Shockingly good stories by R.A. Spratt
The collection of Shockingly good stories by R.A.Spratt is shockingly good! Shockingly good is what anyone who is familiar with R.A.Spratt's Nanny Piggins series, Friday Barnes Mysteries series or Peski Kids series has come to expect. Spratt knows how to entertain. There are many gasp, hold your breath and laugh out loud moments in these stories.
In the Shockingly good stories collection, the reader is treated to the beloved but irreverent Nanny Piggins telling her version of well-known fairy tales. Spratt, through Nanny Piggins, manages to shock and turn expected conventions upside down. The children I have read these stories to have been horrified and delighted with Nanny Piggin's naughtiness, the clever vocabulary and the adventures.
Friday Barnes appears in other stories. She is a school-girl, the same age as our readers and her detective work occurs within recognisable school and local community settings populated by recognisable characters. She is plucky and intelligent. The switched-on young reader cannot help but try to pick up clues and think logically in an effort to work out "who done it" before Friday does. Good luck to that reader because with Spratt there is always a clever and unpredictable twist!
Other stories about two characters called Mum and Tammy are crazily imaginative and peppered with contemporary sassy dialogue. The stories are far-fetched. Odd things are thrown together like piranhas, grubby boys and ducks. It works.
R.A Spratt does not patronise children or insult their intelligence with simplistic language and predictable stories. She plays with idioms, turns of phrase and with concepts and ideas that encourage questioning and delighted wonder. Her vocabulary is extensive and high impact eg. when referring to ducks waddling across roads... " It's like they've got extremely specific amnesia where they totally forget that they are capable of flying thousands of kilometres with geographic precision." (p.60) Children are inspired to think, imagine and create mental pictures. They learn all sorts of facts and concepts and experience vicariously action, adventure and dilemma without realising because they are so busy laughing. Even reluctant listeners are won over.
Teachers, librarians and parents need to keep Shockingly good stories handy for those moments when engaging, short stories are called for.
Themes: Fractured fairy tales, Flights of imagination, Girl detective work.
Wendy Jeffrey
