Scholastic, 2018. ISBN 9781742994147
(Age: 4+) Highly recommended. Themes: Monsters, Humour. Our hero is
all dressed up to scare the living daylights out of the reader. He
has a donned a skeleton costume, a hat with a row of teeth, large
furry slippers and googly eyes sprouting from his head - all things
to provoke and scare. But each time he brings something else into
the picture he is trying to create, something very unscary enters.
Told to expect something scary, readers will laugh with anticipation
and then surprise as he whisks aside the red sheet to reveal an
apple tree not a monster, nothing scary at all. He tries again,
pulling down the blue curtain covered in stars, expecting a monster,
but a rainbow appears. Then a bunch of rabbits hop into the picture.
Frustrated he calls again for a terrifying thing, only to have an
ice cream vendor come onto the page. By now with his hands on his
hips, he declaims loudly how he wanted this to be a scary book, full
of horrifying and terrifying things, aiming to scare the readers,
not make them hungry for an ice cream, or look at a bunch of cute
rabbits. Each page rings with his frustration, so after another
attempt, his grandma rides across the page, he has had enough, and
drags a monster onto the page. The monster unhappily scares everyone
else away, but our hero is happy that he now has something scary to
show the reader, although the monster is not as scary as he wishes
him to be.
A delightfully funny story of not getting what you want, of
frustration at things not working out as you intended, this tale
will resonate with younger children who will recognise exactly what
the boy feels.
Bland creates a wonderful mix of the scary and unscary, using words
in a different type to entertain the reader and make them aware of
the meanings of some of these new words. In the background can be
seen parallel stories: his dog loves the apple tree, digging around
its roots and finding a bone, the rabbits eat all the apples, going
to great lengths to get the last one on the tree. Readers will love
the humour, picking out details on each page, watching the antics of
all the other characters on each page.
Fran Knight
Wraith by Alexandra and Shane Smithers
Magabala Books, 2018. ISBN 9781925360950
(Age: 13+) Recommended. Themes: Science Fiction, Flight, Climate
Change, Aboriginal people. James can fly; he practices his technique
out in the bush, as his best friend Darren shouts words of
encouragement. He's unsure of his special powers and unfortunately
tends to crash land. Darren hatches a cunning plan when James'
parents travel to New Zealand for a work conference. Through some
tricky manoeuvres Darren helps his Bra'a return to his empty family
home and continue to master his flying skills.
Wearing Darren's invention, the Variable Pressure Release unit,
James is propelled up into the atmosphere. He crashes into
Nebulosity, a cloud city peopled by sky dwellers. After waking from
a coma, he is amazed by this advanced city, a different civilisation
with its unique transport and technological advances. James is drawn
into a desperate search to find the SAFFIRE technology designed to
save the city from the effects of climate change. With the help of
Aureole, a young girl determined to save Nebulosity, James needs his
to rise to the challenges and help in this journey.
Woven throughout is the three villains' story, their mission is to
find and destroy the SAFFIRE technology. They travel in an array of
fast vehicles, employ a range of tools and utilise their specialised
skills to thwart the teens' plans. Their attitudes, conversations
and actions heighten the drama and build the fast-paced action.
The main Aboriginal characters James and his mate Darren are
genuinely relatable, realistic, humorous, showing determination as
they discover, grow and develop their abilities. Key environmental
messages of personal responsibility and working together to save the
planet underpin "Wraith: James Locke and the Azuriens".
Alexandra and Shane Smithers have written a complex and compelling
narrative, set against the background of both rural and urban
Australia. Their creativity, attention to detail, scientific
understandings, complex worlds and populations of sky and earth
dwellers make this a richly rewarding read for teens and young
adults.
Rhyllis Bignell
Puffin the architect by Kimberly Andrews
Puffin, 2018, ISBN 9780143793755
(Age: 4-7) Recommended. Themes: Housing, Design, Architecture,
Homes, Rhyming fiction, STEM. Puffin is a smart architect who's
trying to design a house for some very fussy clients, two pufflings.
They tour the town, investigating all the other animals' houses with
special design features just right for the animal, their jobs and
personal needs. In wonderful rhyming poems, Andrews takes these hard
to please clients to Platypus the baker's place cut into the
hillside, Detective Hound's secret study and Painter Goose's
light-filled art studio.
Each rhyme begins with 'a lot of clever cupboards' for storage and
adds the furniture and special built-ins, a place perfect for them.
The poems are written on a project plan, just like an architect
uses. Kimberley Andrews delightful cut-away paintings are perfect
for children to explore, matching the design element from the poem.
Pilot Moose's treetop home includes cupboards for his flannel
shirts, a pulley-operated lift and a flying fox between the bathroom
and his house. Look for the energetic pufflings on each double-page
spread, flying or playing with Pig's collapsible stools.
Architectural drawings, blue prints and plans add to the interest of
this fun picture book.
The pufflings are the architect's most bothersome clients. At the
conclusion of the story we discover who the Puffin architect is and
who the pufflings belong to, a heart-warming ending.
"Puffin the Architect" is an excellent story to link with STEM
topics for younger students, as they can design and plan other
animal homes or their own personal spaces. This is just right for
families to share and for Early Years classes as a springboard into
Technology activities.
Rhyllis Bignell
Other Worlds series by George Ivanoff
Ill. by James Hart. Random House Australia, 2018. Game World book 3. ISBN 9780143786238 Dark World book 4. ISBN 9780143786252
(Age: 8-11) Recommended. Themes: Friendship, Adventure, Zombies,
Gaming. "Find the key! Open the doorway! Enter the other world!"
George Ivanoff's gripping portal fiction series continues with "Game
World" and "Dark World". Each stand-alone story features new
characters facing challenges, obstacles and competing for survival
in an alternate world.
"Game World" centres around a world of virtual reality, when gamer
Hall puts on the VR helmet and is transported into a strange game
world where humans and computers battle to survive. Field Marshall
Maheera meets Hall and warns him that he is in the middle of a war,
fighting drones of all shapes and sizes. He must use his gaming
skills to discern what is reality and what is virtual and find a way
back home. Hall's online nemesis Randomizarbian actually assists him
in his mission.
"Dark World" begins with Newt and Rowan waiting in Principal
Hardnose's office after an altercation in Science class. They remove
a magical book from the principal's library and on opening it a
portal appears. They are a drawn in to a sinister world filled with
piles of rubble, destroyed buildings and zombie-like creatures
roaming around. Newt and Rowan discover a laboratory run by an evil
scientist intent of destroying the Darkness with a bolt of energy
from her Volt Cannon. This conjures up a huge spider-like creature
and a royal character from another portal which results in magic and
mayhem. Newt and Rowan learn to rely on each other and overcome
their differences as they seek to escape from the Darkness.
The books in the "Other Worlds" series are exciting fast-paced
junior novels, filled with action, adventure, mystery, set in
alternate realities. With both boy and girl protagonists and themes
of friendship, collaboration, accepting diversity and problem
solving, these novels will engage readers from ages 8 and up.
Rhyllis Bignell
Found by Fleur Ferris
Random House, 2018. ISBN 9780143784326
(Ages: secondary) Highly Recommended. Themes: Crime, Survival,
Witness protection. About to tell her strict father, Bear, about her
boyfriend, Beth hesitates when she sees him across the road waiting
for her. A van pulls up and he is gone, his backpack left on the
road. Explaining this to her mother she is met with a strictness she
has never heard in her voice. Told to wait she is frightened by her
tone, even more so when confronted by what she hears as they head
for the bunker on their farm.
In a witness protection program since she was a baby, Beth has had
no idea that the skills her parents have developed in her as part of
growing up were designed to make her resilient, able to adapt and
survive.
This is a pace maker of a story, sure to grab every reader's
attention as they are impelled to turn the pages wanting to see how
Beth copes with this new set of circumstances.
Ferris' police background gives a strong base of reality to the
tale, and her story telling skills are paramount as we watch Beth
avoid the pitfalls put in her way.
Her new boyfriend, Jonah, senses that something is wrong when Beth
does not answer calls or text messages, and her father does not turn
up to sports training. Used to the family being absolute sticklers
about turning up on time and keeping appointments, Jonah takes steps
to go to the farm to investigate.
Here there are three men in balaklavas, already holding Bear, and
waiting for Beth to show up. But they find Jonah instead and from
the security of the bunker, Beth and her mother see him being
beaten, and so decide to act, despite the strict instructions from
Bear that once in the bunker they stay until help arrives.
Eventually Bear, Beth and Jonah are able to make some headway, but
as the police arrive and the ambulance takes away Beth's mother, we
know that the leader of the gang, Carlos, is still at large.
A superb thriller, Fleur Ferris has found a niche in young
adolescent novels waiting to be filled by a writer with a strong
background knowledge that permeates the whole story.
Fran Knight
Fairytales for feisty girls by Susannah McFarlane
Allen and Unwin, 2018. ISBN 9781760523541
(Age: 5+) Highly recommended. Themes: Fairy tales. Fractured fairy
tales. Women and girls. Old stories rewritten for a modern age,
these tales will have younger listeners laughing out loud as they
recognise stories they have heard but with a difference, making them
more palatable for modern children, and undermining the stereotypes
that persist. The recent spate of pink books have met their match in
these funny, up-to-date stories of girls taking their situation in
hand and improving their lot. Living 'happily ever after' is much
more fun when the girls manage their futures for themselves.
Not a Rapunzel serenely waiting for a handsome prince to ride by but
a Rapunzel who loves building things, longs to see what is outside
her tower and makes a plait from her hair which she cuts off and has
a passing lad tie to the tree, using her lute to sail down the hair
to freedom. And not a Red Riding Hood, screaming for help from the
axe-man, but a strong-willed girl using her knowledge of the flowers
in the wood to give the wolf a tainted cup of tea, enough to make
him drowsy, enabling her to rescue her Gran. Cinderella goes to the
ball, dropping her glass slipper. All is well. But she does not go
home and wait for the prince to try it on her slender foot, she goes
in the other direction and sells the remaining slipper giving her
the financial independence to achieve her dream. And Thumbelina
freeing herself from the various small animals that beset her, had
me scrambling for a fairytale book to see how the 'original'
developed.
The four stories in this wonderful book, "Red Riding Hood",
"Rapunzel", "Thumbelina" and "Cinderella" are rewritten by Susannah
McFarlane, well known for her stories in the "EJ12 Girl Hero",
"EJ12Spy School", "D Bot" series, as well as being involved with the
highly acclaimed "Go Girl" and "Zac Power" series.
Each of the stories in this book is illustrated by a different
Australian artist, giving a differing perspective of life in these
fairy stories to watch out for as they are read. Seeing Rapunzel
using her saw and hammer, or Cinderella tending to her rescued
animals or Red finding the axe for the woodsman who has misplaced
it, or Thumbelina taking her self in hand, shows a feisty side to
these girls which will enliven, fascinate and entertain all readers.
Fran Knight
The cook and the king by Julia Donaldson
Ill. by David Roberts. Macmillan Books, 2018. ISBN 9781509813773
(Age: 4+) Highly recommended. Themes: Humour. Fears. Cooking. Food
preparation. Medieval history. Castles. How wonderful to read and
look at a very funny picture book. So many coming across my desk at
the moment are portentous and heavy-handed, trying to address an
issue (mainly mental health) in a didactic and preaching way. So
this book is a breath of fresh air: funny, beautifully illustrated,
with an whiff of irony about the cook's dealings with the king that
is frankly delicious. The king wants a new chef, one who can cook
what he really wants, but there is no one to be found. He rejects
all applicants, until Wobbly Bob turns up, self deprecating and
anxious about his inability to do what the king wants. But his
anxiety is not the core of the book. The core is humour, laughing at
the king wanting things to be just so, that by the end he has done
all the preparation and cooking himself. Wobbly Bob didn't have to
worry at all, because telling the king how worried he was about
going fishing or digging up the potatoes, or using a knife or frying
something over a fire, he was able to extricate himself from the
task, leaving the king to do it himself. And of course the king
thinks his meal the best ever and offers Bob the position.
Readers will laugh out loud at the situation and its conclusion,
revelling in Bob's inabilities and the way he was able to manipulate
the king into doing the work. The repetition is infectious, the
rhyme encouraging children to predict what word will end each line,
and the illustrations are just wonderful.
The medieval background gives a lot of information to readers about
that period of time: costume, castles, kitchen and cooking, while
the opening page with its unicorn tapestry is eye popping. Each page
gives another humorous situation and the looks on the faces of the
king and his subjects are wonderful. And kids will just love Bob's
wobbly hat, which may lead kids to ask about his trousers and other
accoutrements of his trade.
Fran Knight
You can't let an elephant drive a digger by Patricia Cleveland-Peck
Ill. by David Tazzyman. Bloomsbury, 2018. ISBN 9781408879146
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Themes: STEM. Probability. Humour. Verse. A
range of improbably domesticated animals are given impossible things
to do, inviting every reader to simply laugh out loud at the antics
shown. Each double page shows an improbable scene: a shark in the
bath, a polar bear cutting hair, a seal acting as a chef, brushing
your teeth with a crocodile and more, all illustrated with gusto,
hinting at the possible things which may happen with the animal
doing something he is simply not designed to do.
Told in four line rhyming stanzas, each page invites the reader to
predict the last word of each line and many adults will find
children learning the stanza detailing the animal they like best.
Kids will love the looks on their faces as they try out their
impossible tasks, and the corresponding looks on the children's
faces as a shark appears in the bath or an octopus helps with
dressing or a wolf offers to read a bedtime story. Each page
bristles with laughter and kids will love looking at the detail
where other things are happening: mice carrying away the mousetrap,
a cat under the table eating the fish dropped by the seal or the
elephant's poo dropping onto one of the workers.
Full to the brim with hilarity, children will relish this unusual
tale, another from the duo who created "You can't take an elephant
on a bus". David Tazzyman is new to me and I found out more about
him here.
Initially a commercial illustrator, he illustrated the "Mr Gum"
books for Egmont in 2006 and has illustrated children's books ever
since. Patricia Cleveland-Peck has written some 14 books and more
information can be found here.
Fran Knight
The Frooties series by Hil Rogers and Joshie Lefers
Ill. by Pete Petrovic. Scholastic, 2018.
"Bad Apple". ISBN 9781742765952
"Crazy Kiwi". ISBN 9781742765969
(Ages: 7-9) Themes: Fruit. Author and publisher Hil Rogers came up
with the crazy idea to humanise her fruit bowl, creating a cast of
fun characters with big personalities. Entrepreneur Joshie Lefers
adds his own unique style with all of the silly jokes, humourous
comments and fruity puns.
"Bad Apple" focuses on the trickster of the Frooties, who's always
up to no good: poor Lady Mango awakes to find dark eyebrows and a
curly moustache drawn on her face. Even with a warning from the
Director of Melons, Watermelon Man, Bad Apple turns his punishment
to clean out the fruit bowl into fun. He can't stop his Mop Express
and pushes the Banana Bunch off the table. Banana Drama! A trip to
the scary Rubbish Bin is required to save the bananas. This
difficult journey involves making a Cling Wrap Bridge, the
traversing down a knotted tea towel and a surprising catapult into
the bin. Bad Apple meets some slightly disgusting characters whose
comments are quite punny - 'Let's Avo Cuddle' and the fish skeleton
who comments 'I don't have any body.' Bad Apple's kitchen adventures
are madcap, with his friends include Punky Pineapple, Lefty and
Righty Cherry twin and Petey Pear on hand to help. Their modes of
transport and movement around the kitchen aided by the utensils adds
to the craziness of this cartoon style junior novel.
"Crazy Kiwi" is an overwhelmingly green story, while all the other
Frooties want to look their best and be chosen for breakfast by the
Human Hand. Kiwi has some self-esteem issues. He's brown on the
outside and green on the inside and he's a funny shape. Time for a
visit to Granny (Nanny) Kiwi in the Old Froots (or Fruits) Home, a
dangerous journey to undertake, surviving the Flames of Doom, the
Creeping Forest and the Steel Grater. Kiwi, Nana Banana and Strawbs
have some close encounters. They meet Confused Tomato a Not-Fruit
Fruit, step into a Spaghetti Western food fight with a cowboy
Cucumber and Zucchini and finally arrive at their destination. After
some Midday Madness at the nursing home, the friends work on Kiwi's
makeover.
"The Frooties" series are deliciously written and Pete Petrovic's
zany cartoons bring the kitchen characters to life. These stories
are fun to share, just right for readers who love jokes, puns and
gross humour. Check out the bananas enjoying their blender bath in
"Bad Apple!"
Rhyllis Bignell
Oscar the hungry unicorn by Lou Carter
Ill. by Nikki Dyson. Orchard, 2018. ISBN 9781408355756
(Age: 3+) Recommended. Themes: Unicorns. Fairy tales. Food. Home.
Humour. Oscar loves to eat and despite what he eats, he is still
hungry. He eats his stable, the gingerbread house, the pirate ship,
the toadstools which house the fairies and the dragon's pizza. The
dragon points out that the pizza is to share, but Oscar takes no
notice. But at the giant's table, he finds that he is part of the
food going into the giant's mouth so runs away, despairing that he
will never find a home. He crosses the troll bridge eating it as he
goes, and just as the trolls begin to exact their revenge, Princess
Oola comes by with her boat. She scoops him up, telling how she
loves unicorns and takes him to her castle, where food is never
ending and Oscar finds a home. But he still looks at the moon with
avaricious eyes.
This lovely story about eating reflects many fairy tales which
readers will be familiar with. They will love the references to
these stories, spying the illustrations to see what parts of the
fairy story is mentioned. The fun illustrations suit the tone of the
story well, and younger readers will love peering into each picture
to see the details.
Teachers and parents will be able to use the story to talk about the
place of food in our lives, and the appropriateness of some of the
food available against a funny and inviting story.
Fran Knight
Black cockatoo by Carl Merrison and Hakea Hustler
Magabala Books, 2018. ISBN 9781925360707
(Age: 11+) Highly recommended. Mia sees her brother Jy firing stones
at birds with his shanghai. Among the fallen birds there is a
dirrarn black cockatoo, and Mia defiantly gathers it up and wrapping
it in her arms carries it inside to her bedroom hoping to nurse it
to recovery. Her jawiji grandfather scolds her brother and tells him
that he is doing the wrong thing by their culture.
It is never actually stated in the book, but the reader soon
realises that this is an Aboriginal family. Mia's grandparents
retain their culture despite experiences of being rounded up and
losing family to the stolen generations, and they share their
traditional values and cultural beliefs with their family. But Jy is
becoming less respectful and is drawn into cruel and thoughtless
games with other unruly teenagers. Mia is trying to follow a 'both
ways' path, gradually discovering her totemic connection to the
dirrarn, and also studying hard at school.
A deceptively simple story, enhanced by fine-detailed black and
white drawings portraying Australian wildlife and surroundings,
"Black Cockatoo" cleverly draws the reader into a greater
understanding of culture and Country. The teasing humour and banter
between family members is very natural and reveals warm and loving
relationships. Words from the Jaru language and Aboriginal English
are included in the text in a way that makes the meaning clear, so
whilst there is a glossary at the end, there is really no need to
refer to it.
Authors Merrison and Hustler bring their understanding of Indigenous
teenagers growing up in a remote town - Merrison works with young
Aboriginal boys through the Clontarf Academy and Hustler was a high
school English teacher at Halls Creek, Western Australia. Their book
will surely be welcomed by children in those areas, as a welcome
reflection of their culture and experiences, but it is also a story
that children anywhere can relate to, with its themes of exploring
identity and overcoming bullying.
I would recommend this authentic Australian story for all school
libraries, but it would make a particularly appropriate addition to
the collection for the International Year of Indigenous Language,
2019, as it includes living Aboriginal languages in a way that is
very natural and easy to understand and appreciate. Teacher's
notes are available.
Helen Eddy
Blakwork by Alison Whittaker
Magabala Books, 2018. ISBN 9781925360851
(Age: Senior secondary - Adult) Recommended. Poetry. White linen
washed by black hands, hangnails on worn hands . . . Whittaker
succinctly conjures images of colonisation, oppression and
segregation. She tells the story of abattoir life, the jobs the
black people do on the outskirts of country towns - the killwork. It
is stark and confrontative language, but also rich and poetic. She
is an artist with words.
Words are arranged like patterns on a page. To keep the integrity of
longer lines, sometimes the poems are arranged sideways, landscape
view. Other times, lines interweave alternately. She plays with
words - 'Beneviolence' with its repetitive versions of 'THIS IS GOOD
FOR YOU! THIS IS FOR YOUR GOOD' is simple but very effective.
Also very effective is the device of taking the forty-nine most
common three-word phrases in a text and arranging them, ranked, as a
poem - as with the judgement in the Trevorrow v State of South
Australia case, the inquest into the death of Ms Dhu, and the Mabo
vs Queensland decision. The phrases and the words used reveal
everything about the conflict of cultures; the legal terms
contrasting with the devastation of stolen children, the inhumanity
towards the person in custody, and the disregard for native
inhabitants of land.
Whittaker is a Gomeroi woman - she includes Gamilaraay words as well
as Aboriginal English in her poems; Aboriginal voices can clearly be
heard in her poetry. "Blakwork", with its 'bloodwork', 'heartwork',
'badwork', 'workwork', 'newwork', and lots of other kinds of 'work'
makes for a strong voice demanding to be heard.
Helen Eddy
More and more and more by Ian Mutch
Fremantle Press, 2018, ISBN 9781925591545
(Ages: 4+) Recommended. Themes: Recycling, Waste, Collecting. Henry
Harper loves collecting, so when he collects Kate he asks her to
stay with him on his planet. She agrees saying that she just loves
collecting and together the two passionate collectors collect all
they can find. In funny rhyming couplets the list is endless:
balloons and spoons, TVs and a pair of skis, sneakers and speakers,
elastic and toys made of plastic. The audience will love predicting
the word that rhymes, learning some of the engaging couplets to say
for themselves. And absorbing the drawings on each page they will
see how the planet is getting very overcrowded. Tons of stuff is
illustrated: all the sorts of things that may be seen dumped along
roads, or in the sea, or left out for the rubbish collection, things
no longer used or unable to be recycled.
And the contrast between the overcrowded planet, weighed down with
rubbish, and the last few pages where things are clean and green,
will not be lost on the readers.
They will have a great time looking at the detail included on each
page, and make suggestions about how each could be reused, recycled
or disposed of with care. Leading onto discussions about the waste
we produce, this book will form a great cornerstone of any
discussion about waste, and channel the class' ideas to how to
recycle things in their classroom, at home and in the community.
With the current discussion about waste, this book forms a timely
addition to picture books which will initiate class attention on this
urgent matter. Eager eyes will scan each page and call out all the
things they see that have become rubbish, with the wonderful
endpapers reiterating what they have seen in the pages of this book. Teacher
notes are available.
Fran Knight
Digby and Claude by Emma Allen
Ill. by Hannah Sommevillee. National Library of Australia, 2018.
ISBN 9780642279279
(Age: 7) Recommended. Themes: Australian History, Development,
Heritage, Architecture, Housing. The change that came across
Australian suburbs in the 1030's with clearing away of slums and
abandoned buildings is shown here through the story of two young
boys, Digby and Claude. They have an ideal life of roaming freely
through their neighbourhood, of claiming a small patch of land with
a wonderful old tree as their play space, of dragging all sorts of
discarded materials to make their cubby house extend up into the
tree. As the boys build their tree house, they watch the
redevelopment project across the road, of slums being demolished and
low cost housing being built in its place. Claude's father prevents
his son coming to the site because of the danger posed by the trucks
and diggers. When summer arrives so do the families and their
children, and Digby welcomes new friends to his tree house. And in
the tree, he tells the newcomers stories of days long ago when a
friend called Claude helped build the tree house.
This is a warm and enveloping story about the place where you
belong, a story of memories that build up around your own place,
that place called home. Digby and Claude together build their own
place and stock it with memories that they share, and when Claude
goes, Digby recalls those memories with others, sharing his place
with the newcomers. The contrast with the rebuilding over the road
reinforces the idea of home, how each new generation builds their
own memories and stories about their own place. Buildings come and
go but the stories remain.
The illustrations, redolent of images found in books and annuals
published for children between the wars, recreate the carefree and
innocent lives of children where they had the freedom to imagine and
build a tree house, meeting their friends there for the days with
nothing to do but play and chat and build, while in the background
we see the changes in the skyline of the suburb.
Several pages after the end of the story are devoted to a time line
of housing in Australia which will give readers an idea of the range
of housing in Australia from early times, and will encourage them to
look further. A page is devoted to a newspaper article outlining the
Erskinville development one of the first of its type in Australia, a
small cohort of low rental flats for families with children.
An interesting read, Digby and Claude could be used in conjunction
with the iconic "My Place" (Nadia Wheatley) which shows the changes
in Australia over time, through the life of one tree and the lives
of those around it, both books extolling the idea of home. Teacher's
notes are available.
Fran Knight
Dino diggers: Dumper truck danger by Rose Impey
Ill. by Chris Chatterton. Bloomsbury, 2018. ISBN 9781408872482
(Age: 4+) Recommended. Dinosaurs, Technology, Accidents. In
Dino-Town, the Dino Diggers are all ready for action. Dressed in
their hard hats and fluoro jackets, they can take on any problem
which comes long, so when the town bridge collapses after a heavy
rain storm, they are ready with their machines to clear the path and
help rebuild the bridge.
Young readers will adore the five friends, Terri,Tyrone, Bruno, Ricky
and Stacey, working out just why each has that particular name,
their size and physical attributes eagerly recognised by dinosaur
hunters. The problem of the bridge and the baker's van stuck beneath
causes the team some headaches as Tyrone takes his digger down into
the river bed to get the van out. He does this successfully but they
both end up on the wrong side of the bridge. Another problem creates
another solution, and all ends happily, with the dinosaurs reopening
the bridge in time for traffic. The Dino Diggers have done their
work.
Young readers will love looking at the array of work done by each of
the trucks illustrated, recognising these implements from seeing
them on their streets. The illustrations give a streamlined image of
each of them allowing kids to point out the features of each.
Recognisable work safety measures are included, alluding to the
possible dangers of this work, and showing readers what needs to
happen to keep themselves safe. In the last few pages is a cardboard
cutout of Stacey's dump truck with instructions on how to put it
together, continuing the fun of the book.
Fran Knight
