Fanny Britt (text) & Isabelle Arsenault (illustrations) translated from French by Christelle Morelli and Susan Ouriou (Walker Books) Hélène has a tough time at school, secluded and taunted by her former friends about her weight. At home, her mother is exhausted and overworked. She finds comfort in reading Jane Eyre, identifying with the heroine’s hardships …
Benji Davies (Simon & Schuster Children’s Books) Noi and his father live in a house by the sea with their six cats. While Noi’s father is busy fishing, Noi is left to occupy himself at home, often wandering on the beach. After a great storm hits, Noi goes down to the shore, looking for what the angry sea …
I have only recently discovered Hannah Cumming’s picture books. At first it is the artwork that attracted me to them. Her style is child-friendly and soft, but with a lovely dreamy quality to it. Once I started reading her books however, I discovered thoughtful, warm and evocative tales, which often a moral without ever being preachy, and …
Leigh Hodgkinson (Nosy Crow) When a bear inadvertently steps out of the woods and into the big city, he finds himself utterly lost and frightened. It is just too bright, too noisy, and too scary. He seeks shelter and solace in a building called Snooty Towers and after a hell raising encounter with a revolving door and …
Sarah Crossan(Bloomsbury Children’s Books) Kasienka’s father has left her mother and moved to England. The mother, persuaded that she can make him change his mind, uproots Kasienka’s whole life, fitting it into a suitcase and a laundry bag, and they arrive in Coventry. Forced to live in a bedsit, Kasienka and her mother must get …
Oliver Jeffers(HarperCollins Children’s Books) The boy and the penguin from Lost and Found return in this brand new adventure. The two are still the best of friends and love doing everything together. But there is something that Penguin feels he needs to learn by himself. He wants to learn to fly. As readers, young and old, …
Emily Gravett(Macmillan Children’s Books) Blue Chameleon is lonely and wants to find a friend. He can turn himself into all sorts of shapes and colours so everytime he meets something or someone, might it be a sock, and snail, boot, fish or banana, he is able to change so he looks just like them. Despite this, nobody …
