The Fairy Ball (Lettice) by Mandy Stanley

Template:Infoboxsort Lettice is a rabbit. She lives with her family in a rather pretty bit of the countryside, and one day, while making a daisy chain, gets an invitation to a Fairy Ball. Duly sprinkled with fairy dust, she sneaks through a hole in the tree into the magic country, where her daisy chain gets the honour of becoming reins for Queen Titania's carriage. Lovely party ensues and as thanks, Lettice gets one wish to use when she comes back home.

As you can see, we are very much in the girly, sparkly, fluffy, insufferably pink territory here and anybody older than 6 would probably find coping with The Fairy Ball rather hard. However, the girly girls of 3 and 4 years of age would almost certainly love this picture book as it it's very pretty indeed. In fact, the artwork in The Fairy Ball is very good, with dynamic, well executed pictures, obviously sickly sweet and dripping with glitter but beautifully drawn and rather good in its kind. Lettice itself is very endearing little rabbit indeed, with clearly expressive face.

The text is less appealing, it reads aloud without squirming, but that's about it, there is no particularly good poetic or rhythmical quality to it nor noticeable creative use of language. The story itself presents a gentle adventure, it doesn't even have a moral as there is no material to make it from, and will undoubtedly delight many little girls, with its realisation of the Magic dream and a perfect blend of all these current girly icons: fairies, princesses and ballerinas (as there is some dancing to be had and Lettice ends up wearing a kind of tutu outfit).

There is nothing special about The Fairy Ball but it's pretty and completely inoffensive (unless you really can't stand glitter) with just about readable text and very attractive pictures. Children who liked the previous Lettice books will like this one, while other girly girls aged roughly 3 to 5 might enjoy it too.

Thanks to HarperCollinsChildren'sBooks for sending this book.

Daisy Meadows' Rainbow Magic provides similar fodder to a slightly older audience. For a touch of real storytelling magic, go for The Cat, the Crow, and the Banyan Tree.

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You can read more book reviews or buy The Fairy Ball (Lettice) by Mandy Stanley at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.

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