==Confident readers==
__NOTOC__
{{newreview
|author=Valerie Thomas and Korky Paul
|title=Winnie's Jokes
|rating=2.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Who turns off the lights at Halloween? The lights witch. What does an Australian witch ride on? A broomerang. Yep, it's a joke book.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192729063</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=A G Taylor
|summary=Michael Rosen has picked the best modern children's poetry, from John Agard through to Benjamin Zephaniah. It stemmed from Rosen performing in schools and libraries with many of the poets, and as children's poetry anthologies go, it's amongst the very best.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141324503</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Philippa Pearce and Helen Craig
|title=A Finder's Magic
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Till (that's short for Tillawn) has lost his dog Bess and he has no idea how he's going to find her until a mysterious stranger appears. Mr Finder interviews various witnesses, including a cat, a mole, a heron and Miss Mousey. It's not what Miss Mousey says that gives Mr Finder the vital clue as to what has happened to Bess, but the sketch she made of the riverbank at the time that Bess went missing. There's a lot of magic in the quest to find Bess, but it's all very confusing for Till and at one point he even doubts the motives of Mr Finder.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406319821</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Emily Bearn
|title=Tumtum and Nutmeg's Christmas Adventure
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=I do look forward to a good children's story, and having read Tumtum and Nutmeg's [[The Pirates' Treasure (Tumtum and Nutmeg) by Emily Bearn|previous adventure on a pirate ship]] I was particularly looking forward to this one. It's Christmas, and our two friendly little mice have been working hard, preparing delicious treats and temptations ready for Christmas Day. One evening they go upstairs to check on the children who live in their house, Arthur and Lucy, and find their letters to Father Christmas. Last year the children didn't get any presents because their chimney was blocked up and Father Christmas couldn't get in. They've asked for the same presents again this year, hopeful that this year Father Christmas will manage to find a way through even though their father refuses to unblock the chimney for fear of drafts. Tumtum and Nutmeg are worried anyway that the letter won't reach Father Christmas in time, and that the children will be disappointed once again. They decide to take matters into their own hands and set off to visit the terrifying Baron Toymouse in Toy Kingdom to see if he can help. However, with clockwork cats to contend with, and the capture of Tumtum by the evil Baron, Christmas could turn out to be an even bigger disaster than they'd thought...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405250267</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Michael Grant
|title=Hunger
|rating=4.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=The kids of Perdido Beach are still within the FAYZ, a barrier erected by Little Pete - no-one knows how - when the nuclear plant went into meltdown. An uneasy truce between Sam's tribe of Perdido Beach kids and Caine's Coates Academy kids is beginning to waver. The food is running out and the Darkness has its claws in all those it's encountered. Caine himself is reduced to delirium by the voice of the Darkness in his head and Lana the healer knows it's inevitable that she too will answer its call. Sam is struggling to keep any form of order. As more and more kids begin to develop special powers and the hunger bites deeper into everyone's bellies, it's inevitable that conflict will break out. And it does, in some very unpleasant ways.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405251522</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sam Osman
|title=Quicksilver
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=''Quicksilver'' is the story of Wolfie, Tala and Zi'ib, three ordinary children from three different continents. They have never met, until a strange chain of events involving gun-toting gangs and eccentric old men means they all end up in Thornham, a London suburb. They soon realise they are connected: they all have green eyes with golden flecks and a missing parent. But was it fate, chance or the ley lines that encompass the earth that brought them together? Before you know it they're solving clues and fulfilling a one thousand year old prophecy. But all they want to do is find their parents.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407105736</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Joanne Dahme
|title=Tombstone Tea
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Having recently moved to a new school, in a new town, Jessie is struggling to make friends and fit in. She is afraid to show these new people who she really is - in her old school she often found she had 'blank' moments, when she could hear voices and 'see' people who weren't really there. In desperation to become part of a 'group' she accepts the dare of a group of girls to spend the night in the Cemetery and collect some gravestone rubbings to prove she was there. Once there she bumps into Paul, the handsome caretaker, and finds herself in the middle of a strange evening when, Paul claims, local actors get together to rehearse for something called the 'Tombstone Tea', a play in which they portray those buried in the graveyard...there's something strange though about these actors and Jessie soon finds herself caught up in a chilling drama.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0762437189</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=David Miller
|title=Sea Wolf
|rating=3.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Meet Hanna, Ned and Jik. They're on an unlikely quest to recover the world's biggest and richest pearl, from the hiding place Jik alone knows of, when there's a problem in the shape of a tornado. They're thrown from the craft they're on, Ned disappears - and then there were two. Hanna and Jik get rescued by the occupants of a horrid, piratical craft, engaged in very environmentally-unfriendly fishing. Jik gets overworked and underfed, and then there was one... Only one - Hanna - with the spunk, brainpower and energy to keep her spirit together, and try and get one up on the Maestro who commands the boat.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192729020</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Katie Davies
|title=The Great Hamster Massacre
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Meet Anna. Rather than write the usual staid what-I-did-in-my-holidays report for school, she is taking the time to tell us about her pet issues over the summer, from recalling the Old Cat, and the horror that is the New Cat, to the New Rabbit down the road, and her own demands for a hamster or two. There are family secrets to be revealed relating to hamsters of old, parents to argue with, and finally a trip to the pet shop - and that's just the start of Anna's troubles.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847385958</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Josh Lacey
|title=Two Tigers on a String
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Ben's not too keen to be sharing his bedroom with his half-brother, Frank. But you don't have to be the hero of a detective adventure such as this book to know that as Frank's mother has vanished from the face of the Earth, Ben will let it lie - for a while. Nor is it too surprising to see the four Misfitz together, on another case, as they go on the hunt for the missing woman.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407109782</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Patrick O'Brien
|title=You Are The First Kid On Mars
|rating=4.5
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=It is a sci-fi future of no danger whatsoever, with no technological breakdown, and no fatal meteor strike, but that of course is only to be expected for this market. I say it more to highlight how well the book has been illustrated. Digital airbrush techniques and more have taken the antiseptic sheen off the whole experience, but have still allowed for a great detail in the machinery, and also a lovely warmth in the face of the lad we're empathising with.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0399246347</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Mary Naylus
|title=The Dresskeeper
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Things are pretty grim for Picky. She is thirteen years old, being bullied at school, and has to spend her weekends helping her single, working mum to take care of her little brother and her senile grandmother. One evening, at her Gran's house, she goes up into the attic and tries on an old dress that she finds inside an old chest. The dress turns out to be magic, and she suddenly finds herself back in 17th Century London, struggling with a strange man who is calling her 'Amelia' and is trying to kill her. Picky ends up embroiled in Amelia's 17th century life as she tries to find out the truth of who is attempting to murder her, at the same time as trying to avoid arousing suspicion with her strange behaviour whenever she returns to the present day.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956122280</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=John Abbott Nez
|title=Cromwell Dixon's Sky-Cycle
|rating=4
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=Meet Cromwell Dixon. He's a real tinkerer, forever in a barn or somewhere building something manically unusual. Luckily - although his long-suffering mother may disagree with that word - he's around at the birth of powered flight. Will his plans for a pedalled air machine work?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0399250417</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jeff Kinney
|title=Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=It is a truth universally acknowledged that school summer holidays are only enjoyable if you want to enjoy summer. Greg here doesn't want to notice it, and would prefer to spend his days curtains drawn, face glued to late night TV or a computer game, hand either clicking away at a controller or shovelling in snacks. The last thing he needs, then, is his mother, on a ''family togetherness'' trip, and on a budget, with bad ideas of what Greg should be doing instead.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141327650</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Rick Yancey
|title=The Monstrumologist: The Terror Beneath
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=In late 19th century America, young Will Henry has been the apprentice of the stern, forbidding Dr Warthrop since the death of his parents, who were also employed by the doctor. The twelve year old boy has seen many things in his service to the monstrumologist - a specialist in monsters - but nothing can prepare him for the fateful day when an elderly grave robber brings the doctor the twin corpses of a young girl and the headless creature with fangs in his chest who had tried to feast on her.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184738546X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Matt and Dave
|title=Yuck's Robotic Bottom
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=It's concerned me for a while that it's relatively easy to pick up early readers for girls – princesses, magic soft toys, mermaids and pets abound – but there's a much smaller choice for boys. It's important too with early readers that the content is ''interesting'' and reading becomes more than just something which you ''have'' to do at school and moves into being fun. Matt and Dave have found the answer in Yuck.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847382991</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Michael Morpurgo and Emma Chichester Clark
|title=The Best of Times
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Most children enjoy a good traditional tale and this lovely book by Michael Morpurgo seems to have all the right ingredients – a handsome prince and a beautiful princess who fall in love, get married and live happily ever after. Or do they? Sadly, not long after Prince Frederico marries the lovely Princess Serafina, she becomes very sad. Nobody knows what has caused such great sadness, but poor Prince Frederico is desperate to find a cure for his wife's misery. He tries everything in his power and eventually decides to offer his kingdom to anyone who can make her happy again before she dies of a broken heart. Lots of people come to the palace to try and help but in the end the solution is a simple one provided by some very kind travellers.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405232552</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Simon Weston
|title=Nelson to the Rescue
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Nelson used to pull Mike the Milk's milk float, but he has now retired. He lives in the stable at the back of the dairy along with a couple of tricky rats, Rhodri and Rhys, a pigeon who has no sense of direction, a frog who thinks he's a secret agent spy and an old racehorse who spends most of his time sleeping. Rhodri and Rhys find a mysterious message on Mike's fridge and the animals believe that Mike has been invited to Buckingham Palace to receive an MBE. Somehow our hero, Nelson, finds himself travelling down to London, pulling a ceremonial coach for Prince Charles as well as giving a TV interview about his experience.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848510454</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jon Berkeley
|title=The Lightning Key (Circus Trilogy)
|rating=4.5
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=I shall start with a word of advice. When you're being hounded by a circus master, and a magician, for the soul of a tiger that's contained in a tiger's egg that's contained in the brain of your teddy bear, and your best friend - a fallen angel - is trying her best to make sure the other angels do not turn on you in a big way - then you're probably living the third book in a fantasy trilogy. Still - never mind, the angel's efforts will involve you entering a dream world of flight and cloud cities, the chase after your enemies will take you across the world to desert oases and back, and friends new and old will be on board to help.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847384447</amazonuk>
}}
