September 2012 – Page 2 – Aussie Reviews

Garden of the Purple Dragon, by Carole Wilkinson

Ping ran back through the pine trees, her heart pounding. Kai wasn’t sitting at the mouth of the cave where she’d left him. He looked around, but the fog was like a blindfold. She called his name and ran into the cave. The little dragon was digging up the bed, scattering pine needles everywhere. Ping rushed to him…
“We’re going to find somewhere else to live,” she said, trying to sound calm.

Ping thinks she has found a safe hiding spot to bring up Kai, the baby dragon whose care has been entrusted to her. But her peace is disturbed when she realises someone has found her. She must do everything she can to protect Kai, the last dragon, but who can she trust?

Garden of the Purple Dragon is the second title in the Dragonkeeper series, picking up soon after the first left off. Ping was once a slave girl who didn’t even know her own name, until she discovered that she could communicate with dragons and that she was, in fact, heir to the position of Imperial Dragonkeeper. Now she is on the run with baby Kai, the last of the Imperial dragons, keeping him safe from those who would use him for evil – even if it kills him.

First published in 2005, Garden of the Purple Dragon has been republished, along with other books in the series, with stunning new covers and the same wonderful tale which readers will love to revisit or to discover for the first time. And, of course, on finishing it, they’ll be looking for number three in the series to see what happens next.

Garden of the Purple Dragon , by Carole Wilkinson
Black Dog Books, first published 2005, this edition 2012
ISBN 9781742032467

This book is available from good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

My Book of Jokes, illustrated by Bronwen Davies

Why didn’t the chicken cross the road?
Because it was chicken.

Why don’t teddy bears eat much?
Because they’re already stuffed.

My Book of Jokes is a small hardcover offering, featuring, as the title suggests, jokes. Each joke is asked on one page withe reader needing to turn the page to see the answer. The jokes are illustrated in bold digital illustrations with quirkily appealing characters. Whilst each joke and pair of illustrations is self contained, some images and characters reappear. For example a picture of a traffic jam includes the a garbage truck from an earlier joke and a chicken on the pavement.

The jokes are most likely to appeal to early independent readers, though the illustrations and format mean the book will also be appealing to younger children.

Good for a few laughs.

My Book of Jokes, illustrated by Bronwen Davies
Scholastic, 2012
ISBN 9781742831657

Available from good bookstores or online from Fishpond.

Purple Roads, by Fleur McDonald

Matt’s hands trembled so violently the tea slopped over the rim. The scald hardly registerd but he let the man take the cup from him and hold it to his mouth.
‘How am I going to tell her?’ he kept saying, over and over. All he could think of was his future – and that of his family – lying in the charred ashes on the road. It took a little while before he realised the guttural moans he could hear came from himself.

Anna and Matt had a lot going for them – childhood sweethearts, they’d worked hard to buy their own farm, and weren’t afraid to keep working to make it profitable. But events beyond their control start to take their toll: he seasons are unkind, then Matt’s truck catches fire and then, when the saving rain finally comes, their precious fertiliser is stolen, making it impossible to continue.

With the farm gone, Anna is determined to rebuild their life, even though it is nothing like they had dreamed of. They can start again, she is sure, even if just for the sake of their daughter. But Matt isn’t convinced. He is caught up in searching for answers. He is going to solve the mystery of the stolen fertiliser and put the wrong to right. As each works to follow their hearts, Matt and Anna’s relationship starts to crumble. Perhaps it will be too hard to put it back together again.

Purple Roads is a rural fiction tale which is an interesting blend of romance, mystery and contemporary fiction. There’s a lot going on, with Anna being revealed as a strong, resilient type who can overcome adversity and work for change, and Matt’s struggle with depression and financial adversity being explored. Both characters are well developed as are other minor ones.

An entertaining read which will appeal to those for a taste for realistic rural fiction.

Purple Roads, by Fleur McDonald
Allen & Uniwn, 2012
ISBN 9781742374819

Available in good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

The Coat, by Julie Hunt & Ron Brooks

The coat stood in a paddock at the end of a row of strawberries. It was buttoned up tight and stuffed full of straw and it was angry.
‘What a waste of me!’ it yelled to the sun and the sky and the crows and the paddock.
‘What an unbelievable waste!’

A coat abandoned to life as a scarecrow on a strawberry farm sees an opportunity for change when a down and out man passes by. The coat beckons the stranger over and soon the man, recognising the beauty and potential of the coat, is swooping and soaring on an adventure. Together they travel to Big Smoke where, in a cafe, the man discovers the amazing talents of the coat, and of himself, as they play and perform for an adoring audience.

The Coat is a treasure of a picture book, with the delightful quirkiness of a talking, talented coat and an exciting adventure and transformation for both man and coat. There are messages and subtexts aplenty – the value of friendship, finding hidden talents, belief of self and in others, and more, making this a text which could be used in the classroom across the year levels, but it also just a book to be treasured.

The text is presented as a script font, initially against sepia-hued backgrounds. there is no colour in the illustrations as both coat and man are dejected and see little purpose in their lives. Colour starts to seep in as man and coat soar towards Big Smoke with the performance scenes featuring rich washes of colour. The book as a whole has a big rich feel with the burgundy hues of the cover making it a volume you want to hug.

This is an adorable book.

The Coat, by Julie Hunt and Rob Brooks
Allen & Unwin, 2012
ISBN 9781741146059

Available from good bookstores or online from Fishpond.

Ned Kelly's Secret, by Sophie Masson

At that moment, a man stepped out of the bush and all other thoughts fled my head at once.
Short, bearded, middle-aged, wearing a wide-brimmed hat and good clothes with too-large boots, he could have looked like any other traveller. That is, if you ignored the pistols in his belt and the double-barrelled shotgun he was levelling at us.

Hugo is new to Australia, travelling with his French father in search of exciting stories of the gold rush. But before they reach the gold fields they unwittingly become part of a story themselves, when they are held up by the bushranger Harry Power. Afterwards, Hugo’s father decides that the story of the bushrangers is a far more exciting one, and the pair decide to spend some time in Benalla.

When Hugo defends a girl against the tirades of a shopkeeper, he makes some unexepected friends, particularly the girl’s brother, the friendly and fiercely loyal Ned Kelly. Hugo is upset at the poor treatment and judgement levelled at the Kellys, especially Ned, but as their friendship grows he learns more about Ned Kelly’s secrets.

Ned Kelly’s Secret is an absorbing historical tale for upper primary aged readers. Telling just a small part of Ned Kelly’s story through the eyes of a visitor to the country, who nonetheless finds common ground with the young Ned, provides a unique version of events. The story also provides a glimpse at the history of the times, with attention given t travel, landscape and social structure in a way which informs without overtly seeming to do so. Likely to appeal to ages 10 and up.

Ned Kelly’s Secret, by Sophie Masson
Scholastic, 2012
ISBN 9781742830322

This book is available in good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereveiws.

The Queen with the Wobbly Bottom, by Phillip Gwynne & Bruce Whatley

There once was a queen, a beautiful and clever queen, who was loved throughout her land.
But when she looked in the mirror, when she wriggled her hips, her bottom wobbled just like a raspberry jelly.

No matter what the Royal Lady-In-Waiting tells her, the Queen is sure that her people can’t possibly love her, because of her big wobbly bottom. So she offers ever increasing rewards for whoever can solve the problem of the royal wobble. But it’s hard – the royal beautician can’t fix it, the royal inventor can’t fix it, even the royal fitness instructor can’t do it. The Queen is about to despair, until the Poet offers a solution. The Queen doesn’t think it will work but, encourage by her Lady-In-Waiting she gives it a go. The Poet doesn’t fix the wobble but, after writing her poems of praise each day for thirty days, he fixes her self-perception. The Queen realises, at last, that she is loved, wobbly bottom or not.

The Queen with the Wobbly Bottom is a delightful, humours picture book story about self-confidence, wobbly bottoms and the value of good poetry. The message is strong, but there’s no need for it to be hammered, because the humour and simplicity of the solution says it all.The illustrations show the cleverness we have come to expect from much-loved illustrator Bruce Whatley, with the Queen portrayed as a abuetifully round and regal hippopotamus, and her Lady-In-Waiting a clever-looking mouse, with the other court members a delightful array of animals.

This is a picture book which youngsters will love both for the tale and for the chance to explore the illustrations, and educators and parents will also love the message. Poets (and lovers of poetry) will also adore that it is poetry that saves the day!

The Queen with the Wobbly Bottom, by Phillip Gwynne & Bruce Whatley
Litte Hare, 2012
ISBN 9781921714597

This book is available in good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

Welcome to Normal, by Nick Earls

‘Craig, hi,’ Don said, stepping forward and reaching out his hand. ‘Don Nordenstrom. Welcome to Normal.’ He said it as if Normal was just any other name on the map. Welcome to Paxton, welcome to Peoria. The weirdness of welcoming someone to normal had long ago rubbed away.

Being welcomed to Normal is just one of the wonderful quirky moments in this collection of eight short stories from Queenl;and’s Nick Earls. The settings and situations vary – often far from normal as the protagonists travel far from home to explore their own or their travel mates’ pasts, experiencing moments which could be ordinary but manage not to be. Though each story is unique, recurrent motifs of travel, self-discovery and relationship problems travel across stories. Some stories are seen through the eyes of young protagonists watching their parents’ tempted to infidelity and revisiting the places of their yuth.

A favourite story for me was The Heart of Robert the Bruce with a couple travelling through Spain, alleviating the difficulty of being mismatched with another couple as travel partners and so challenging each other to introduce outrageous yet plausible lies into dinner table conversation. Watching the lies grow at the same time as the protagonists’ understanding of their own relationship is both fun and moving, and a lie involving Karen the GPS voice was a highlight.

Welcome to Normal is a wonderful blend of everyday, quirky and thought-provoking.

Welcome to Normal, by Nick Earls
Vintage, 2012
ISBN 9781864711547

This book is available from good bookstores or online fro Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

Mummy's Kisses, by Paula Clark & Lisa Stewart

Mummy’s kisses are so special,
they’re just for you to keep.
They will stay with you forever
and calm you while you sleep.

There are kisses for all kinds of things -waking up in the morning, playing games, meeting new people and trying new things. There are also kisses for when things don’t go according to plan and, of course, for the end of the day. This gentle rhyming picture book celebrates the joy of the bond between mother and child – both when they are alone together and also when the child tries out new things, and takes steps away from Mum. The main pairing, a mother echidna and her baby, are delightfully roly poly and there are also lizards, platypuses and ducks.

The rhyme scans well and is easy to read, perfect for bed time reading, and the illustrations are similarly gentle, in muted pastels, with lots of pinks, gentle yellow backgrounds and pastel browns. The gum blossoms on the cover are embellished with touches of gold, a pretty touch.

Lovely as a gift book, this is a cute offering.

Mummy’s Kisses, by Paula Clark & Lisa Stewart
Scholastic Press, 2012
ISBN 978174283122

This book is avaialble ingood bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

Broken, by Elizabeth Pulford

My head is full of bubbles. Strange, floating words, bits of conversations, bits of people. Some I know. Some I don’t. Hundreds of contoured dots. I can’t see straight. Can’t think straight. I seem to be nowhere. I seem to be everywhere. If only the wretched thumping in my head would stop.

Zara lies broken, trapped in a coma after a terrible accident. She can’ts peak, buts he can hear – and her subconscious is taking her places she doesn’t wish to go. As she struggles to make sense of what’s happening to her now, she also deals with memories of a traumatic event in her childhood, and searches through a comic-book landscape for her brother, who was in the accident with her. She must make sense of it it all if she is to survive.

Told using a variety of forms – first person present tense, past tense, narration of dream-sequences as she adventures through a mixed up world based on her bother’s favourite comic strip, as well as graphic novel elements as some scenes are brought to life in comic book cells. Zara also has ‘conversations’ with her hospital room visitors, though they can’t hear her responses. This is a lot of different forms, but it works, and teen readers will enjoy the variety and the novelty it represents. The comic world is a novelty, but it is also the tool for Zara to confront her past and her borther’s fate and, as the novel progresses, the two become increasingly intertwined.

SUitable for teen readers, Broken is an intriguing read.

Broken, by Elizabeth Pulford
Walker Books, 2012
ISBN 9781921529887

This book is available from good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.

Tanglewood, by Margaret Wild & Vivienne Goodman

‘What is family?’ asked Tanglewood.
‘Family is love and friendship. Family is everything.’

Tanglewood is the only tree on a tiny island, and she is lonely. She calls to the dolphins, the seals and the birds to come and play with her, but they don’t, and Tanglewood thinks she might die of loneliness. Then, in the midst of a storm, a seagull falls into her branches, and Tanglewood shelters her. When Seagull leaves, to return to her family, Tanglewood is even more alone, having known the feeling of company, but she stays strong, because one day Seagull will return. When that day comes, Tanglewood gets a delightful surprise – not one seagull, but a whole flock, bearing the gift of life in the form of seeds.

Tanglewood is a breathtaking collaboration. Margaret Wild’s text is powerful, syaing enough but never too much and moving like a gentle stream from page to page. Read aloud, the words entrance. The illustrations are a mix of sizes, form double page spreads, to multiple panels on a page, as well as single panels and horizontal panels spanning the middle of spreads with text above and below. The might of the sea, the sparsity of the lonely island and the beauty of the gulls are all captured.

This is a charming, wrenching, gorgeous story.

Tanglewood, by Margaret Wild & Vivienne Goodman
Omnibus, 2012
ISBN 9781862915701

This book is available from good bookstores or online from Fishpond. Buying through this link supports Aussiereviews.