Difference between revisions of "Newest Confident Readers Reviews"

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[[Category:Confident Readers|*]]
 
[[Category:Confident Readers|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Confident Readers]]
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==Confident readers==
 
__NOTOC__
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sam Gayton
 
|title=Lilliput
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=Sam Gayton's tale of a tiny girl who longs to go home has all the ingredients you need for a thumping good read. There are villains and heroes, adventures and deadly peril, new friends and wonderful animals, plus some charming illustrations. Oh, and chocolate. There's lots of that, and the book is all the better for it.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849394121</amazonuk>
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Fleur Hitchcock
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|author=Rob Keeley
|title=Dear Scarlett
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|title=Childish Spirits: 10th anniversary special edition
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Shortly after her eleventh birthday Fleur receives a mysterious box from her father who died five years earlier. The box contains a strange collection of items that provide Scarlett with clues to her father’s life. For years she has accepted the story that her father had been a notorious jewel thief but as she attempts to make sense of the clues it becomes apparent that maybe things were not quite as they had seemed. With the help of her friend Ellie, Scarlett sets off on an exciting and at times dangerous mission to discover the truth.
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|summary=Around here, we're big fans of children's author Rob Keeley. He's a ball of happy positivity, he understands children, and he writes for their pleasure and enjoyment, not to lecture or hector.  
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857631500</amazonuk>
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The ''Childish Spirits'' series is one of his greatest achievements. It's a sequence of ghost stories centring on Ellie, a stalwart young girl who can cope with anything the spirit world throws at her, and Edward, a spoiled lordling and the first spirit Ellie encounters
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|isbn= 1783064617
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Max Boucherat
|author=Piers Torday
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|title=The Last Life of Lori Mills
|title=The Last Wild
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=The animals and the plants have all died, killed by the red-eye: only insects are immune. And the humans have all retreated to the Island, terrified that they too will catch the horrible disease. As there is nothing else to eat they live on formula, a sort of bright pink gruel which, no matter what they call it, always tastes of prawn cocktail crispsThe gloop is made by Factorium, the world's biggest food company, which has gradually taken over the running of the whole Island, including schools, hospitals and eventually the government itself.
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|summary=We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesomeWhat could possibly go wrong?  Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, and that is to log on to Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's world.  But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky.  For the server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of tampering.  When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780878281</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0008666482
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton
|author=Julia Golding
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|title=Dungeon Runners: Hero Trial
|title=Young Knights of the Round Table
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|rating=4
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Rick is thirteen hundred years old — not bad going for a teenager. He has been living in Avalon, where time moves differently, and training (along with another two hundred human changelings) to get his revenge on the human family which abandoned him so long ago. And now he has his chance.
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|summary=Meet Kit.  Like most of the people in his world, it seems, he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the sport where a team of warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and race to the exit, perhaps bothering with the treasure or the big bad and the points they grant you along the way.  Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's seen of the latest race on the inn TV equivalent is that one team has been retired, eaten, and a new trio of questors is needed. Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken to the goading from the token bully of his world and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a team.  What chance does this friendless, muscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, and how could he possibly hope to succeed?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192732226</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1839945184
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=James Sherwood Metts
|author=Simon Rae
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|title=Planet Storyland
|title=Keras
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|rating=4.5
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Ever since reading ''The Enchanted Wood'' as I child, I always enjoyed stories about children who had the freedom to explore the world and go off finding adventures, unencumbered by the protective restrictions that most children face. Fantasy indeed, but this kind of world without limits often produces the most imaginative and memorable childhood tales.
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|summary= Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think of other, new ways to spend time, along came an awful pandemic. Life was pretty much shut down and, along with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857560344</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1736128426
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Tom Percival
|author=Terry Deary
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|title=The Wrong Shoes
|title=Rotten Romans (Horrible Histories)
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
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|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=
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|summary=Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways.  He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel.
'History with all the nasty bits left in' is the catch phrase for Terry Deary's Horrible Histories series. Deary hasn't just left the nasty bits in, he has built a whole series around them. His stories are gruesome, revolting, vile and disgusting at times. That is precisely why the children love them. But underneath all of the nasty bits, there is quite a lot of history as well. Rotten Romans covers an area of history I am fairly well versed in. Even so, I learned a few things myself. At ages 4 and 8, my sons certainly learned a lot more. This book is equally enjoyable for young children with no prior knowledge of Roman history - or an adult who has actively studied this period.
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|isbn=1398527122
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407135775</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=1805141872
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|title=The Teacher Who Knew Too Much
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|author=Rob Keeley
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=''Seventeen banks and a jeweller’s have been raided. The police are baffled, but only Ben knows the truth – his Maths teacher, Miss Judson, is really a safecracker! With police and her gangster boyfriend Al on their trail, Miss Judson and Ben go on the run. But Al needs them for one last job...''
  
{{newreview
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Goodness me, that Miss Judson is a terror! How on earth did a nice teacher like her manage to get mixed up with a bad 'un like Al? We'll find out. Luckily for Miss Judson, the pupil who discovers her terrible secret is Ben, the son of a famous magician who has ambitions to be as good as his father some day, and who thinks Miss Judson is worth saving
|author=Sheila Rance
 
|title=Sun Catcher
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=The Bronze Age is an intriguing time, where the fight for survival and the harshness of greed and war co-exist seamlessly with the fabrication of beautiful artefacts and a profound belief in occult mysteries tied to the seasons and the natural world. Tareth, the crippled weaver, earns his keep in the community which rescued him and his daughter from the sea by making and dying brightly coloured cloths to sell at the annual Gather. But he has another, more secret skill. While Maia sleeps he spends his nights, almost against his own will, weaving an extraordinary silken garment for her, one which whispers to her of her far-away home and her dark destiny. For she is no ordinary girl but a princess of the Eagle People and the chosen heir to the sun stone. This stone is a revered and powerful crystal which is needed to channel the sun and use it to warm the land at the end of each winter, and without it famine and cold reign eternally. At the same time, it extracts a terrible price from the Catcher, causing her intense pain and eventually blinding her. In a bid to protect the infant Maia from her fate Tareth stole and hid the stone, and fled with her across the sea.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444006207</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Christopher Edge
|author=Derek Keilty
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|title=Black Hole Cinema Club
|title=Will Gallows and the Rock Demon's Blood
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=The Great West Rock has never been the most peaceful place in which to live.  There is a healthy attempt at multiculturalism, with humans, elves, dwarves and good trolls getting along OK, but for the bad trolls nobody likesUnfortunately they're making themselves more and more known. Will Gallows is a little upset that he's not being allowed to learn any magic, but the unease and tetchiness throughout the land will hit his small family when someone makes off with a herd of their new calvesEven worse, who – or what – is behind a lot that is going on has a game-changing connection to his family's immediate past…
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|summary=Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'All big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagineBut as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on?  Will they ever get back to the cinema, and to their real lives?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849395357</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1839942738
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Adam Stower
|author=Philip Reeve
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|title=Murray and Bun
|title=Goblins vs Dwarves
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|rating=4.5
|rating=5
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|genre=Confident Readers  
|genre=Confident Readers
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|summary=Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs.  This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…
|summary=Goblins are the bad guys, right? Everybody knows that. They're just like orcs and trolls: ugly, smelly, and evil through and through, with no interest in life but eating anything that moves and having a good punch up now and again (preferably both at the same time). But what if they weren't all like that? What if one of them turned out to be a tad brighter than his greedy, thieving, brawling brothers?
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|isbn=0008561249
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407134809</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh
|author=Catherine Wilkins
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|title=The Glorious Race of Magical Beasts
|title=My Best Friend And Other Enemies
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|rating=4
|rating=3
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Jessica and Natalie have been best friends for ages. But in the last year of primary school, when new girl Amelia moves to their school, she starts to come between them, forming a secret society with Natalie - and not letting Jessica join. Can Jessica repair her friendship with Natalie, or find some new friends? Armed with only her ability to draw great cartoons, she sets out to find out.
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|summary=Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs.  Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a generation missing in the family.  A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a magical beast. This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his gran.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857630954</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0571382231
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Helen Cooper
|author=Antony Wootten
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|title=The Taming of the Cat
|title=Grown-ups Can't be Friends with Dragons
 
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Brian finds home a bit of a trial these daysSince Mum went, Dad seem to have spent as much time as he could down at the pubBig sister Emily does her best to keep them all fed and the washing done, but she's not that old herself and her only support is her boyfriend MarkSchool's not going too well for Brian eitherWhatever he does he seems to land in trouble, even when he doesn't mean to and his teacher sometimes despairs of himWhat that boy needs is a good listening to.  Brian does have a secret though - his cave.
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|summary=Once again, mice are pitched against catIn this case, principally, we have Brie the mouse, up against Gorgonzola the cat – and in case you're seeing a connection, they live in a cheese shop and therefore all the names used here seem to be the names of cheesesAnyway, Brie is shunned, scorned and, if you must, mous-tracised, for the way his habits don't match the other mice he lives withThey nibble up paper wrapping from the cheese for bedding – he displays it as art and makes stories based on the visuals on itAnd that story-telling will come in handy one night, when he feels all alone and cast outIt's almost as if there were another character from fable who had had to tell stories to keep themselves aliveThis makes Brie the top dog in the mouse community, though, as all the others had the chance to half-inch some cheese while the cat was distracted. But will the story have the successful sequel it needs when that cheese runs out?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0953712338</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0571376010
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Lauren St John
|author=Sally Gardner
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|title=Finding Wonder
|title=Three Pickled Herrings (Wings and Co 2)
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|rating=4
|rating=4.5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=
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|summary=Roo's life has become almost impossibly difficult.  Her mum died when she was young, and now she finds herself awoken in the middle of the night by the police banging on her door to tell her that her dad has dropped dead on his way to the corner shop to buy a lottery ticket.  When asked what other family she has, she can only name her aunt, Joni, who she knows her dad didn't think very highly of. But she has no one else, and so off she goes to live with her unreliable aunt. Things continue to get worse for Roo, as when she and Joni leave London in Joni's old campervan, it breaks down in the middle of nowhere and then bursts into flames!  Poor Roo!
Emily Vole and the rest of the team at Wings and Co Fairy Detective Agency are worried. They have been open for five months and have not had a single case to solve. Then Sir Walter Cross dies in strange circumstances; shooting into the sky in a cloud of purple smoke before falling to his death. Shortly afterwards they receive more tales of bad luck and disaster from Mr. Rollo the tailor and the Smith family who have been preparing for their daughter Pandora’s wedding. Suddenly Emily, the Fairy Detectives and of course, the remarkable talking cat, Fidget, find themselves with not one but three cases to solve. Are Wings and Co. up to the task? Of course they are!  
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|isbn=0571376169
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444003739</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Adam Baron and Benji Davies
|author=Hilary McKay
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|title=Oscar's Lion
|title=Binny for Short
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|rating=3
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=It can be quite risky to start a book with what is almost the final scene, especially for younger readers. Prize-winning author Hilary McKay, however, writes with such a sure hand that by the time the end comes round for the second time everything has dovetailed beautifully and is yet, somehow, full of surprises. In fact, it is a sure bet that many readers will want to immediately return to the beginning and read the book again, just to see how she does it.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444900544</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Alex Barclay
 
|title=Curse of Kings (The Trials of Oland Born, Book 1)
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=In a land tormented by the screams of 999 souls, victims of dreadful experiments which have taken place since the despicable coward Villius Ren betrayed a king and seized power for himself, a young boy is about to become a hero. Servant to Ren and the rest of the Craven Lodge, 14-year-old Oland Born takes a stand and is forced to flee the castle after reading a mysterious letter addressed to him, but written by a king who died before he was even born. Trying to find out more about his background and how to save the kingdom from the Lodge, Oland sets out on a quest.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>000733575X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Andy Briggs
 
|title=Tarzan: The Savage Lands
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Lord Greystoke is looking for his cousin Tarzan – but while he claims he merely wants to be reunited with his long-lost relation, Robbie and Jane are suspicious of his true motives. Can they find their friend to warn him before the nobleman reaches him, and just why is Lord Greystoke so keen to brave the wilds of Africa?
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|summary=We start incredibly bluntly, with Oscar hoping to have his mother or father, but mother is more likely – read him his very favourite book a couple of times before he has to be ready for school.  But when he enters his parents' bedroom, all he sees is a mahoosive male lion on their bed, looking sheepish, and admitting that he won't be hungry for another two days.  But there are benefits to having a lion around – it can be shown as an unspoken threat to the bully that ruined a birthday party for Oscar the other month.  And it can shapeshift, so he can take it to school and it can get him out of a problem. And it's wonderful to have around the house – not limiting his biscuit intake, being much more lax about the rules, and so on.  OK, it can't work a dimmer switch but it can give Oscar a wonderful time.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571297323</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0008596751
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Judith Eagle
|author=Sarah Naughton
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|title=The Stolen Songbird
|title=The Hanged Man Rises
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Teens
 
|summary=The Wigman is at large, murdering children. You'd think this would be the first concern for Titus Adams, as he's only fifteen, his parents are incorrigible drunks and he has a young sister, Hannah, to look out for. But in London in the late 1800s, there are more pressing concerns than serial killers on the loose. Like how to pay the rent. Like where the next meal is coming from. Like staying out of the workhouse. Like keeping your sister on the right side of the law. Thankfully, Titus has a friend in Inspector Pilsbury. He doesn't arrest Hannah when she's caught with pickpockets. He feeds her and keeps her safe at the station until Titus comes to collect her.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>085707864X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sarah Moore Fitzgerald
 
|title=Back to Blackbrick
 
|rating=5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Cosmo thought he had enough problems, with his absent mother, ridiculous name, and status as 'loser kid' at school. But his Grandfather isn't the man he used to be - the man that Cosmo idolised. Sometimes, he can't remember what day it is, or where certain things go in the kitchen. And then other times, he can't remember who Cosmo is, or that Brian, Cosmo's brother, died. Cosmo does all he can to help him, but post-its on the cupboards and omega-3 oils aren't enough to keep doctors from coming to assess Grandfather and deciding he needs to be taken into full time care.
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|summary=Caro's mother, a world-famous whistler, has failed to return home from her recent work trip abroad and is now missing. Her other mother, Ronnie, is having to go up North to take care of her sister who is unwell. So who is going to look after Caro?  Sent to stay with Gam, someone Caro has heard her mother despises, she feels frustrated and confused and worried.  All her summer holiday plans of building herself some equipment to practise her gymnastics are brought to a halt whilst she is stuck inside this staid old Victorian lady's house, along with an orphan boy, Albie, who is living there too.  But she soon finds herself caught up in a mystery, as she discovers a painting of a bird hidden away inside her mum's old suitcase, and all across London a fearsome gang called the Snakes are thieving artworks and terrorising people.  Is the painting somehow linked to the gang?  And what has happened to Caro's mother?  Is she somehow involved in the mystery too?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444006592</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0571363148
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Tania Unsworth
|author=Niel Bushnell
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|title=Nowhere Island
|title=Sorrowline
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Jack's mother was killed when he was a young boy and now, just before his thirteenth birthday, he learns that his father is leaving him too — for a spell in prison. And then things get seriously weird, because his long-dead grandfather appears to warn him that his life in in danger. The old man is closely followed by a bunch of murderous creatures called the Dustmen, and in order to escape them Jack is forced to flee back to 1940, using a sorrowline.
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|summary=Meet Gil.  Just twelve, he is so determined to escape the care system – the system that constantly puts him in futureless places that are not homes – and find a home for himself. He is en route to yet another fosterer, when he jumps into an anonymous car, and lets it ride him to his future.  That future seems to be in jeopardy when someone steals his one bag of belongings – but that someone lives with his brother in a camp on an island between the two directions of a motorway, a place inaccessible and definitely ignored enough to provide for their safety and seclusion.  Them, and a mute girl also finding a home there, albeit so much more successfully. Over a few weeks we see if their oddball destinies can combine, or if this is one place where life as we would want it just would not work…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849395233</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1804540080
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Helen Peters
|author=Sally Rippin
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|title=Friends and Traitors
|title=Angel Creek
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|rating=3
|rating=4.5
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=It is Christmas Eve and Jelly's family are gathered together to celebrate. It should have been a perfect night but for Jelly it is not because her family have recently moved to the other side of the city, far from all her friends, just as she is about to start at senior school. She is feeling so alone and miserable that nothing will brighten her mood and to avoid the festivities Jelly and her two cousins slip away in the darkness to the nearby creek.
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|summary=England, WW2.  Two young girls are new at the country pile called Stanbrook. One is Nancy, destined to be in service all her life it seems, like the female generations before her.  The other is Sidney, a girl from a hoity-toity Sussex boarding school that has been removed there away from bomber flight-paths.  The girls are chalk and cheese, and if we hadn't guessed that then their behaviour with each other over their first encounters would only prove it so.  But something is amiss, and first separately and then in combination they realise the Lord Evesham must be a rum 'un. Midnight deliveries are received under cover of secrecy, talk is made of meetings with Germans, and not only that, a local Spitfire factory has been attacked.  But surely the girls are wrong, and the upper class could never be so underhand?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405262087</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1788004647
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Jamie Littler
|author=Chris Columbus and Ned Vizzini
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|title=Arkspire
|title=House of Secrets
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=
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|summary=Two sisters, Juniper and Elodie, born fifteen minutes apart, are growing to be chalk and cheese.  Juniper is an eager hunter and trader in illicit magic, including relics from prior major wars left out in the Badlands.  Elodie is intent on getting closer to power in one of the religious districts of Arkspire, perhaps even to become the child in line to inherit the power of the Watcher, the closest to a ruler the district has, and one of the five major victors in said earlier war. Being trained in the magic that only five people can use would definitely change the status of the whole family.  But in finding something oddly magical, Juniper might just be able to gain some power of her own – for good, or for very, very bad…
The Walker family used to have a big house in San Francisco, but after their father lost his job in mysterious circumstances, they were forced to move into the spooky Kristoff House, a strange place once occupied by a disturbed fantasy author. Soon after they move in, they realise that their arrival has set terrible events in motion, and children Cordelia, Brendan and Eleanor are forced to try and rescue their parents from a terrible fate.
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|isbn=0241586143
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007490143</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=024162343X
|author=Maudie Smith
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|title=Stolen History
|title=About Zooming Time, Opal Moonbaby!
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|author=Sathnam Sanghera
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|rating=5
 +
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
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|summary=I was the bad company other people got into at school.  I was disruptive in religious education classes because I disputed the existence of a 'god'.  Where was the proof?  In history lessons, it was probably worse still.  Not too long after the end of WWII, I didn't so much want to learn about the British army's successes (and occasional failures, but we didn't dwell on those) in what came to be called 'the colonies' as want to dispute what right the army had to be there in the first place.  Looking back, I still believe I was right - but I regret that I lacked the maturity to approach 'the problem' politely.  I wish I'd had Sathnam Sanghera's ''Stolen History''.
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{{Frontpage
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|author=Thiago de Moraes
 +
|title=Old Gods New Tricks
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Martha feels lonely without her Best and Only Friend, Opal MoonbabyThat's obviously a rather unusual name but it's not the only thing about Opal which is unusual.  She's an alien from Carnelia and she originally came to earth as part of a challengeShe had to make a human friend and despite the fact that Martha was determined that she would ''never'' have another friend, the relationship somehow worked.  When we [[Opal Moonbaby by Maudie Smith|last saw her]] she was on her way back to Carnelia and Uncle Bixie.  Martha was heartbroken to see her go - and I'll confess to being just a little bit upset myself. But don't worry - she's back!
+
|summary=Meet Trixie.  Forever getting into scrapes, larks and adventures involving flooding the school aircon with fart powder, she could almost be thought a young goddess of nuisanceBut just when she's being told that by her one-last-chance-giving headteacher, the world changes.  Suddenly, practically everything electronic stops working – a power-out, even of electric cars, hits not just the town the school's in but the entire planet (apart from mobile phones, and all that powers the Internet, just for our convenience's sake).  Trixie, luckily, realises what has happened – the ancient Gods have taken the power of power from usAnd so she begins her epic quest, to gather all the people that can steal it back – namely the characters from myth that have past form in stealing from the Gods, ie the semi-deities, giants, half-gods and so on known as the tricksters.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444004794</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=178845295X
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Hannah Gold and Levi Pinfold
|author=A B Saddlewick
+
|title=Finding Bear
|title=Monstrous Maud: Scary Show
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=If you have a [[:Category:A B Saddlewick|series of books]] set in a school, all to feature a different aspect of school life, you are duty bound it seems to feature a talent contest for the pupilsThis series is no different, although of course the school isIt's where Maud goes, and she's the only human.  So her fellow pupils can do formation vampire bat flying, or a wicked spell casting, and even the invisible girl will join in, ''showing off'' her gymnastics. What hope the poor human girl Maud, who has pretended to be an evil nasty 'Tutu' all year just to try and fit in?
+
|summary=[[The Last Bear by Hannah Gold|Last time]], April had been on Bear Island, a lot further north than many people would venture, and finding a ridiculously unexpected but delightful friendship with a polar bear – that she called Bear.  Back home, things on the domestic and family front are a bit advanced, but not perfect for her, and so can easily be ignored when word comes through from the islands Bear was last left onFor a bear doing very Bear-y things has been shot and woundedDesperate to make sure he's OK, she and her father return to the Arctic and hope that in a world of very white and very dangerous things, she can find one specific white and dangerous thing – and that the friendship can continue.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780551738</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008582017
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Simon Fox
|author=Sarah Lean
+
|title=Deadlock
|title=A Horse For Angel
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Eleven year old Nell feels as though her life is a list of pointless activities that she didn't choose and that she doesn't enjoy; the drama club, the maths tutor, the swimming lessons and the endless waiting for her busy, single mum between them all. Nell is looking forward to spending two restful weeks with her Grandma over the Easter holiday but at the last minute she discovers that she is to stay with relations that she doesn't know. Nell has a secret and when she travels to her Aunt's home she takes a suitcase containing her secret with her and on the first day of her stay she has a chance encounter with a local girl, Angel, who has secrets of her own. Despite the initial hostility between the two girls they gradually realise that they must learn to trust each other if they are to care for the things they love.
+
|summary=Late one night Graham Blake is late back from his shift on the force, and then suddenly rings Archie, demanding he fetch something from a secret place, and join him on the run.  They get together, but barely begin to smell the whiff of Southern trains when the father is arrested, leaving Archie on the late express to Brighton, toting a tin his father was determined to keep away from his colleagues, and the bearer of a whole heap of questions.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007455054</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1839944420
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Cath Howe
|author=A B Saddlewick
+
|title=My Life on Fire
|title=Monstrous Maud: Horror Holiday
+
|rating=5
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=And you think you have it tough… Maud is the only human at a school entirely populated by monsters – vampires, zombies, invisible people and so onSo just put yourself in her shoes when it's parents' evening, trying to divert her family from realising the truth about everyone and everything around themWorse than that, try and put yourself in her shoes when it's revealed that she has to get an impossibly high score on an essay to not be kept back a year and lose contact with all her best friendsWorse than that, empathise with Maud as her folks meet another pupil's family at the parents' evening, and they therefore agree to go on holiday with a family of werewolves… at full moon…
+
|summary=Ren's family home is destroyed in a fire.  She, her parents, and her little brother lose everythingShe doesn't have any of her clothes, or any of her special little knick-knacks from her cupboard, and now she is living at her grandmother's house where they can't touch anything, or do anything, or even eat the foods they normally eatWhen she goes back to school she discovers that the class are doing a special art project, creating boxes of their lives, to display things that are important to them and show who they are as a person.  But Ren has nothing to put in a box, and so she finds herself starting to steal thingsSmall things, things that people might not really miss, not when they have so much already.  But what will happen to her if someone finds out what she is doing?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178055172X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1839942835
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author= Rob Keeley
|author=K A S Quinn
+
|title= The Boy Who Disappeared and Other Stories
|title=The Queen at War (Chronicles of the Tempus)
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Katie Berger-Jones-Burg is puzzled. Living with her former pop-star mother in a New York apartment she is having strange visions. It seems she has forgotten all about her previous time travelling adventures (in The Queen Must Die) although someone appears to be trying to send her some clues to prompt her memory. Her friends from Victorian England, Princess Alice and James, are facing difficulties of their own, with a very sick friend and also the threat of war. They need Katie's help, but how can they get her to travel back in time to them?
+
|summary= Hooray! Bookbag favourite Rob Keeley is back with a return to the short story format! The Boy Who Disappeared treats us to eleven new tales, each as fun to read as his previous offerings.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848870558</amazonuk>
+
|isbn= B0BVW69N1G
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Laura Noakes
|author=Siobhan Rowden
+
|title=Cosima Unfortunate Steals a Star
|title=The Revenge of the Ballybogs
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Not much has changed in Barnaby's world since the [[The Curse of the Bogle's Beard by Siobhan Rowden|first book in this series]]His grandmother is still smelly, burpy, purple and a pickler on an industrial scaleBarnaby is at last working alongside her as opposed to hating her, but not everything is running completely smoothly, and Barnaby still doesn't know everything there is to know about his heritage either the pickle factory he is supposed to inherit, or the bogle blood his unusual background has left him withThese short, dirty, hairy, stinking critters live in a world of their own underneath an unusual nearby bog – when they're not invading people's homes and causing mischiefOnce again, however much Barnaby is reluctant to, he is forced to enter their world in an effort to solve a major calamity in his family, but this time without the help of his mother – for someone or something has kidnapped her…
+
|summary=Meet Number OneOr rather, Cosima Unfortunate.  Or rather, just Cos to her friendsThe practice in the home she lives in is for the girls to just be named by the number they correspond to in the ledger, and they're all Unfortunates young people with disabilities, uncommon mentalities or suchlike that Victorian society frowns greatly uponBut Cosima bears the tag as a surname because nothing else seems to be known about where she came from, as the first ever inmate, and unique in having no known family in the outside world.  During a daring escapade to steal some posh cakes from the kitchen one afternoon, she discovers a plan involving said outside world – a devilish Lord Fitzroy seems to want to adopt all the girls for his Institute.  But why, and what does that body entail?  And could it possibly bring Cos closer to the past she has so little link with?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1407124900</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0008579059
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Alice M Ross
|author=Henry Winkler and Lin Oliver
+
|title=The Nowhere Thief
|title=How To Scare The Pants Off Your Pets (Ghost Buddy)
+
|rating=4.5
|rating=3
 
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=Billy is the only person who can see the ghost of Hoover Porterhouse the Third that he shares a bedroom with. While nobody else knows about the phantom's existence, Billy certainly knows about his character – his arrant braggadocio and the many self-serving rules he demands he lives his afterlife by. The problem is that that same lack of respect and responsibility is what is keeping Hoover in Billy's life and not moving on, and his attitude is so bad he's been grounded by the Higher-Ups in charge of such things. Billy's not one to live with an annoyance like that, though, and decides to prove the Hoove can be responsible – and caring for a pet should be the obvious proof with which to start…
+
|summary=At last there is new stock in the impoverished yet over-full antiques shop Elsbeth and her mother run in a seaside town.  Elsbeth knows this because she has stolen it. She also knows she should be free from worries about being found out, because she has the ability to leave this world, and use an unworldly portal of kaleidoscope colours to enter other worlds, where the sea levels are rising dramatically and the buildings are generally empty of humans and ripe for plunder. With eviction imminent, can Elsbeth nab anything to actually generate custom at the shop?  Well yes, is the answer, but the fact a mysterious man knows exactly which items come from these different Somewheres only raises more questions…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>140713230X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1839943769
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Natasha Farrant
|author=Michael Morpurgo
+
|title=The Rescue of Ravenwood
|title=Little Manfred
 
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=In The Imperial War Museum, a little wooden dog stands in a glass display case. He was donated to the museum in 2005 by a family who lived at a farm in Kent. The little dog was made from cast-off apple boxes by a German prisoner of war who worked at the farm.
+
|summary=This story is another excellent adventure from the author of ''Voyage of the Sparrowhawk''.  Ravenwood is an old house, in the North of England, where Bea and Raffy have been living for most of their lives. They are part of a complex, extended family arrangement, as Bea is there with her Uncle Leo, and Raffy is there with his mum, and they are living together as a family.  They have grown up swimming in the cove, roaming through the trees, completely at one with all of the nature around the house and loving every inch of the place. But now the house is under threat, as Leo is under pressure from his other two brothers to sell the property to a developer as it's becoming more and more expensive to maintain.  The children find themselves worrying not only about where they're going to live, but if they'll even be together, and if Ravenwood itself will be torn down.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007491638</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0571348785
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Robin Birch and Jobe Anderson
|author=Tom Watson
+
|title=Secret Beast Club: The Unicorns of Silver Street
|title=Stick Dog
+
|rating=4
|rating=3.5
+
|genre=Confident Readers
 +
|summary=Jayden's nose is forever in a book, which means he knows a lot about mythological creatures – the phoenixes and unicorns of the world, for example.  Aisha is addicted to her new tablet, where she can see videos of anything that might be out there. The problem, as their mothers see it, is that they are never 'out there' themselves, exploring the outside world of Hackney, London.  But when a narrowboat turns up carrying a science-minded, educational purpose, and with a past involving Jayden's cousin, they find a magical world they never knew existed.  For many of those mythological creatures are real, including the one Aisha thinks she's seen on a bit of local footage.  The crew of the boat, including a living gargoyle, are tasked with saving the rare critters – and the kids unknowingly have the magical sight needed to join in.  Dare they side with Leila, the woman on board, and her relative who lives as a figure in a painting, and become saviours of the unseen?
 +
|isbn=0241573483
 +
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|isbn=B09XWSXSKY
 +
|title=Maestro Orpheus and the World Clock
 +
|author=Robert Penee and Joanne Grodzinski
 +
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary='I Can’t Draw, Okay?Tom Watson apologises in the opening chapter of ''Stick Dog''.  He then goes on to lay some ground rules with the reader, explaining that:
+
|summary=Frederick (or Fred, but never Freddy, please) couldn't sleep. A tune, rather like the ticking of a clock was playing over and over in his mind.  It happened every time he came to visit his grandfather.  He hadn't really wanted to come; after all, he's ten now and all those old clocks don't appeal to him anymore.
  
'....this Stick Dog story (with the bad pictures that my art teacher doesn’t like) will also be told in a way that I like (but my English teacher doesn’t).'  
+
''Who needs old clocks anyway?  All they do is tell the time. And time isn't good for anything...''
  
'Good deal?'
+
And that was why he was looking at the clock beside the bed.  It was nearly twelve o'clock but at midnight the clock chimed only six times.  There was nothing for it but to go and find grandad - but where was he? And why had all the clocks stopped at twelve o'clock?
 
+
}}
'Excellent. Let’s move on.'
+
{{Frontpage
 
+
|author=Nigel Baines
'This is going to be fun.'
+
|title=A Tricky Kind of Magic
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007494823</amazonuk>
+
|rating=4.5
 +
|genre=Emerging Readers
 +
|summary=Cooper loves to perform magic tricks. His father was a magician, and named Cooper after the great Tommy Cooper. But sadly Cooper's father died suddenly, and now Cooper doesn't quite know who to be, or how to be. And when his dad's prop rabbit starts talking to him, he ''really'' doesn't know what's going on anymore!
 +
|isbn=1444960261
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
Move on to [[Newest Cookery Reviews]]
|author=Anna Wilson
 
|title=The Smug Pug
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Confident Readers
 
|summary=We first met Pippa Peppercorn and the pooch-pampering parlour in [[The Poodle Problem by Anna Wilson|The Poodle Problem]] and then in [[The Dotty Dalmatian by Anna Wilson|The Dotty Dalmatian]].  Pippa is a whole six months (and a little bit) older now but she still bounces off the page like a rubber ball with red pigtails.  I did worry about her just a little bit as she didn't seem to have any friends of her own age.  The elderly Mrs Fudge, the ladies who have their hair done at the salon and Raphael the postman are really no substitute for someone of your own age with whom you can have fun and giggles.  And pass notes to each other in school - which is an essential part of growing up.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447200756</amazonuk>
 
}}
 

Latest revision as of 08:02, 9 June 2024


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Review of

Childish Spirits: 10th anniversary special edition by Rob Keeley

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Around here, we're big fans of children's author Rob Keeley. He's a ball of happy positivity, he understands children, and he writes for their pleasure and enjoyment, not to lecture or hector.

The Childish Spirits series is one of his greatest achievements. It's a sequence of ghost stories centring on Ellie, a stalwart young girl who can cope with anything the spirit world throws at her, and Edward, a spoiled lordling and the first spirit Ellie encounters Full Review

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Review of

The Last Life of Lori Mills by Max Boucherat

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesome. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, and that is to log on to Voxminer, the world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's world. But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky. For the server she and her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn? Full Review

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Review of

Dungeon Runners: Hero Trial by Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Meet Kit. Like most of the people in his world, it seems, he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the sport where a team of warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and race to the exit, perhaps bothering with the treasure or the big bad and the points they grant you along the way. Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's seen of the latest race on the inn TV equivalent is that one team has been retired, eaten, and a new trio of questors is needed. Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken to the goading from the token bully of his world and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a team. What chance does this friendless, muscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, and how could he possibly hope to succeed? Full Review

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Review of

Planet Storyland by James Sherwood Metts

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Things have been a bit sticky for the Earthlings. AI and automation have been proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to do and other tasks that took time to accomplish. Just as they were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think of other, new ways to spend time, along came an awful pandemic. Life was pretty much shut down and, along with it, all the many daily social interactions on which they depend so heavily. Full Review

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Review of

The Wrong Shoes by Tom Percival

5star.jpg Confident Readers

Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and had an accident. Throw into that mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. He is good at art, and clings to the moments of joy when he is drawing, that feel like a light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. Full Review

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Review of

The Teacher Who Knew Too Much by Rob Keeley

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Seventeen banks and a jeweller’s have been raided. The police are baffled, but only Ben knows the truth – his Maths teacher, Miss Judson, is really a safecracker! With police and her gangster boyfriend Al on their trail, Miss Judson and Ben go on the run. But Al needs them for one last job...

Goodness me, that Miss Judson is a terror! How on earth did a nice teacher like her manage to get mixed up with a bad 'un like Al? We'll find out. Luckily for Miss Judson, the pupil who discovers her terrible secret is Ben, the son of a famous magician who has ambitions to be as good as his father some day, and who thinks Miss Judson is worth saving Full Review

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Review of

Black Hole Cinema Club by Christopher Edge

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Lucas and his friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, a place that has the nickname of 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, they're looking forward to lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new film format is very different, and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the cinema, and to their real lives? Full Review

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Review of

Murray and Bun by Adam Stower

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do… Full Review

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Review of

The Glorious Race of Magical Beasts by Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Eli is a busy lad – by day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, and in the evening a helper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. Eli lives with his lovely gran, too – for there is a generation missing in the family. A few short years ago, Eli's parents were both lost to the titular race, a globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a magical beast. This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of magic at the end – the only thing to possibly save his gran. Full Review

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Review of

The Taming of the Cat by Helen Cooper

3.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Once again, mice are pitched against cat. In this case, principally, we have Brie the mouse, up against Gorgonzola the cat – and in case you're seeing a connection, they live in a cheese shop and therefore all the names used here seem to be the names of cheeses. Anyway, Brie is shunned, scorned and, if you must, mous-tracised, for the way his habits don't match the other mice he lives with. They nibble up paper wrapping from the cheese for bedding – he displays it as art and makes stories based on the visuals on it. And that story-telling will come in handy one night, when he feels all alone and cast out. It's almost as if there were another character from fable who had had to tell stories to keep themselves alive. This makes Brie the top dog in the mouse community, though, as all the others had the chance to half-inch some cheese while the cat was distracted. But will the story have the successful sequel it needs when that cheese runs out? Full Review

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Review of

Finding Wonder by Lauren St John

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Roo's life has become almost impossibly difficult. Her mum died when she was young, and now she finds herself awoken in the middle of the night by the police banging on her door to tell her that her dad has dropped dead on his way to the corner shop to buy a lottery ticket. When asked what other family she has, she can only name her aunt, Joni, who she knows her dad didn't think very highly of. But she has no one else, and so off she goes to live with her unreliable aunt. Things continue to get worse for Roo, as when she and Joni leave London in Joni's old campervan, it breaks down in the middle of nowhere and then bursts into flames! Poor Roo! Full Review

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Review of

Oscar's Lion by Adam Baron and Benji Davies

3star.jpg Confident Readers

We start incredibly bluntly, with Oscar hoping to have his mother – or father, but mother is more likely – read him his very favourite book a couple of times before he has to be ready for school. But when he enters his parents' bedroom, all he sees is a mahoosive male lion on their bed, looking sheepish, and admitting that he won't be hungry for another two days. But there are benefits to having a lion around – it can be shown as an unspoken threat to the bully that ruined a birthday party for Oscar the other month. And it can shapeshift, so he can take it to school and it can get him out of a problem. And it's wonderful to have around the house – not limiting his biscuit intake, being much more lax about the rules, and so on. OK, it can't work a dimmer switch but it can give Oscar a wonderful time. Full Review

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Review of

The Stolen Songbird by Judith Eagle

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Caro's mother, a world-famous whistler, has failed to return home from her recent work trip abroad and is now missing. Her other mother, Ronnie, is having to go up North to take care of her sister who is unwell. So who is going to look after Caro? Sent to stay with Gam, someone Caro has heard her mother despises, she feels frustrated and confused and worried. All her summer holiday plans of building herself some equipment to practise her gymnastics are brought to a halt whilst she is stuck inside this staid old Victorian lady's house, along with an orphan boy, Albie, who is living there too. But she soon finds herself caught up in a mystery, as she discovers a painting of a bird hidden away inside her mum's old suitcase, and all across London a fearsome gang called the Snakes are thieving artworks and terrorising people. Is the painting somehow linked to the gang? And what has happened to Caro's mother? Is she somehow involved in the mystery too? Full Review

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Review of

Nowhere Island by Tania Unsworth

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Meet Gil. Just twelve, he is so determined to escape the care system – the system that constantly puts him in futureless places that are not homes – and find a home for himself. He is en route to yet another fosterer, when he jumps into an anonymous car, and lets it ride him to his future. That future seems to be in jeopardy when someone steals his one bag of belongings – but that someone lives with his brother in a camp on an island between the two directions of a motorway, a place inaccessible and definitely ignored enough to provide for their safety and seclusion. Them, and a mute girl also finding a home there, albeit so much more successfully. Over a few weeks we see if their oddball destinies can combine, or if this is one place where life as we would want it just would not work… Full Review

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Review of

Friends and Traitors by Helen Peters

3star.jpg Confident Readers

England, WW2. Two young girls are new at the country pile called Stanbrook. One is Nancy, destined to be in service all her life it seems, like the female generations before her. The other is Sidney, a girl from a hoity-toity Sussex boarding school that has been removed there away from bomber flight-paths. The girls are chalk and cheese, and if we hadn't guessed that then their behaviour with each other over their first encounters would only prove it so. But something is amiss, and first separately and then in combination they realise the Lord Evesham must be a rum 'un. Midnight deliveries are received under cover of secrecy, talk is made of meetings with Germans, and not only that, a local Spitfire factory has been attacked. But surely the girls are wrong, and the upper class could never be so underhand? Full Review

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Review of

Arkspire by Jamie Littler

4star.jpg Confident Readers

Two sisters, Juniper and Elodie, born fifteen minutes apart, are growing to be chalk and cheese. Juniper is an eager hunter and trader in illicit magic, including relics from prior major wars left out in the Badlands. Elodie is intent on getting closer to power in one of the religious districts of Arkspire, perhaps even to become the child in line to inherit the power of the Watcher, the closest to a ruler the district has, and one of the five major victors in said earlier war. Being trained in the magic that only five people can use would definitely change the status of the whole family. But in finding something oddly magical, Juniper might just be able to gain some power of her own – for good, or for very, very bad… Full Review

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Review of

Stolen History by Sathnam Sanghera

5star.jpg Children's Non-Fiction

I was the bad company other people got into at school. I was disruptive in religious education classes because I disputed the existence of a 'god'. Where was the proof? In history lessons, it was probably worse still. Not too long after the end of WWII, I didn't so much want to learn about the British army's successes (and occasional failures, but we didn't dwell on those) in what came to be called 'the colonies' as want to dispute what right the army had to be there in the first place. Looking back, I still believe I was right - but I regret that I lacked the maturity to approach 'the problem' politely. I wish I'd had Sathnam Sanghera's Stolen History. Full Review

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Review of

Old Gods New Tricks by Thiago de Moraes

4.5star.jpg Confident Readers

Meet Trixie. Forever getting into scrapes, larks and adventures involving flooding the school aircon with fart powder, she could almost be thought a young goddess of nuisance. But just when she's being told that by her one-last-chance-giving headteacher, the world changes. Suddenly, practically everything electronic stops working – a power-out, even of electric cars, hits not just the town the school's in but the entire planet (apart from mobile phones, and all that powers the Internet, just for our convenience's sake). Trixie, luckily, realises what has happened – the ancient Gods have taken the power of power from us. And so she begins her epic quest, to gather all the people that can steal it back – namely the characters from myth that have past form in stealing from the Gods, ie the semi-deities, giants, half-gods and so on known as the tricksters. Full Review

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Review of

Finding Bear by Hannah Gold and Levi Pinfold

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Last time, April had been on Bear Island, a lot further north than many people would venture, and finding a ridiculously unexpected but delightful friendship with a polar bear – that she called Bear. Back home, things on the domestic and family front are a bit advanced, but not perfect for her, and so can easily be ignored when word comes through from the islands Bear was last left on. For a bear doing very Bear-y things has been shot and wounded. Desperate to make sure he's OK, she and her father return to the Arctic and hope that in a world of very white and very dangerous things, she can find one specific white and dangerous thing – and that the friendship can continue. Full Review

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Review of

Deadlock by Simon Fox

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Late one night Graham Blake is late back from his shift on the force, and then suddenly rings Archie, demanding he fetch something from a secret place, and join him on the run. They get together, but barely begin to smell the whiff of Southern trains when the father is arrested, leaving Archie on the late express to Brighton, toting a tin his father was determined to keep away from his colleagues, and the bearer of a whole heap of questions. Full Review

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Review of

My Life on Fire by Cath Howe

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Ren's family home is destroyed in a fire. She, her parents, and her little brother lose everything. She doesn't have any of her clothes, or any of her special little knick-knacks from her cupboard, and now she is living at her grandmother's house where they can't touch anything, or do anything, or even eat the foods they normally eat. When she goes back to school she discovers that the class are doing a special art project, creating boxes of their lives, to display things that are important to them and show who they are as a person. But Ren has nothing to put in a box, and so she finds herself starting to steal things. Small things, things that people might not really miss, not when they have so much already. But what will happen to her if someone finds out what she is doing? Full Review

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Review of

The Boy Who Disappeared and Other Stories by Rob Keeley

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Hooray! Bookbag favourite Rob Keeley is back with a return to the short story format! The Boy Who Disappeared treats us to eleven new tales, each as fun to read as his previous offerings. Full Review

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Review of

Cosima Unfortunate Steals a Star by Laura Noakes

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Meet Number One. Or rather, Cosima Unfortunate. Or rather, just Cos to her friends. The practice in the home she lives in is for the girls to just be named by the number they correspond to in the ledger, and they're all Unfortunates – young people with disabilities, uncommon mentalities or suchlike that Victorian society frowns greatly upon. But Cosima bears the tag as a surname because nothing else seems to be known about where she came from, as the first ever inmate, and unique in having no known family in the outside world. During a daring escapade to steal some posh cakes from the kitchen one afternoon, she discovers a plan involving said outside world – a devilish Lord Fitzroy seems to want to adopt all the girls for his Institute. But why, and what does that body entail? And could it possibly bring Cos closer to the past she has so little link with? Full Review

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Review of

The Nowhere Thief by Alice M Ross

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At last there is new stock in the impoverished yet over-full antiques shop Elsbeth and her mother run in a seaside town. Elsbeth knows this because she has stolen it. She also knows she should be free from worries about being found out, because she has the ability to leave this world, and use an unworldly portal of kaleidoscope colours to enter other worlds, where the sea levels are rising dramatically and the buildings are generally empty of humans and ripe for plunder. With eviction imminent, can Elsbeth nab anything to actually generate custom at the shop? Well yes, is the answer, but the fact a mysterious man knows exactly which items come from these different Somewheres only raises more questions… Full Review

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Review of

The Rescue of Ravenwood by Natasha Farrant

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This story is another excellent adventure from the author of Voyage of the Sparrowhawk. Ravenwood is an old house, in the North of England, where Bea and Raffy have been living for most of their lives. They are part of a complex, extended family arrangement, as Bea is there with her Uncle Leo, and Raffy is there with his mum, and they are living together as a family. They have grown up swimming in the cove, roaming through the trees, completely at one with all of the nature around the house and loving every inch of the place. But now the house is under threat, as Leo is under pressure from his other two brothers to sell the property to a developer as it's becoming more and more expensive to maintain. The children find themselves worrying not only about where they're going to live, but if they'll even be together, and if Ravenwood itself will be torn down. Full Review

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Review of

Secret Beast Club: The Unicorns of Silver Street by Robin Birch and Jobe Anderson

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Jayden's nose is forever in a book, which means he knows a lot about mythological creatures – the phoenixes and unicorns of the world, for example. Aisha is addicted to her new tablet, where she can see videos of anything that might be out there. The problem, as their mothers see it, is that they are never 'out there' themselves, exploring the outside world of Hackney, London. But when a narrowboat turns up carrying a science-minded, educational purpose, and with a past involving Jayden's cousin, they find a magical world they never knew existed. For many of those mythological creatures are real, including the one Aisha thinks she's seen on a bit of local footage. The crew of the boat, including a living gargoyle, are tasked with saving the rare critters – and the kids unknowingly have the magical sight needed to join in. Dare they side with Leila, the woman on board, and her relative who lives as a figure in a painting, and become saviours of the unseen? Full Review

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Review of

Maestro Orpheus and the World Clock by Robert Penee and Joanne Grodzinski

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Frederick (or Fred, but never Freddy, please) couldn't sleep. A tune, rather like the ticking of a clock was playing over and over in his mind. It happened every time he came to visit his grandfather. He hadn't really wanted to come; after all, he's ten now and all those old clocks don't appeal to him anymore.

Who needs old clocks anyway? All they do is tell the time. And time isn't good for anything...

And that was why he was looking at the clock beside the bed. It was nearly twelve o'clock but at midnight the clock chimed only six times. There was nothing for it but to go and find grandad - but where was he? And why had all the clocks stopped at twelve o'clock? Full Review

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Review of

A Tricky Kind of Magic by Nigel Baines

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Cooper loves to perform magic tricks. His father was a magician, and named Cooper after the great Tommy Cooper. But sadly Cooper's father died suddenly, and now Cooper doesn't quite know who to be, or how to be. And when his dad's prop rabbit starts talking to him, he really doesn't know what's going on anymore! Full Review

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