently arrived from Mars or even further afield, you would know that the Middle East presented one of the more intractable problems of the 20th Century, and still no resolution in sight. Message in a bottle is an attempt to personalize the conflict and connect the reader to the essential humanity of the ordinary person caught on either side of the divide.

The novel is a two-hander, the protagonists being a 17-year old Israeli girl and a 20-year old Palestinian male living in Gaza. Initial contact was made through Tal Levine, the Israeli girl, putting a note with her email address in a bottle, and getting her soldier brother to drop it in Gaza. The narrative then progresses through 'direct-to-camera' thoughts and email correspondence of Naim, aka 'Gazaman', and Tal. Although the novel doesn't provide a magic formula, in fact remarks that 'history is relentless, it doesn't think about people who want a quiet life, it just grinds on, sometimes breaking everything in its way', there is an up-beat conclusion.

Recent studies discussed on Radio National's The Book Show have claimed that readers of fiction experience a deeper empathy and understanding of our shared humanity compared to non-readers or even readers of non-fiction, and I think the novel is quite successful in this. Here is Tal explaining to her boyfriend the realities of what it's like to witness a suicide bombing:
'the TV doesn't let you smell the smell, or hear the silence, that second of silence straight after the explosion, the second when everyone's dazed, petrified. And then the screams, the moans, the sobbing, the groaning, they all cry like little children, the injured, even if they're fifty years old.'

This is very powerful, although the writing of Tal's inner thoughts at times is a bit clunky and cringe-making, possibly a result of the translation (from French). The novel Broken Bridge (by Lynne Reid Banks, 1994 re-issued 20007) deals with similar subject matter, but with far more nuanced characters and developed narrative. However it is a much longer book: if your students require a shorter read, I would certainly recommend Message in a bottle. (Would also recommend a lovely recent movie, The band's visit, about an Egyptian Police Orchestra visiting Israel, but accidentally stuck overnight in a small-town backwater.)
Peter Helman

Crusher is coming by Bob Graham

Hachette (Lothian Children's Books) ISBN 9780734410702
(Age 3-7) A reissue of the 1987 book and sporting a new cover, Crusher is coming! is a delight to read. Peter clears up his room of soft toys, instructs his mother not to kiss him and refuses to have his baby sister anywhere near because Crusher, the football hero, is coming to his house. Crusher arrives and although Peter tries to entice him with videos and comics and a tree house, Crusher is happy to have a tea party with his little sister and to buy her an icecream.

This is a light hearted story with humourous pictures that tells a simple tale about childhood fears. Peter is afraid that Crusher will be too macho to enjoy his family, but he turns out to be the exact opposite, preferring to play with Claire than do the boy's stuff that Peter has planned.

The illustrations are delightful. Crusher has a bandaid on his head and the family dog is a disaster. Children will enjoy the subtle humour of both the text and the illustrations. I especially enjoyed Peter's mother calling Crusher Basher and Cruncher.
Pat Pledger

Finding Darcy by Sue Lawson

Black Dog Books, 2008. ISBN 978174203023 4
$18.95. 278p
(Age 11+) A different slant on the war theme, Finding Darcy shows a year 10 girl, at first very resistant to the idea of researching information about her long dead great grandfather, and then gradually becoming more intrigued, ever mindful of the cold reception received from her grandmothers when approaching that subject.

Sent to live with her grandmother and great grandmother, when her mum goes off to Melbourne to complete a 3 month retraining course, Darcy is at first horrified at having to live with these two old women, set in their ways and impervious to any modern ideas. Darcy is reprimanded at every opportunity, told when to shower, how to eat, given a list of chores to do around the house, and restricted in her use of the phone. Her privacy is invaded, friends restricted, and her life becomes dreary. She is alienated from all those things which teens accept today as must haves, a mobile phone, computer, freedom to come and go as she wishes, friends who drop in, and a loving family to be with. She snaps at her friends, becomes more sensitive to the teasing of a small group within her class, and all the while rebels at any attempt by her teacher to help her with her project.

Sue Lawson captures the voice of this young woman perfectly, with her snide remarks, arguments with her mother, relationship with others at her school and particularly her changing view of the two women she is living with. All is most credible. At first I sighed at reading another angsty story told in the first person, but it took only a few pages to become deeply absorbed with Darcy's plight. This book is a wonderfully inventive tale of a little known campaign in our Pacific war history, and the means by which it is told is sure to entice middle school readers. And along the way the story underlines research techniques and information sharing which students now must be capable of doing to a high level to be successful.
Fran Knight

Noodle Pie by Ruth Starke

[Sound recording] Read by Stephen Pease. Louis Braille Audio , 2008. (4 hrs 30 mins)
ISBN 97817425120348 4 CDs $52
Ruth Starke's brilliantly evocative story of a returning Vietnamese refugee, is brought satisfyingly to life in this wonderful recording by Louis Braille Audio.
On the plane to Hanoi, Andy hears some of the stories about his father's escape from Vietnam many years before. Looking out to sea, he cannot understand how his father was able to do something so scary, and he realises how worried his father is as they get closer to the land of his birth.

Subtly Starke underscores the differences between Australia and Vietnam, as she reveals through the simplest things, the strangeness of the country to which Andy is going. From the instructions on the plane, to the stories Andy's father tells him, to the jewelry his father has bought, the first chapters reveal the disparity between the lifestyles of the two sections of the family.  Through Andy's eyes the reader sees Vietnam from an Australian point of view, and as his eyes become more attuned to things Vietnamese, the reader too, is drawn into the rituals and customs of this very different way of life.

Andy makes many mistakes. He sees the family restaurant through the Australian stress on hygiene and health rules, he sees the family's treatment of his cousin Minh, as despotic and cruel, he sees the traffic as rule-less and chaotic, but he learns anew that things cannot be taken at face value. Taken aback at the new suit his father wears, his expensive watch and talk of his business, Andy cannot reconcile the view the family has of his father and what he really is. He learns too, that there is more to his father's story than the one he has been told in the past.

Stephen Pease's reading is just right. He is able to replicate the accent of a Vietnamese person speaking English or VietEnglish or Vietnamese. The father's accent is very clear, and his fear on the plane, palpable. Pease differentiates seamlessly between each of the members of the Vietnamese family, from the grandmother, to the aunt and uncle, cousins and children. Complementing this appealing multicultural story, the reading is evocative of the nuances of life and living for this sprawling family, and their joy at meeting again. The recording recreates the story admirably, adding a subtle knowledge of the words and phrases which I skimmed over on reading, but were made clear from the audio version.
Fran Knight

The London Eye Mystery by Siobhan Dowd

(Age 9+) Strongly recommended. This has all the ingredients of a thumping good read; believable characters that you really care about, a mystery that seems impossible but true, a fast moving plot and a satisfying ending. The London Eye Mystery has been short-listed for the Stockport Book Award and has already earned a devoted following among nine to eleven year olds at my school.

It's one of those books that appeals on many levels. The storyline, a boy who goes missing from a pod on the London Eye, is all the more exciting because it seems so impossible. The two main characters, feisty Kat and her brother Ted, are two of the most believable, strong and likeable characters I've had the pleasure to meet.

The adults in this story are less important and it is the children that ultimately solve the mystery and save the day. It is all so believable that as the plot rattles along we are immersed in a race against time to find and rescue Kat and Ted's missing cousin, Salim.

It is the characterisation of Ted and Kat that really lifts this book away from more mundane adventure mysteries. Ted is autistic which, as he explains, means the wiring in his brain works differently. As a result expressions such as 'you could cut the atmosphere with a knife' are particularly challenging. Body language is something else he struggles to interpret, and we are given an insight into a world where the intricacies of relationships that most people take for granted have to be learned and practised. However, it is the wonders of Ted's logical brain and superior reasoning that enable him and Kat to solve the mystery of Salim's disappearance.

This is a marvellous story that lends itself to being read aloud. With such strong male and female characters it should prove a big hit for both boys and girls.
Claire Larson

The beginner's guide to bears by Gillian Shields and Sebastien Braun

Orchard Books, 2008. ISBN 9781846161032
(Age 3-5) Who can resist a teddy bear? This charming story gives the reader lots of information about bears. It describes what to look for in a bear ('soft, gentle, cuddly and warm'), what bears like, (playing games, toys and making lots of noise) and what they want when they don't feel well. At bedtime bears need a 'cuddly toy and a special blanket'. The book concludes with a mirror that the reader can look into with a favourite bear.

Beautifully illustrated by Sebastien Braun, this story has pictures of all sorts of bears, each with delightful individual faces and playing everyday games.
Beginning and rounding off the story is an appealing little poem:

You need a bear
And a bear needs you.
You and a bear
Together makes two.

The gentle rhymes and short text make this story a good read aloud for the young child and will help an older child predict the story.

Pat Pledger

The Two Pearls of Wisdom by Alison Goodman

HarperCollins, 2008. ISBN 9780732288006 $32.99 434 p.
(Ages 12 - Adult) When Eon struggles to rise to his feet after being knocked down again by Swordmaster Ranne, every veteran reader knows that here is a boy who will survive against all odds, overcoming his disabled leg and small stature, to compete in the ceremony to find the new apprentice to Dragoneye. But all is not as it seems, and the Swordmaster mocks Eon, and many others in the company training the 12 boys for tomorrow's ceremony seem to know already who will win.  And it is not Eon. The hated Lord Ido's presence seems palpable, and his scheme for the new apprentice seem to be holding sway, until the Mirror Dragon, not seen for five hundred years, picks Eon out as the trainee.

From then on, Eon's path is set, his master and his friends from his master's household reap the rewards of training him, and are elevated with Eon into the Palace. But they must all be wary, Lord Ido is not one to be crossed, and there is another concern, Eon must never be seen by inquisitive eyes, lest he be revealed for what he really is, a young woman, one for whom the honour of being an apprentice can never be.

Being a Dragoneye means that the person can call the dragon to him, but Eon is gutted by his inability to do so, beginning to rely on drugs to help him. Lord Ido realises this and is able to force Eon to do his will, amassing all the power he needs to take over when the sickly emperor dies. The contest between Ido and Eon is stunning, as Ido takes the ascendancy because of his knowledge of Eon's sexuality, and his scheming controls all others around him. The tension is crushing as events happen which add to the air of control and counter control. All the while the reader swings with the shifts in allegiance, absorbs the twists, ponders what will happen next.

This is a society based on Ancient China and Japan, but brimming with fabulous overtones of Dragon Mythology, with dragon lore that is original and brilliant, giving the reader a new vocabulary to absorb and images to grasp. The background is dazzlingly described, the food - edible; the costumes within a finger's grasp; the tension within the palace breathes down the reader's neck. And as you read, you will find yourself looking over your shoulder to watch out for who may be listening in or watching you. As with all good fantasies, the climax is frantic and bloody, leaving the reader salivating for more.

A luminous fantasy novel which lives on, The Two Pearls of Wisdom is to be followed with a second book, Necklace of the Gods. I can't wait.
Fran Knight

Orphans of the Queen by Ruth Starke

[sound recording] Read by Caroline Lee. Louis Braille Audio, 2004 (6 hrs 15 mins)
ISBN 07320291395 CDs $68
Ruth Starke is well known for her evocative stories about migrants coming to Australia. Each of her novels tells the story of one family and its struggle to find a place in a new city and country. In her recent Noodle Pie, we read of Andy and his Vietnamese father returning for the first time to Hanoi to meet the family. In the award winning NIPS XI, we see a group of students from a variety of backgrounds trying to play cricket in an attempt to be Australian, and in this book, we read of a family of two children, brought to Australia from England, where they lived in an orphanage. Separated at Perth, Hilly arrives at the orphanage in Adelaide, where she is treated poorly, and in an attempt to reunite her little family, writes to the Queen, about to visit Australia in 1954, for help.

Based on the stories about Adelaide's Goodwood Orphanage, where life was often harsh and allied to the little known tales of orphan children sent out to Commonwealth countries as immigrants, Starke's story is monumental in exposing the lives of some of these children, and their treatment once they arrived in Australia. Their powerlessness is overwhelming, as Hilly tries to find her brother, Egg, in Perth. Students will love the story of the children on the ship coming to Australia, as it goes through the Mediterranean Sea, then through the Suez Canal, and across the Indian Ocean, and they have a carefree time before they arrive. But this soon changes.

This reading by Caroline Lee is wonderful. She speaks calmly and deliberately, portraying the two main characters, Hilly and Egg with a different nuance in her voice, which delineates them readily for the reader. The many accents of the children and the passengers on the ship are exceptionally well realised, and Lee's voice readily evokes an image of the character in the mind of the listener. It is an emotive reading which will enthuse its listeners.
Fran Knight