Carley Yardley, Dog and the Lost Leg, Walker, 1 July 2015, 32pp., $16.95 (pbk) ISBN 9781925081084 Dog has lost his leg and consequently, his happy jiggle! His friend Fox joins in the quest to find Dog’s missing leg. They seek help from various friends as dog tries on an assortment of legs (and a few tails) before he manages to find what he needs to get his jiggle back. He never does find his missing leg, and the playful resolution of the story draws attention to the created aspect of the characters. This is a charming book for preschoolers with…
Author: Admin
Dementia affects over 340,000 Australians. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia and the second leading cause of deaths in Australia. These statistics are heartbreaking when you consider the number of Australian families facing associated trials. Littered throughout online support groups are testimonies of despair, isolation and frustration. Individuals are reaching out to their community for support and aids that will make their journey easier. World Dementia Month – September This month is World Dementia Month; an opportunity for nations to adopt better awareness and to act. Myself, and a select group of Australian authors and illustrators saw…
I was very excited to have the opportunity to put questions to Fiona Wood, author of Six Impossible Things, and Wildlife, and her latest, just released title, Cloudwish. Her answers are gracious and insightful. How did you get started as a writer? Writing is a second-stage career for me. I started with freelance journalism when I was at home on maternity leave with my first baby, then went on to study screenwriting at RMIT. I wrote TV scripts for twelve years, and finally started my first novel, Six Impossible Things, about eight years ago; it was published five years…
Alison Giles (text), Mark Wilson (illus), Cockatoo Man, Clickcloud Publishing, 12 April 2015, 70pp., $19.79 (pbk), ISBN: 9780994204936 With the carefree action of the young Binnu pulls out his ‘ging’ and shoots down a cockatoo, inadvertently incurring the wrath of his Grandfather and elders in the community. To undo his error Binnu must journey to the Gambinyi gorge and make a tribute to the spirits so the Cockatoo Man will not stalk him and endanger his community. Cockatoo Man is a short 70 page book easily read in an hour. Essentially there are two main characters and through them readers are…
Sally Rippin (text) Alisa Coburn (illus), Billie’s Wild Jungle Adventure, Hardie Grant Egmont, 1 September 2015, unpaged, $14.95 (hbk), ISBN: 9781760124441 Billie can’t wait to play with her friend Jack at Kindy, and within minutes they are deeply engaged in a series of adventures up the mulberry tree and into the jungle, morphing into cheeky monkeys with human faces. Throughout the story, the children are totally engrossed in imaginative play as they endow the ‘jungle’ with all sorts of imaginary inhabitants both friendly and dangerous. Billie has to draw on her courage and cleverness to escape the wriggly pink-and-purple python. The text is…
Kate Mayes (text), Ruthie May (text), Sara Acton (illus.), Daddy Cuddle, ABC Books/HarperCollins, 20 July 2015, 32pp., $19.99 (hbk), ISBN: 9780733334054 This is an utterly charming, amusing and delightful story for early childhood listeners. Little bunny wakes up early and tries many strategies to wake up Dad to play. The minimal text is enriched by gentle line and wash illustrations showing bunny dragging in a succession of items and toys to lure Dad out of bed. You can only imagine the struggle to get the bike upstairs! Front and back endpapers encapsulate the ultimate result of bunny’s increasingly demanding efforts, while the last…
Renee Treml, Once I Heard a Little Wombat, Random House, 3 August 2015, 24pp., $14.95 (hbk – board book), ISBN: 780857987396 In this board book for early childhood readers, five baby Australian animals are asked in turn to stop and play with the unseen questioner. The simple, rhyming text includes action verbs – hop/plop, splish/splash, stomp/chomp – to encourage young listeners to engage in language as well as the action which is demonstrated in the pictures. Minimal fine line drawings of twigs, logs, ferns and leaves hint at the habitat for each of the animals, which are charmingly drawn…
Jack Heath, The Human Flytrap (Scream #1), Scholastic, 1 May 2015, 144pp., $12.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781760152086 Carnivorous plants are fascinating aren’t they? When Dale’s school experiment on the nutrients consumed by carnivorous plants surpasses the experiments of his peers, Josh and Dale know it is tied up with the many mysteries at Axe Falls. Josh and his family have recently moved house and their removal vehicle has disappeared without trace. Josh discovers crime scene tape in the bathroom with no known explanation and the neighbour appears to be a mad woman quite prepared to randomly yell “Get out!” to him.…
Jandy Nelson, I’ll Give You The Sun, Walker, 1 June 2015, 432pp., $17.95 (pbk), ISBN: 9781406326499 Noah and Jude are fraternal twins with strong artistic talents, who share high level intuitive links. When a car accident changes their family’s lives for ever, a chasm opens between them and it seems that life can never be right again. While trying to find a new normal, this brother-and-sister pair apply to enrol at a selective art high school and despite the sadness in their lives, jealousy between them escalates. Devastating consequences occur with the selection of one twin and the gap between the pair seems…
Rebecca Stead, Goodbye Stranger, Text Publishing, 5 August 2015, 304pp., RRP $16.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781925240320 Goodbye Stranger falls into the very clear category of contemporary realism for the Year 7 to 9 group. This is a difficult age and a difficult area to try to classify books. There are all sorts of unwritten no-no’s for young people aged between about 11 and 14, including obvious ones, such as strong language and graphic sex, drug use, and gratuitous violence. But others are not so clear cut, and it’s these areas where parents and educators think carefully about each individual tween before…