Changes

I had no problem with accepting the soft toys as sentient beings: I have a natural predisposition in this area but this shouldn't detract from Graham Fulbright's mastery of character development. Snowcub is the ambassador around whom the story revolves but he's not the leader of the group. Fulbright's skill is not only in the development of the individual characters but also of the way in which the dynamics of the group change and develop. It was easy to be invested in all five and to care about what happens to them - and to animals in general.

The curse of the book reviewer is that they get to read a book straight through, perhaps going back to reread certain sections, as I did several times. ''Snowcub'' is a book to read slowly, to savour, to return to many times. It might sound worthy, as though it's going to play heavily on your mind but Fulbright neatly balances this with some unconventional writing which had me laughing out loud on occasions. He plays well with language. There's the famous Spanish Donkey, Otay. (Think about it.) I liked the two birds, Alpha and Omega - Alph and Meg to their friends. It's not just words we play with either: Nick is keener on numbers than language. I found myself playing with the number thirty-seven - which is not something I thought I would ever write!