Mudpuddle Farm: Cock-A-Doodle-Doo by Michael Morpurgo and Shoo Rayner
| Mudpuddle Farm: Cock-A-Doodle-Doo by Michael Morpurgo and Shoo Rayner | |
|
| |
| Category: Emerging Readers | |
| |
Reviewer: James Donald
 | |
| Summary: A fantastic book for all ages showing a great level of sophistication and imagination for a children's book. | |
| Buy? Yes | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 144 | Date: June 2017 |
| Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Book | |
| External links: Author's website | |
| ISBN: 978-0007270125 | |
|
Share on: | |
| Video:
| |
This is an anthology book containing two titles from the Mudpuddle Farm series (Mossop's Last Chance and Albertine, Goose Queen). In the first of these we see all the animals work together to save the saggy old cat-puss from being fired. The second story sees our resident genius tested by an encounter with a crafty fox whilst the farmer decides to avoid all the fuss by going for a shave.
Poor old Mossop. His teeth are going, he only has one eye and he is getting on a bit. Everyone else on the farm pulls their weight and Farmer Rafferty has had enough of Mossop sleeping all day long. Fortunately the whole farm comes together to save the day. As with all of these books we have a gorgeous synergy between the art and story.
Mossop has been very much a background character for the other books in this series so it was great to see him jump to centre stage. Albertine the genius goose saves the day with a plan making this the perfect Mudpuddle story.
Albertine, Goose Queen is an odd little story. We start with a growing sense of unease due to an approaching… something. This is followed by the arrival of a fox hunt and a fox. Both of these events are handled very well. Morpurgo walks a fine line with the fox hunting. He never overtly condemns it but he most certainly doesn't condone it. The hunt is just there, warts and all, and you draw your own conclusions.
The fox is very cleverly handled. Morpurgo pulls a bait and switch giving us both the monster and more besides. I won't ruin the tale but Albertine (one of the great creations of fiction) is a true genius.
I cannot rave about these books enough. Buy them to read to your children and then let them explore them for themselves. I found enough in the art and the tales to keep me interested as an adult and my children (theoretically far too old for them) loved them too.
Further reading: Mudpuddle Farm: Alien Invasion, Mudpuddle Farm: Hee-Haw Hooray and Mudpuddle Farm: Pigs Might Fly!, all by the same author and illustrator.
Please share on: 
Facebook, 
Twitter and
Instagram
You can read more book reviews or buy Mudpuddle Farm: Cock-A-Doodle-Doo by Michael Morpurgo and Shoo Rayner 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 Mudpuddle Farm: Cock-A-Doodle-Doo by Michael Morpurgo and Shoo Rayner at Amazon.com.
Comments
Like to comment on this review?
Just send us an email and we'll put the best up on the site.
