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Jump to navigationJump to searchSurf's Up (Mammoth Academy) by Neal Layton (view source)
Revision as of 11:40, 16 August 2020
, 11:40, 16 August 2020no edit summary
... which is lucky, because this story's adventure calls for some exceedingly radical surfing skillz. The humans may have scarpered from Mammoth Academy lands, but they have to go somewhere. And, ominously, humans have boats and will paddle. And they quite like the look of a particular island.
Ah, you can't help but love errant but good-hearted mammoth children, can you. ? Particularly when they're drawn vividly and energetically on the page before you. Neal Layton's Quentin Blake-esque mammoths are cheeky, dopey and lovable by broad stroke, and good-hearted and heroic by word and text. They're droll too and this early reader is as suitable for reading aloud to the less confident as it is for reading alone by the keen learner. I loved Simon and Simone, the dudish new additions to Mammoth Academy. They reminded me of the current surfing turtle in ''Finding Nemo''.
Oscar, of course, comes through for them, and the humans, of course, get their much-deserved comeuppance. Early readers are difficult to rate, but this one gets a definite thumbs up from Bookbag.
My thanks to the nice people at Hodder for sending the book.
If they enjoyed ''Surf's Up'', they might also have fun reading about Sue Mongredien's [[Dungeon of Doom (Prince Jake) by Sue Mongredien and Mark Beech|Prince Jake]]. [[It Moved! by Anne Fine]] is also sterling fun for early readers, as is [[Aliens In Underpants Save The World by Claire Freedman and Ben Cort]]. We also liked [[Boobela and Worm Ride the Waves by Joe Friedman]].
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