Book reviews

my take on childrens books I have enjoyed and hope you will feel the same

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Spies, traitors and heroes

The world of detecting and spying has long been a fertile ground for authors of adventure stories.  However there has been a steady increase, particularly about the 20th century World Wars, since much of the information is no longer covered by the Official Secrets Act.  After all, we knew nothing about Bletchley Park and similar organizations, until at least the 1970s.  I have just included some of my favourite books from the last year or so and I hope that readers will find them as fascinating as I have.  These fictional events can lead you on to discover the real life heroes of the past.

Piccadilly Press, 978-1800784406

“I Spy” by Rhian Tracey  is an exciting and fascinating look at the lives of a young girl and her family, living at Bletchley Park during the war.  The story centres around 12 year old Robyn, who has to leave school for security reasons and finds herself working with the pigeon loft manager at Bletchley, looking after messenger pigeons.  When it appears that there is a traitor on site, Robyn and her friends decide to investigate, because adults rarely take note of what children are doing!  I am delighted to say that I have just seen advance notice of a second adventure called “Hide and Seek” which will be published in February 2024.  This would make an excellent introduction to the work that was being undertaken at Bletchley during the war.

Nosy Crow, 978-1788004640

“Friends and Traitors” by Helen Peters is a fantastic but quite easy to read story of life in a country house during the war.  It portrays the action from the differing perspectives of Nancy, a housemaid and Sidney, an evacuated schoolgirl, who is there with the rest of her boarding school. Also there are the owner (an Earl) and a group of his friends.  When the girls overhear some worrying conversations they each decide to take action, only discovering each other’s plans along the way.  Are there people plotting against the British government and what can the girl do to thwart their plans?  I have to say thank you to Helen Peters for the lovely shock I received on reading the name of one of the minor characters from the past; it is not often that you find your own name being used in this way and it means I will treasure the book.

Bloomsbury Education, ‎ 978-1801990103

“Rosie Raja: Mission to Cairo” by Sufiya Ahmed is the second adventure featuring this heroine and this time she manages to follow her father to Cairo and ends up being part of a mission to seek out traitors.  Whilst this is mainly a spy story, it also focuses on the role of the British as an imperial power  and on the rights of the Egyptian people to self determination.  The first book in the series is called “Rosie Raja: Churchill’s Spy” and is an exciting introduction to this brave young heroine.

Andersen Press, 978-1839133138

“Safiyyah’s war” by Hiba Noor Khan takes a look at a little known part of the war in France and that was the part played by the Muslim community in helping their Jewish neighbours and the allied soldiers to escape from the Nazis, especially in the area around Paris.  Look on this blog for a full review as part of the blog tour.  A fabulous read.  I have just seen that there is an information book about this series of events.  I have ordered it and will add this to the blog at a later date.

Puffin, 978-0241429877

“The Ministry of Unladylike Activity” by Robin Stevens is the first in the follow on series from this author.  It centres around the adventures of May Wong, the younger and very precocious sister of Hazel Wong, who was a central character in the series “Murder most Unladylike”.  May is now following her sister to Deepdean school and hates it.  However the war has begun, so she cannot return home to Hong Kong and decides to try and become a spy and of course she ends up in all kinds of trouble, as she and her friends pretend to be evacuees, in order to seek out traitors at a stately home. A second adventure “Body in the Blitz” is due for release in October 2023.  I have just read this on Netgalley and it is definitely a case of ‘get your orders in now’ for this fabulous book.  Robin Stevens just keeps getting better (impossible though that sounds).

Nosy Crow, 978-1839948855

“Alice Éclair, Spy Extraordinaire!: A Sprinkling of Danger” by Sarah Todd Taylor and Beatriz Castro is the third in a fabulous series featuring the young |Alice Eclair.  The stories are set in Paris  between the two wars and whilst Alice officially works in her mother’s Patisserie, she has also been recruited by the secret services, after her uncle turned traitor.  These stories mix danger and a hint of glamour as the heroine is involved in the worlds of fashion, film and aeronautics.  In this latest adventure Alice finds herself working undercover, as part of the catering team  whilst a film is being made at the Palace of Versailles   I really recommend these great stories, both for the action and for the descriptions of the cakes.

Hodder, 978-0340999615

“Secret Breakers Series” by H L Dennis.  This is a series of six novels set after the war but with the main characters having links back to the wartime events at Bletchley Park.  However there are hints about mysteries that are far older and which no one has been able to  interpret so far.  It is a series full of intrigue and adventure which has managed to stand the test of time.

 

 

For those who want to delve deeper into the real-life adventures of espionage and war, here are a few titles to start you off.

The Grand Mosque of Paris: A Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During the Holocaust by Karen Ruelle and Deborah Durland Desaix.  Holiday House Inc, 978-0823423040

Noor Inayat Khan by Sufiya Ahmed.  Scholastic, 978-0702300059

Spies, Code Breakers and Secret Agents: A WW II book for kids, by Carole P Roman.  Rockridge Press, ‎ 978-1646111015

Heroes of World War II..  by Kelly Milner Halls.  Rockridge Press, 978-1648763786

“Spies (Horrible Histories) by Terry Deary and Martin Phillips. Scholastic, 978-1407105673.

 

 

 

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The Wrath of the Woolington Wyrm by Karen Foxlee and Freda Chiu

I began reading this book whilst drinking coffee at Paddington Station, nothing strange so far, but then as I got to the line about the strange screeching noise, it happened!

“It let out a screech that was wild and full of rage!  …….It was a noise that had not been heard for many years.”

Yes, there was a terrible noise reverberating through the station, it sounded like an angle grinder cutting through metal bars; given that there is building work in that area of the station I can only assume this was part of the building works.

The story is set in the small village of Woolington Well, where archaeologist  Professor Martin has been asked to excavate, prior to a shopping centre development.  Her daughter Mary-Kate has to accompany her, as it is the school holiday and her grandmother will be away on holiday.  this should have been a very simple job, but on arrival at the village, they are met by a series of strange events.  Why are saucers of milk outside most front doors and why are so many houses shut up?  Meeting the village librarian and Lord Woolington (Lord of the Manor) they are met with tales of a legendary beast called the Wyrm, although Lord W insists that it is all make believe.  Whilst her mother begins her work on the dig site, Mary-Kate and her new friend Arabella (daughter of Lord W) start investigating the history of the Wyrm and particularly the claim that it “likes children”.  What happens next really adds to the action and makes several people change their mind about the legend and whether there can be any truth in the tale.

Although this brilliant story is set in a very small village and has a very limited number of characters, it really does not lack in excitement, intrigue or action.  I love the map of the village and its surroundings, so that you can follow the action as it takes place.  But can someone tell me where the church is?  There is a cemetery, but no church building, so is there a story behind this omission?  We have a beautiful rural idyll and the idea of a huge shopping centre in the middle of the village is unthinkable.  In real life I think there would be outrage and the planners would hopefully stop it.  One of the things that the two girls did discover is that the legend of the Wyrm and the odd happenings only occur when work is being done to the Village Square and the Well, after which the village is named, so is there a link?

Mary-Kate Martin is someone that you can feel great empathy with.  She suffers from a great deal of anxiety and needs the comfort of her special treasures, including her globe stress ball and I have my own version of this, as you can see from the picture at the side.  She also needs the reassurance of things being balanced, even down to glittery shoes to go with the glittery bag.  Mary-Kate seems to display many feelings that we might understand as being neuro-diverse, yet she manages to overcome many of her anxieties when she really wants to find things out.  Her new friend Arabella is also a great support and although an outgoing, bouncy extrovert, she is willing to  listen to Mary-Kate and even follow her when needed.

A really interesting element of this story is that we don’t have a completely evil villain.  Both the Wyrm and Lord Woolington have reasons for their behaviour and it is just a matter of finding a way around these differences.  We also have  the relationships between both of the girls and their respective parents and it is good to see that they have  strong and positive connections; which enables them to feel they can get support when needed.  This is an absolute delight to read and I love Mary-Kate and how she copes with her worries; it really is a five star book.  Thank you Pushkin Press for inviting me  to be part of this celebration for such a great book and congratulations to Karen Foxlee for a fabulous new heroine.

I am delighted to say that when looking at the author’s web that there is a second title due out on 28th March 2024.  I have got my fingers crossed that it will be available for review.

 

 

The Author

Karen Foxlee is an Australian author who writes for both kids and grown-ups. She grew up in the outback mining town Mount Isa and still frequently dreams she is walking barefoot along the dry Leichhardt River there.

One of four children she started telling stories when she was young. She filled countless small exercise books with sweeping sagas of orphaned girls illustrated with pictures cut from the back of Reader’s Digest magazines.   

She has worked as an underground cable mapper, pool kiosk attendant, library assistant and hotel laundry hand and eventually became a registered nurse. All the while she never gave up her secret dream of becoming a writer. ….

Karen lives in South East Queensland with her daughter and several animals, including two wicked parrots, who frequently eat parts of her laptop when she isn’t looking. Her passions are her daughter, writing, day-dreaming, baking, running and swimming in the sea.

https://karenfoxlee.com/

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Her Majesty’s League of Remarkable Young Ladies by Alison D Stegert and Micaela Alcaino

We seem to have a fascination with young ladies who are actually detectives or spies and it is not something new; although I am compiling a blog post for some of the latest additions to the genre.  It goes back to characters such as Nancy Drew and I am sure that there are many more sleuths to be discovered.  Over the last few years we have been delighted by authors such as Katherine Woodfine, Robin Stevens, Laura Wood and Sarah Todd Taylor and I am happy to say that this new title is a perfect addition to this group of five star authors.  I also apologise to the many other authors who I have not named, but whose work I admire and will hopefully include in other blog posts.

Winifred Weatherby is determined to be an inventor and follow in her father’s footsteps.  Even though she is only fourteen she is already helping him and is even making significant improvements to some of his ideas.  However, when her father disappears, Winnie is determined to find him, even though she is in danger herself.  Then she is recruited to a secret organization of young women (housed at her school) and they are charged with trying to discover the identity of the mysterious “Mr Magpie”, who is threatening Queen Victoria.  What follows is a fantastically exciting adventure, with a multitude of twists and turns involving the two main interlinked plots. The only questions are who is Mr Magpie and what does he want to achieve with his the threat to the Queen, and can Winnie find her father (together with his invention called a ‘Telautograph’)?

This has proved to be an absolute delight to read.  It is full of intrigue and adventure and the fast pace of the action keeps the reader focused on what is going on; it is a real roller-coaster of a ride.  The characters are well-drawn and very individual; I particularly love Winnie and her feisty and determined attitude.  We also have the inclusion of members of the royal family, which allows for a little bit of fun in highlighting the often fraught relationships.  What really comes across is the attitude towards women and the belief that they are not capable of running their own lives and having much in the way of intelligent thought.  However, the central characters in this story totally disprove such antiquated and sexist ideas (although it still seem to survive to this day in some areas).  There is a real sense of female empowerment and a desire to prove that everyone should be able to follow their interests and skills.  Winnie’s fascination with science is particularly relevant in a period where scientific achievement is at the forefront of developing a modern world.  I do hope that we see further adventures for this intrepid group of young ladies as they are going to have a huge group of followers.

Alison D Stegert

Children’s Author
Alison writes stories of many genres for children of all ages, but historical fiction for readers aged 10 -14 is her sweet spot.

Born and raised in the US, Ali has long called Australia home. She’s lucky to live in Gabbi Gabbi Country, the beautiful Sunshine Coast.

Literary Agent Lucy Irvine of PFD Agency, London, represents Ali’s writing.

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Peril on the Atlantic (Mysteries at Sea) by A M Howell and Marco Guadalupi

Over the last few years I feel that we have seen a proliferation of stories about adventures on ships and trains.  It is not really surprising as these have been a favourite setting for crime novels ever since Hercule Poirot took a journey down the Nile and boarded the Orient Express.  It allows the author to work with a close knit group of characters and in a space that is limited, thus allowing them to create the necessary settings required for the action.  Although there have been many stories about The Titanic, I can’t remember any others written about this particular Grande Dame of the Sea.  Interestingly the ship was only finished because of a government loan, during the depression and a condition was that Cunard would merge with the White Star Line.  So in early 1936 RMS Queen Mary made her maiden voyage and then continued to cross the Atlantic until she was de-commissioned in 1967; she was a truly iconic vessel.

This rip roaring adventure centres around Alice, the daughter of the Staff Captain on board the new ship.  She unexpectedly finds herself on board the vessel during the school holidays and is looking forward to having fun, discovering her way around.  However, she is told that she has to stay in her cabin or on the crew decks, reading books and doing her needlework.  Even in the 1930s this would not have been agreeable to a strong-willed and headstrong young girl.  Of course Alice sneaks out to explore and accidentally finds herself a witness to an attempted murder.  As a result of this, she makes friends with Sonny, Miriam (both young passengers) and Charlie, a young member of the crew.  They decide to investigate the incident and soon find themselves caught up in all kinds of skulduggery and criminal activity.  While the adults are concerned with trying to win the Blue Riband for the fastest Atlantic crossing, the young people are finding links to this and the other happenings on the ship.  Can the children solve the mysteries and will justice be served?

What a fantastically complex web the author has managed to create.  There are several threads which interweave their way through the book and it is only at the end that we understand the full complexity of the tale.  The setting of the story is beautifully described, but I think it is the unwritten class differences that resonate  when you have the interaction between so many characters and in such a relatively small and confined space; there is also the reference to Nazi Germany, as Miriam’s family are  escaping persecution by moving to America.  Above all this is a wonderfully exciting and fast paced adventure story,but it also has many lessons to show us, about family and friendship.  I really can’t wait for the next adventure, which sees the main characters involved in royal intrigue and a new setting in the Mediterranean.

About A.M. Howell

photo credit to Tom Soper

A.M. Howell has always been inspired by the stories around her, and how imagination can unlock the secrets of the past. Her thrilling historical mysteries have garnered great critical acclaim, winning both the Mal Peet Children’s Book Award, and the East Anglian Book of the Year Award, as well as being shortlisted for lots of other prizes and consistently being reviewed in the national press. A.M. Howell lives in Suffolk with her husband and two sons.

Since her 2019 debut The Garden of Lost Secrets, A.M. Howell has fast cemented herself as a stand-out author of thrilling middle-grade historical fiction. She has enjoyed widespread critical acclaim, twice being afforded the prestigious Times Children’s Book of the Week slot, and with The Telegraph calling her “a hypnotically readable writer, who keeps the pulse racing”, as well as prize wins and strong sales.

A.M. Howell is the recipient of the Mal Peet Children’s Award for The House of One Hundred Clocks which was also the overall winner of the East Anglian Book of the Year Award, the first time a children’s book has won this prize, whose past recipients include Sarah Perry.

After hearing about the discovery of a 100-year-old gardener’s notebook at the National Trust’s Ickworth House in Suffolk, A.M. Howell found herself wondering who it could have belonged to, and so The Garden of Lost Secrets was born. She continues to be inspired by the stories around her, and how imagination can unlock the secrets of the past. Her new series, Mysteries at Sea is inspired by her own childhood travels on ships.

After completing a BA and MA at the University of Manchester, A.M. Howell now writes policy documents for local government. In 2015, she was one of 15 writers selected to take part in the Curtis Brown Creative Writing for Children Course, tutored by children’s author Catherine Johnson.

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Once Chance Dance by Efua Traore

In the last few years we have begun to see a growth in the number of diverse books of all kinds being published, but this is still a very small part of the scene in this country.  Books written by people of colour are beginning to be published, but we still have a long way to go.  It seems appropriate that as I am writing this post, the Diverse Book Awards longlists are being announced.  I have to say that I can imagine this book being part of the longlist next year and I hope that it achieves this.

The author, Efua Traore has been at the forefront of the movement to show us the way that people live in Africa (in this case it is Nigeria), but through the authentic voice of children who live in the villages and cities.  I have been a fan ever since I read her first book, “Children of the Quicksands” and she continues to delight with her characters and her descriptive settings.

This is the story of Jomi, who has been living with his aunt and uncle, after his mother left for Lagos, in order to get a job and then come back for Jomi.  However, after three years she has not returned and he thinks that she has forgotten him.  When circumstances show him some letters from his mother, after developers start digging up the land around his village, he knows this is not the case and decides that he has to try and find her in Lagos.  The problem is that Lagos is the most populated city in Africa (Wikipedia) and how do you find someone in a city of over 26 million when you don’t have an address to go on?  Luckily Jomi is helped by a group of young street children, led by the feisty Tanks and looked after by ‘Aunty Bisi’, a nurse who is providing shelter and food for the young ones.  But the issue is still ‘how to find his mother?’ Then Jomi has a brainwave, his mother avidly watches a dance programme on TV, so if he and the others can get on the show, she will see him and know where he is.  Will Jomi succeed and can there actually be a happy ending for him and his new friends?

The author has created a stunning and  heartbreaking story that resonates in so many ways.  The themes of homelessness and modern slavery are shocking and we know they are happening across the world.  If you then add in the destruction of farmland and forests it makes for a situation that seems almost unbearable.  What makes this into an ultimately positive and hopeful story is the attitude of the central characters.  Despite all of the tribulations that they suffer, they still manage to retain a sense of optimism and a determination to make their lives better.  I really cannot recommend this enough, it is amazing and deserves all the accolades that I am sure it is going to receive in the future.

The Author

Efua Traoré is a Nigerian-German author who grew up in a small town in Nigeria. For as long as she can remember, her head was filled with little stories, but it was not until much later that she began to write them down.

Apart from Nigeria, she has also lived in France and Germany and she writes in English and in German. If she had her way, she would travel much more and write every single day.

Efua won the 2018 Commonwealth Short Story Prize for Africa with her short story ‘True Happiness’ and she is a literature grant holder of the Munich Literaturreferat. Children of the Quicksands is her debut novel which won the Times / Chicken House Prize in 2019.

She lives in Munich with her husband and three daughters.

Photo credit belongs to Boubacar Traoré.   Thanks to the Chicken House website

About me

 

 

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Safiyyah’s war by Hiba Noor Khan

Most of us will have read books about World War II and about the role that children had, sometimes as participants and sometimes as observers.  This is usually told through the eyes of those on the Home Front or those that are refugees because of persecution.  This story takes a different slant, but nevertheless it is a tale that is based on truth and what happened in Muslim communities in war torn Europe.

The central character in this story is Safiyyah, who lives with her parents in the Grand Mosque of Paris, together with the small community who work in the complex.  As the Germans move ever closer to the city, many of Safiyyah’s friends start to move away, but her community feel relatively safe.  However, when the bombs start dropping and the German troops move in to the city, life takes a much darker turn.  Safiyyah is horrified by what she is seeing happen to the people around her and finds it difficult to understand why her father seems to be doing nothing to help those in need.  It is only when she is discovered looking through papers in his office that she is told that he and other members of the community have been providing forged papers and then helping others to escape from the city; in fact there is a whole network based in the grounds of the Mosque.  When her father is arrested for helping Jewish neighbours escape, Safiyyah decides that she has to start helping the resistance in their humanitarian efforts.  What follows is a breath-taking story of courage and daring, as Safiyyah negotiates the dangers involved in leading refugees through the catacombs of Paris, as well as coping with the death of her beloved grandmother and trying to find a way to save her father.

I absolutely loved this story, which helps tell us about the bravery of people that we hear so little about.  This is yet another example of ‘ordinary people doing extraordinary things’, when faced with the inhumanity shown by some political or religious leaders.  Safiyyah is a delightful character, but as with most young people she tends to see the world in very defined ways.  It is only through experience that she begins to understand that life is far more nuanced and that the adults in her life are having to juggle a multitude of needs.  The relationships between the members of the family really highlights the closeness of all the generations and we really feel for Safiyyah when she realises that her grandmother is not going to survive; but she also learns that sometimes older people want to join those who have gone before them.  This is such a poignant episode that echoes the experience of all those other people who were losing loved ones during the war, but it also resonates today  This is one of those books where you are in danger of running out of superlatives.  There is so much hope, even amid the horrors of war and the importance of family and faith shine a real light in the darkness.  Thank you to the author for such an inspiring story, which is bound to become a classic in future years.

The author

Hiba Noor Khan

Hiba’s academic background is in Engineering/Physics, having completed Postgraduate study at the University of Oxford in 2015. Since graduating she has worked in the Environmental Sector, as a Refugee Advocacy Worker for The Children’s Society, a Physics teacher and TV presenter. She has a keen interest in social and political affairs and assisted policy research for the Governments Commission on Religion and Belief in Public Life in 2015. Her passion for international development has led Hiba to travel to implement various sustainable development projects in rural Tanzania, and to deliver aid to Syrian refugees in Turkey.

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The Bedtime Boat by Sital Gorasia Chapman and Anastasia Suvorova

Children and bedtime are an issue that most parents will have had to deal with at some time or another.  But this is also an issue for adults, who in this fast paced world of ours, find it very difficult to find that calm feeling that will allow them to sleep.  Over the last few years and particularly since the pandemic, we have all become more aware of our well being and mental health.  The importance of a good night’s sleep is well known, but giving yourself the sense of calm that is needed to sleep, that is not so easy.  thankfully there is advice out there to help us and our young people to relax and sleep.

In this delightfully engaging story we get to meet the young Chandan and his mother as they go through their nightly ritual to bring calmness and relaxation to the end of the day.  It has been a hectic day with lots of adventures, including a visit to a fun fair; but now is the time for those comforting activities such as a bath, brushing teeth and snuggling down with favourite toys and blankets.  However, even for a small child it is not always easy to relax from the excitement of the day.  The brain has a habit of repeating the events of the day and questioning what has happened.  Thankfully Chandan’s mother has a method of helping him calm down and this is a technique which uses the concept of a boat (placed on the tummy) in order to calm and soothe breathing.  But Chandan is a child with a lot of imagination and he envisages a range of sea based problems that need dealing with; from pirates, whales,  and sharks all of these fears have to be dealt with.  His mother uses the constant repetition of  “Watch the boat, Chandan, it floats on the ocean.  It rises and falls with your breath’s gentle motion.”  This helps bring a symmetry  to the flow of the story and also a gentle rhythm  which becomes really obvious and calming if you read the story out loud.

The illustrations really bring this story alive with the vivid, yet quite mellow, colour palette.  The layout on the pages varies a great deal and even  the phrase “watch the boat” is  used in a multitude of ways, so that there is no chance of boredom.  We have images  in vertical and horizontal alignment as well as those taking the whole page, or even a double page spread.  There is always something to discover and this should work beautifully as a bedtime story, or a calming afternoon read for foundation age children.  the love of the parent and child comes through both the text and the images and makes the book feel like a warm and cuddly blanket.

The back of the book gives instructions on how to make a paper boat and though it seems quite easy, you do have to keep in mind which is the back and which is the front!  Yes, I have made a first attempt and will give it another go, to see if I can improve!!  I think I might read the story whilst listening to Enya singing “Sail away”

Sital Gorasia Chapman, author

Sital left a career in banking, trained as a yoga instructor, and then started writing. She studied Writing for Children at the City Lit, and her picture book submission was commended at the FAB awards in 2019. Sital was commissioned to write a poem for the CBeebies children’s television series Colours. She writes fiction, non-fiction and poetry for children and lives in London with her husband and three young daughters.

Website: https://sitalgorasiachapman.com/

Anastasia Suvorova, illustrator

Hello! My name is Anastasia Suvorova. I am a freelance illustrator based in Limassol, Cyprus.
I specialize in artwork for picture books, covers, advertisements, animations and game projects. I aim to create poetic, philosophical, deeply felt and permeated by a sense of magic illustrations. I love creating new and beautiful worlds through my projects, especially in stories about nature, dreams, travel, attention and kindness.
Represented internationally by Illozoo | the visual communication agency.
anastasia@chaosego.com
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The House Trap by Emma Read and Coralie Muce

I suspect that we all have experience of houses that are run-down, creepy and have stories told about them.  I still remember as a child a house, on my walk home from town, that we had been told was inhabited by a witch!  Needless to say we always walked on the opposite side of the road, even though we never saw this person.

In this wonderful story we have the same concept.  The children are the central characters and they comprise of two families, Claude and his young sister Amity and his best friend Deliah, but we also have new friend Sam, who manages to create friction in the group.  At a family gathering before Claude and his family move away, the children are sent out to play and Amity runs off into the local Badwell wood; this is a place of rumour and tragedy, with tales of disappearing children, which explains why it is out of bounds.  When the others follow, they find the dilapidated remains of a house, which had been empty since the 1930s.  The front door is wide open, so they go in, hoping to find Amity and then the door closes behind them.  This is when everything starts to go wrong as they can’t get the door open and the house almost seems to be playing tricks on them.  Now, the three children have to try and find Amity and then get themselves out of the house.  What follows is almost like an Escape Room challenge as the children find clues, many of which revolve around the original disappearance of the last owner’s daughter in 1930.  Will the young people escape and what mysterious forces are working against them?  Importantly do you believe in ghosts and spirits?

Well, whilst this is a story for middle grade readers it is still aiming at sending a shiver down the spine, and it achieves this brilliantly.  We start off with the frictions between the young people and this is so central that it almost lulls us into a sense of false security.  However, the author very slowly builds up the tension and gradually introduces more and more elements that make you desperate to get out of the building.  This really is a wonderfully sinister tale of the supernatural and it is going to be a brilliant introduction to this genre for the primary reader.  Linked to this we have the more recognizable issues between siblings and friends as they inevitably grow and change over time.   The old saying “two’s company, three’s a crowd” definitely seems to be the case at the beginning of the story, but as things develop, the young people learn that they have to work together if they actually want to achieve their aims.  I love the way that the children learn from their adventures and that they are not two dimensional characters, making us feel more invested in their stories.  Thank you Emma for a truly spine-chilling story.

About Emma

Once upon a time (in school), Emma was told she had to choose between being a scientist and a creative but deep down she knew she could be both.

Her favourite things in the world are: badges, Death On the Nile (1978), hats, foxes, deserts, desserts and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. She’s not sure which holiday is best – Halloween or Christmas (she loves all things spooky, but also presents and singing Christmas carols.) Her one regret in life is never having trained to be an astronaut.

​https://www.emmareadauthor.com/ 

 

 

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The Sundae Delivery Service by Holly Rivers

I was asked to take part in this blog tour just before I went on holiday, so the story stayed at home waiting for my return.  Oh, how I wished that I had taken it with me (the explanation will follow shortly.)  I had the great pleasure of reviewing Holly’s previous book about “The Boy in the Post” and so it was delightful that I would be able to enjoy the new adventure featuring the three Shalloo siblings, Orinthia, Seafra and Taber.

In this book they are back in their village of Little Penhallow and are excited because an Ice Cream parlour, called the Two Scoops Creamery, is opening up and offering FREE cones to the first one hundred customers.  Well, I would have done exactly what the children did, although I don’t think I could run as fast as they can.  The problem is that everyone else wants the free treats; luckily the children meet up with Dotty, the daughter of the two owners and they manage to wangle their ices.  This is the start of a great friendship, especially between Dotty and Orinthia.  When  Pem and Pandora, Dotty’s mothers, announce that they are about to take part in an international Ice Cream competition called the “Golden Udder Award” and it is in Norway, things start to get exciting.  Together with Dotty and Orinthia (plus two cows called Fosse and Falaise)  the team head to Bergen on board their favourite ship the Mollusca, complete with their friend Mog.

This sounds like a really warm and cuddly story, but no, someone is out to destroy their chances of winning the competition and they find numerous problems are put in their way; culminating in the theft of the two cattle, without whom they would not have the right kind of milk for their Jam Roly-Poly Ice Cream.  Yet again Orinthia is called upon to use all her ingenuity to find out who is the enemy and then to make sure that the Two Scoops Creamery are able to take part in the competition.  Yet again we have a wonderful mix of adventure, intrigue and humour, with our heroes managing to lurch from one crisis to another, but always winning out in the end.  There are really strong theme around the concept of family and although our heroes have a very positive experience, we also get to see what happens when the wider family employs a moral blackmail in order to achieve their aims.

Image is from the official website, thank you to them for a superb photo.

What is so great is that we get to learn about Bergen and in particular its famous Funicular called the Floibanen, although I am still not sure how the enemy was able to undertake one of their activities.  You will have to read the book in order to find out!

At the beginning of this article I said I wished that I had taken this on holiday with me, and that is because I have been on a cruise to Norway, starting at Bergen.  The story brought back so many lovely memories, especially of the Funicular and the amazing views that you get from the top, but it also reminded me of the arrival into Bergen and the astounding scenery surrounding it.  Thank you Holly for creating such a wonderful story and for giving us an insight into the beauty of another country.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Author: Holly Rivers

Holly grew up in a real-life children’s book, playing the part of Drusilla in ITV’s The Worst Witch alongside Felicity Jones. She spent her childhood in Wales, wishing that she was Pippi Longstocking, and after graduating spent time working as an actor, broadcaster and cheese-seller, until one day she had the idea to pen a story about a tenacious young inventor named Demelza. Holly’s days are now spent penning new stories as well as leading drama, craft and bushcraft classes for children. She lives in Brighton with her girlfriend and still wishes that she was Pippi Longstocking.

 

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Old Gods, New Tricks by Thiago Moraes

Like many people of my generation I grew up reading about the various mythologies that were common at the time.  These included Roman, Greek, Egyptian and Norse myths and gods, but what was missing were the mythologies of other parts of the world.  It was only when I became a teenager that I began to hear about South American, Asian, African and then American stories.  However, these are not myths that are widely known or written about and it is only in the last few years that people have felt able to write about their cultural beliefs and histories; or at least that is my perception, so I apologise if I am wrong about this.  I was delighted to read this wonderful story of the Trickster gods, a concept that seems to appear in so many mythologies but about whom I had little knowledge, apart from Loki who is a favourite character at the moment.

The main character, Trixie dos Santos definitely lives up to her name and as the story begins she is getting a final warning from her headteacher and is threatened with expulsion.  At that moment all electricity stops functioning and the world is without lights, computers and in fact anything that depends on this source of power.  As life becomes increasingly difficult for everyone, Trixie decides that it is the old gods who have taken the electricity away an she needs to find a way to trick them into giving it back; the answer is to get the trickster gods to help, something that is a huge challenge, even if she can get them to answer her pleas.  What follows is something of a roller-coaster ride as Trixie and her companions  follow the trail that will lead them to the other gods and hopefully success in giving electricity back to the world.

What a fabulous take on the world of myths and legends.  The trickster gods all have their own little quirks and a real sense of attitude, so that we really enjoy their antics and the interaction between them.  We also see these gods develop a real feeling of friendship with our young heroine, which means they start working together as an approximation to a team.  Trixie is a really feisty young girl who learns a lot through the adventures that she goes through.  There is a lot of growing up and an understanding that life does not always change in the ways you imagine when you start on a journey. The author is also a very talented artist and his illustrations for the book really focus on the wide ranging cultures that are represented; the black and white images really add to the overall sense of foreboding that we feel as the world begins to descend into darkness.  This story also highlights the dependence that this world has on the use of electricity. Even  for those of us who grew up without computers, mobile phones and other digital resources , it is still difficult to imagine going back to the days before this source was available.  In a real sense this book provides a call to look after our natural resources and not squander what we have.

Thiago de Moraes

I’ve been fascinated with myths and legends since I was a very young kid in Brazil. I was fortunate to grow up in a house where there were lots of books lying around, on all sorts of subjects. Most weren’t children’s books, but my parents didn’t mind me reading them, and that’s how I discovered a lot of the mythologies that still captivate me today. Since then, my curiosity and respect for these extraordinary worlds has only grown; I have read many other books, spoken to lots of people and tried to visit and experience as many sites from different cultures as I can.

The first book I remember becoming obsessed with as a child was a large, illustrated edition of ‘Lendas Africanas dos Orixás’*, by Pierre Verger. He was a photographer, anthropologist and ethnographer who studied the myths of the Yoruba people from Western Africa and their counterparts in the African diaspora in the Americas. It was a collection of legends of the Orisha, Yoruba deities, which I found both awesome and a quite frightening. That’s where I first met Exú, also known as Eshu, Elegba and many other names, the god of beginnings, crossroads, mischief and much more. He was the first trickster I thought about having in the book (as it’s his right) and a lot of the plot developed from his presence.

Loki, Maui and Sun Wukong are there for the same reason. I’ve known them for a long time, so I felt like they were old friends that I could invite to join in an adventure (much like Trixie, the book’s protagonist, does.) What attracts me to tricksters, beyond their rebellion and creative force, is how fun their stories are. Humour can sometimes be hard to find in myth, so these tales have always stuck with me. Finally, I learned of Huehuecóyotl (and countless other gods I hadn’t know about) whilst researching a non-fiction book I wrote called Myth Atlas, which features lots of stories from different societies.

All the cultures from which the trickster tales that inspired Old Gods New Tricks come from – Yoruba, Ancient Norse, Polynesian, Chinese and Aztec – are immensely rich and culturally complex. They’re also very different from each other; it’s impossible to sum up all the things that drew me to them, but a common aspect, which I was mesmerized by, is the sense of vitality we get from them. Even though they have deeper meanings and play important roles in religion and ritual, they are also brilliant stories, full of the wonder and confusion of life, and present us with worlds that, although supernatural, are also instantly familiar.

I hope that readers that enjoy Old Gods New Tricks will continue on their own adventures and discover more about these cultures, their myths and legends. There are lots of brilliant places to start, but few are better than your local library or bookshop.

*African Legends of the Orisha

Thank you Thiago for this insight into your work, it is totally fascinating and will hopefully inspire readers to look deeper into the characters you have used.

“Old Gods, New Tricks

David Fickling Books, 9781788452953, £7.99