Adam Hills (text) and Luna Valentine (illustrator), Rockstar Detectives, Penguin Random House, February 2022, 384 pp., RRP $14.99 (pbk), ISBN 9780241505977 Suspend your disbelief at the door, and settle in for a rollicking detective story as twelve-year-old singing sensation Charley and her best friend and comedian George are accused of stealing priceless artefacts that have gone missing in every city that Charley has performed in. Is it the jealous rival who seems to know more than she should about the crimes? Or the red-haired girl who keeps turning up wherever they go? Or is it their manager, who’s been mysteriously…
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Charles Fuge, Little Wombat’s Easter Surprise, Walker Books, February 2022, 28 pp., RRp $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781760654269 Little Wombat, like other animals in the bush where he lives, is hunting for Easter eggs. While doing so, he meets Bilby and Rabbit (although he at first mistakes Bilby for Rabbit thinking Rabbit is in disguise) and they compare the eggs they have found, try jumping (Wombat is not very good at this) and Bilby and Rabbit show how well they can hear with their big ears. But when they all dig burrows, Wombat’s prowess is on display and his burrow is…
Vanessa Pirotta (text) and Samantha Metcalfe (illustrator), The Voyage of Whale and Calf, CSIRO Publishing, April 2022, 32 pp., RRP $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781486315109 The Voyage of Whale and Calf follows the migration of a young calf and his mother from the east coast of Australia to the icy waters of Antarctica. Readers will learn about breeding, feeding, communication, food chains and some of the threats faced by whales. Non-fiction information is softened by lyrical descriptions – ‘painting a picture’ rather than just recounting the facts. The author, a wildlife scientist and science communicator, explains concepts in a child-friendly way,…
Kate Hale (text) and Andy Smith (illustrator), Return to Factopia!, Britannica Books, March 2022, 208 pp., RRP $25.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781913750398 Return to Factopia! is a compendium of short, fun facts presented within brightly coloured and illustrated pages. It is published by Britannica Books (of iconic encyclopedia fame) with none of the boring conventions of encyclopedias but with all of the factual reliability of the Britannica brand. I was particularly struck by the original and creative presentation of the book. Besides the vibrant and funny, cartoon style illustrations, there’s novelty text aplenty – to name a few, the word “slippery”…
Katie Cotton, The Secret of Splint Hall, Andersen Press, March 2022, 320 pp., RRP $25.25 (pbk), ISBN 9781839131967 Their father had been killed during World War 2 and their house in London had been bombed, so Isobel, her older sister, Flora, and their mother must go to live at their mother’s old home with their aunt Bea and her horrible husband Mr Gregory. There they meet two brothers who are accused of stealing, see how Bea is treated by her husband, learn some unsavoury facts about Gregory, and save the world from one terrible secret menacing them all. Cotton has…
Kristen Schroeder (text) and Hilary Jean Tapper (illustrator), Freddy the Not-Teddy, EK Books, May 2022, 32 pp., RRP $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781922539090 Kids have all sorts of comforters and treasures. Over the years at our house, we’ve had a floppy dog called Fluffy, a stuffed lion called Lion, and we still have a couple of blankies that make bedtime possible. Freddy the Not-Teddy is about Jonah and his special toy, Freddy. Freddy is a bit indescribably, indistinguishably unidentifiable. Whether he’s a duck or penguin or something else is entirely irrelevant to Jonah. Then comes the day of the school Teddy Bears’ Picnic…
Jory John (text) and Lane Smith (illustrator), Cat Problems, Walker Books, October 2021, 48 pp., RRP $26.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781529506136 Cat lovers will adore this new offering from prolific picture book author Jory John. Employing the trademark black humour used in Penguin Problems, the story follows a house cat lamenting its life – Now I’m wide awake and I only got nineteen hours of sleep. Sigh. So, now a confession. I’m NOT a cat lover. I’m a firm member of Team Dog. So, the stream of cat hijinks, clawing the couch, demanding one’s ‘spot’ and going ga-ga over a catnip…
Sharon Giltrow (text) and Arielle Li (illustrator), Get Ready, Mama!, EK Books, April 2022, 32 pp., RRP $24.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781922539083 This fun picture book is a role reversal of the normal routines for getting ready for the day. It’s not Mum who is constantly reminding the child what needs to be done, but the child who is chivvying her mother. The reader goes through all the stages that child and mother go through to get ready to go out – from getting out of bed all the way to leaving the house, and all the hazards which appear along…
Nic Gill and Romane Cristescu (text), Rachel Tribout (illustrator) Poo, Spew and Other Gross Things Animals Do! CSIRO Publishing April 2022, 92 pp., RRP $29.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781486314867 This is a book for any young reader who might ever have wondered, what exactly is poo? This book will let the young inquirer know that, apart from the 75% water in human poo, there are hundreds of millions of bacteria and viruses, plus some fungi. It is an ecosystem down there, full of creatures crucial to health. This book is packed with facts and information of the pooey kind that will…
Ann Sei Lin, Rebel Skies, Walker Books Australia, May 2022, 352 pp., RRP $18.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781406399592 Rebel Skies is a beautifully written page turner whose themes draw from author Ann Sei Lin’s experience with Asian cultures. Sei Lin spent a number of years in Japan and this immersion in Japanese culture is evident throughout the novel in her choice of language and the description of characters and settings. Rebel Skies is the first book in a fantasy trilogy. There is an immediate hook as readers are dragged into a world completely unlike our own. This new world has floating…