Lollipop and Grandpa and the Christmas Baby by Penelope Harper and Cate James
| Lollipop and Grandpa and the Christmas Baby by Penelope Harper and Cate James | |
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| Category: For Sharing | |
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Reviewer: Zoe Morris
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| Summary: There's a new baby on the way - will it ruin Christmas, or can Grandpa help cheer Lollipop up? | |
| Buy? Maybe | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 32 | Date: October 2013 |
| Publisher: Phoenix Yard Books | |
| ISBN: 978-1907912276 | |
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Lollipop’s mum has just made an announcement. She started off sneakily by asking Lollipop and her brother James how they’d feel about welcoming another brother or sister to the family, but Lollipop is not stupid. She knows it’s not really up for debate. It’s already a done deal.
Now I’m the younger sister so I never had to deal with The Announcement, but I still know how it goes. A lot of the time the older siblings are none too impressed, and that’s the case here. The baby is due around Christmas time but, as Lollipop puts it, she really just wanted a bike.
Luckily Grandpa, who seems to live with them, is there to help out. He can see Lollipop is upset by the news and the focus it’s taking away from Christmas itself, so he steps in and soon they’re going out to the forest to find a tree, making decorations and generally getting into the festive spirit. When mum and dad have to go off to the hospital, though, things go a bit downhill. Grandpa doesn’t really know how to cook a turkey, and he falls asleep on the sofa while Lollipop and James are still wide awake. Can it all come together in the end? Can Lollipop welcome the Christmas baby and sink into her new role as big, big sister?
This is a sweet, festive story that takes a common problem and makes the best of it. It’s quite reminiscent of books I read as a child, like Lucy and Tom’s Christmas, and has a nice timeless feel to it. Lollipop and Grandpa have had adventures together before, and again, it’s nice to see the inclusion of grandparents in family life. But, it is all a bit scatty, and time starts off quickly and then slows down rapidly. The story has an odd conclusion, and for the purposes of encouraging the embracing of newborns, it seems to finish a bit too soon.
Because this is a picture book I feel I must mention the pictures, but for once I wasn’t the biggest fan. The art work is quite crude and wasn’t my style, though I did like the shiny bits on the cover. The first two pages confused me because they each had a picture on (and the second was just a repeated version of the first) compared to all the later pages where the picture would either stretch across the two sides or be distinct enough that they were clearly two different images. That said, I did like key bits. I loved the way mum is still fat after the baby. It’s all very Kate Middleton, the acceptance that it you’re going to be seen in public hours after giving birth, you might still be a bit wobbly round the middle. I thought Grandpa’s jumper was fun, and details such as the wrapping paper on the presents looked ace.
This is a good book to read at Christmas, and a good book to read when a new baby is on the way, though the two don’t need to coincide in the way they do in the story. It has quite a lot of humour in it, both slapstick (like the trifle) and more subtle like Lollipop’s reaction to the impending arrival, so it’s a fun book to read together, despite my earlier reservations.
Thanks go to the publishers for sending us the latest adventure of this pair.
For an earlier outing, see Lollipop and Grandpa's Dinosaur Hunt.
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You can read more book reviews or buy Lollipop and Grandpa and the Christmas Baby by Penelope Harper and Cate James at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy Lollipop and Grandpa and the Christmas Baby by Penelope Harper and Cate James at Amazon.com.
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