Luna's world: Library dreams by Hayley Gannon. Illus. by Michelle Conn

Luna's world: Library Dreams is a gentle, perceptive little story..."perfect for newly confident readers, as well as older readers needing to bridge the gap between graphic novels and novels proper". One can feel confident that this book hits the mark because it is written by Hayley Gannon - a primary school teacher librarian. Whilst being a librarian may not be always the golden ticket to being a good writer, one might say that it is a big step in the right direction as with Gannon being both a teacher AND a librarian she would have a pretty good idea about what children need to be reading and what they enjoy reading. Gannon has hit a gap in the market which is the space where a child needs to transition to continuous text.

Luna's world: Library Dreams is structured using continuous sentences and paragraphs but as a bridge to progress from a diet of mainly graphic texts typesettings including Sweet roll, Why notes, Note lover and Fruit cake have been selected. These greatly enhance the visual appeal making Luna's world an attractive and engaging reading experience. The internal design by Jo Hunt is very important.  The font varies in size and changes for emphasis. Doodles are scattered around the edges but are not part of the script. Different sized illustrations are included and scattered - entirely consistent with creating a journaling kind of format.

The story is told in journal/diary form in the first person voice of Luna. Luna is a year 5 girl whose great wish is to be a library monitor. Unfortunately, she is impulsive and not the best at concentrating. She has to compete with her arch-enemy Jade Jones for the role. Luna is guided by smart adults (her mother, class teacher, school librarian) and her friends. She learns. 

Love and knowledge of libraries, books and children shines through in a most authentic way. This simple and warm story illuminates a much larger phenomenon and that is the wonderful business of what school libraries, good educators and parents do all the time for children - especially in being able to turn deficits into strengths and fostering the love of reading.

A delightful read, Luna's world: Library Dreams is the first in a new illustrated junior fiction diary series which is "A love letter to the school librarian". This writer suspects that it will bounce off shelves into book bags just like the ever popular Ella diaries and Olivia's secret scribbles. I'm hoping that Gannon picks up on boys and their non fiction interests in this series too. Luna's friend Cody needs to star.

Themes: School libraries, Journaling, Learning differences, Friendship, Competition.

Wendy Jeffrey