children's & YA recommendations on the go
A powerful picture book about communicating emotions and relating to fellow creatures, from an award-winning duo. Creature-of-No-Words lives a happy life on his own, but one day he gets a feeling like ‘the chill touch of ice’ and nothing can lift his sadness. Just then Creature-of-Words arrives and senses his despair. How can she help him communicate and become happy again?
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From the Publisher
The country’s best — and shockingly undervalued — nonsense poet has compiled a collection of his most popular poems and added new illustrations to help out a children’s literature charity (see below). The result is just under a hundred pages of unrivalled entertainment. You won’t find a dud verse anywhere. Here’s one, turned to at random, Hedgehog’s Valentine:
If you’re sickly,
Feeling prickly,
As your trickly
Tears fall thickly,
Don’t act fickly,
Kiss me quickly,
You’ll feel tickly,
Not so prickly,
And partickly
Far from sickly.
For everyone who enjoys their nonsense nonsensical, their rhymes rhythmical (one of the areas in which West is outstanding) and their pictures picturesque, Colin West has dusted down and polished up some of his funniest poems, and added brand new drawings for this collection of Nutty Nonsense. It’s full of amusing characters – step up Norton Norton and his amazing nostrils, accident prone Uncle Harry, and a lighthouse keeper with an enormous family. You’ll also meet fabulous creatures, such as the friendly-looking (but always hungry) Ogglewop, and the fearsome, nocturnal Blunderblat. There’s the mysterious Wobble-Dee-Woo, a nautical cat named Shivermetimbers, and many more crazy creations.
Published by Poems & Pictures, a small independent publisher of books based in the North of England, established in January 2012. All profits from sales of the book will go to the Children’s Literature Festivals charity.
Meet helpful dwarfs, mischievous gnomes and powerful fairy folk in this sumptuously illustrated storybook anthology of classic European folk tales. Much-loved stories such as ‘Kate Crackernuts’, ‘Tom Tit Tot’ and ‘The Griffin’ take readers on a journey through Europe as they climb snowy mountains, delve deep underground and wonder at beautiful palaces.
This unique collection celebrates the rich folklore tradition of Europe, including dwarfs from Flanders, fairies from Scotland and gnomes from Austria, splendidly illustrated by Daniela Drescher, one of Germany’s best-loved illustrators. A treasure of a book.
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“Powerful, compassionate and ultimately hopeful.” Guardian
A novel about two teenagers from opposite worlds, The Crossing is a profound story of hope, grief, and the very real tragedies of the refugee crisis.
Natalie’s world is falling apart. She’s just lost her mum and her brother marches the streets of Dover full of hate and anger. Swimming is her only refuge. Sammy has fled his home and family in Eritrea for the chance of a new life in Europe. Every step he takes on his journey is a step into an unknown and unwelcoming future. A twist of fate brings them together and gives them both hope. But is hope enough to mend a broken world?
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It’s good to kick off a new year of Book of the Day selections with this 100+ page collected poems by Roger Stevens from Otter-Barry Books. The book collects poems from Stevens’ four solo collections previously published by Macmillan and some others included in anthologies, with the addition of one new poem.
With themes including Family, School, Pets, the Wild, Being a Poet and Personal Favourites, this is a self-selected collection of Stevens’ best work. I particularly enjoyed the poet’s italicised annotations at the foot of some of the poems. As he says in the collection’s witty introduction, “Just like I do when I’m performing, I often tell you something about the poem; maybe how I came to write it, or how you could perform it.”
Children will also be amused by Mike Smith‘s illustrations. A short four-line poem about a ‘distant cousin’ is accompanied by a drawing of a child on a doorstep peering through binoculars with a thought-bubble, “We used to be so close!”
Roger was recently asked a host of questions by fellow poets on PoetryZone.
“Following Hendrix through his difficult childhood, military service, and stints in Nashville, New York, and London, blocks of text emphasize the figure’s complicated parental relationships, disinterest in conformity, and dedication to his craft. Digitally enhanced oil-based woodblock ink art centers images of Hendrix’s face and form amid abstract, warm-hued backgrounds that recall band posters and psychedelia.” Publishers Weekly
“Rodriguez’s gritty, oil-based woodblock paintings effectively capture Hendrix’s passion, drive, and genius. Smith describes wanting to conclude with a “moment of triumph…to celebrate the unique individual who inspired me.” And he does: With his “show-stopping tricks / …behind-the-back, between-the-legs, / teeth-plucking licks,” Hendrix set his guitar on fire and “showed the world / how to kiss the sky. This creative, impassioned, in-your-face biography is as on fire as Jimi Hendrix’s guitar.” KIRKUS
Jimi Hendrix’s talent was epic, and so is this fifty-six-page lyrical account of his life, with spectacular artwork by Edel Rodriguez.
Let me tell you a story, a story ’bout a boy, who became a man, a git-tar man, named Jimi.
From his turbulent childhood through his epical appearance at the Monterey and Woodstock festivals, Charles R. Smith Jr. covers it all in this rich and rhythmic account of a singular life, accompanied by the psychedelic splendour of Edel Rodriguez’s acid-tinged artwork. Written as a series of verses beginning with intro and ending with outro, this unique mix of rhythm and rhyme captures the essence of rock icon Jimi Hendrix and his struggle to live life on his own terms.
A YouTube portrait of the Cuban-born illustrator:
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“Crossley-Holland writes like a dream and has the knack of making these stories, which could have felt stuffy in less elegant hands, feel fresh and relevant, while Riddell’s stunning, colourful illustrations — showing handsome warriors, towering castes, fraying wizards, young lovers bring the myths fighting back to life.” The Times
“An absolute treasure of a book.” Chris Soul
BfK 5-Star review
A definitive retelling of the legends of King Arthur, from Carnegie Medal-winner Kevin Crossley-Holland and former Children’s Laureate Chris Riddell.
Be enthralled by the world of Arthurian legend in this lavishly illustrated, masterful retelling. From King Arthur’s childhood to his final battle, the timeless tales of the sword in the stone, the quests of the Knights of the Round Table and the wizardry of Merlin are woven together into a breathtaking feat of storytelling. An extraordinary collaboration between the world-renowned Kevin Crossley-Holland and the three-time Kate Greenaway Medal-winner Chris Riddell, this is a beautiful edition to be treasured by all ages.
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Back in print some half a century after it first appeared, thanks to the New York Review Children’s Collection.
Alice and Martin Provensen were one of the most talented husband-and-wife author-illustrator teams of the twentieth century. A long-out-of-print cult classic, The Provensen Book of Fairy Tales is a treasury of illustrated fairy tales from authors such as A. A. Milne, Hans Christian Andersen, and Oscar Wilde. Here too are clever retellings and newly imagined tales: refined old favourites like Arthur Rackham’s “Beauty and the Beast,” feminist revisions like Elinor Mordaunt’s “The Prince and the Goose Girl,” and sensitive stories by literary stylists like Henry Beston’s “The Lost Half-Hour” and Katharine Pyle’s “The Dreamer.”
Alice (1918-2018) and Martin Provensen (1916-1987) illustrated more than forty books together, nineteen of which they also wrote or edited. They were runners-up for the Caldecott Medal in 1982 for their illustrations of Nancy Willard’s A Visit To William Blake’s Inn and won the award outright two years later for The Glorious Flight, a book they wrote and illustrated themselves.
Alice Provensen obituary (NYT)
Martin Provensen obituary (NYT)
A powerful and personal story from one of Britain’s best-loved authors about his recovery from coronavirus.
After being admitted to hospital in 2020 with coronavirus, Michael Rosen had to learn to walk again. With the support of doctors and nurses and a walking stick he names “Sticky McStickstick”, he manages to embark on the slow steps to recovery. This moving picture book from the former Children’s Laureate, with illustrations from Tony Ross, tells a story of perseverance and hope, and is a testament to the importance of overcoming fear and learning to accept help.
Speaking to The Bookseller shortly after being contracted to write the book, Michael said, “Dear old Sticky McStickStick sits in the corner by the door waiting patiently for me to call on him to help me with my walks. Sad to say, I don’t need him anymore, and yet there was a time in the Rehab Hospital when he was the only way that I could dare to take a few steps across the ward, then later, down the corridor to the loo. I loved him. He gave me a mobility which only a few weeks earlier I could only dream of. And then he gave me the means to do without him! Such self-sacrifice! I loved writing about these things and thrilled that it’s going to be a book with my great friend Tony Ross doing the artwork.”
From a feature in The Guardian: “On another occasion, [Michael] was re-learning how to get up from a bench and was told to put his hands behind himself and his nose over his toes. “Like a child, for the next few weeks, I just kept repeating to myself: hands behind, nose over toes, hands behind, nose over toes.” He adds, with horror: “I should have put that in the book, shouldn’t I?” A few hours later, he emails to say that ‘nose over toes’ has been added, last minute, to the story: “We’ve squeezed it in. It’s in!”
This gift-book contains over a hundred poems, chosen by creator of the bestselling The Poetry Pharmacy, William Sieghart, and illustrated by Emily Sutton. Divided into four thoughtfully-curated sections, including Poems to Make You Smile, Poems to Move You, Poems to Give You Hope and Poems to Calm and Connect You, the poems originate from an extraordinary and diverse range of sources, from Maya Angelou to A.A. Milne, Lemn Sissay, Jackie Kay, Carol Ann Duffy, Joseph Coelho, Kae Tempest, W.B. Yeats, Christina Rossetti and Emily Dickinson, among many others.
Combining traditional favourites with recent gems, here are poems to delight, inspire, entertain, intrigue, console and uplift readers of all ages.