ROAR! by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe

ROAR! by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe
Buy ROAR! by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: For Sharing
Reviewer: Sue Magee
Summary: An exuberant and wonderfully illustrated book about wild animals gives plenty of opportunities for the child to join in and is likely to become a firm favourite.
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 32	Date: July 2007
Publisher: Orchard Books
ISBN: 978-1846164880
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Bold lions love roar, roar, roaring,
While cubs play - racing, chasing,
Scrambling over lionesses and - oops! - tumbling.
So roar, bold lions, roar!

Exuberant in bold primaries colours which reflect the heat of the jungle, the watery elephant pool and the green lushness where the tigers prowl Roar! will have your pulse racing before you've got past the cover. It's the sort of book which grabs adult and child alike and pulls you in to read.

The strength of the book lies in the illustrations by Alex Ayliffe. They're bold and deceptively simple, but once you look more closely there are all sorts of small details which you don't notice at first: the lion cub peering playfully over his mother's back, the bird perched on the elephant and looking out over his tail and the leopard cub lying on a tree trunk. There's plenty to talk about, to be amused, or amazed by - it puts the wild into wild animals.

There's plenty of variety too, with eleven different animals each given a double-page spread. You'll see young and old, active and in repose and doing something characteristic - giraffes eating from tall trees, bears fishing in the river and the panda lying on his back and munching away on some bamboo. It's education and knowledge delivered with a light touch.

The text is good and reflects the actions of the various animals with vigour, but I didn't always find them easy to read aloud. Just try the piece about lions above and I think you'll see what I mean. A syllable more or less in certain lines would make all the difference, but that's an adult being pedantic. What the words do have is lots of repetition which allows the child the child to join in and - the ultimate treat - the chance to shout. It's not a restful book - but it's certainly exhausting! Even at night the lions still love to ROAR!

The book is worth purchasing, possibly even in the hardback version, as it's the type of book which a child will return to, for the basic fun of it and for the pictures.

I'd like to thank the publishers for sending this book to The Bookbag.

If you love ROAR! you'll also love its sister book SNAP! For another book about wild animals, albeit in captivity, you might like to try Rod Campbell's Dear Zoo. For another book where children can join in, how about Puff the Magic Dragon? We think you'll also enjoy Lion Practice by Emma Carlisle and The Tiger Prowls: a pop-up book of wild animals by Seb Braun.

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You can read more book reviews or buy ROAR! by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe 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 ROAR! by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe at Amazon.com.

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