We were all very excited to see what was in store for us this week with our new picture book assignment. This week we have read A Rabbit's Tale by Rob Bounds. This delightful book is about a young rabbit’s adventure after a few narrow escapes on our busy roads. He takes us on a little journey meeting some lovely characters on a quest to find out how he can avoid these dangers.
The story has been used by the illustrator Neil Hunt's school to promote the message "be bright to be seen"
After last weeks teething problems I decided that I would get more sense out of the children by reading it to them all individually as it took a good 15 minutes of mucking about last week before they started settling down. I hold my hands up… we were not the most professional of book groups! What with the girls giggling and Dylan making faces it turned out to be a rather long affair. We cracked it in the end though.
So we started with my daughter Felicity aka Flic who is seven years old (going on 18). Well the first thing that was pointed out to me was that I needed to work on my expressions! Apparently I need to practice my story telling skills, cheeky moo! After a stern telling off she said that she really enjoyed the book and liked the fact that it was in rhyme. She liked the story and pictures very much and would like to read it herself (obviously with more expressions lol). She is a very keen reader and writer and later that evening I had seen she had been writing her own piece of poetry so she was obviously inspired by our little story time session.
Next up is our latest recruit Phoebe, our next door neighbour. Phoebe is nine and is full of constructive criticism and I must say has taken a very keen interest in our weekly story time sessions. She enjoyed the story and said that this would be a great book for schools and to be used as a teaching aid as it teaches you about road safety. She also commented on how bright and colourful the illustrations were so would appeal to younger children.
Then we have my son Dylan who is ten (going on two). Now he loved the rhyming, both of my children have a thing for poetry. He said that the rhyming made the story have a nice flow to it and made it nicer to read. I might add, at this point this was my third attempt of reading this out loud so I was quite the story teller by this time he he. Another point made was that he liked the concept behind the book and how it was not only a good story but had an important message behind it too.
So from the kids we have another thumbs up. From the grown ups point of view…. Well I too have a soft spot for stories in rhyme so was very pleased when I started to read this. The illustrations have been done by Neil Hunt and have a very retro feel which instantly took me back to my childhood. Anything that makes you go back to your inner child is always a good thing in my eyes. The illustrations are created using bright bold colours in a sketchy style that I am sure children would enjoy.
The story itself is lovely, and I agree with the kids I do like the message behind it. It is important to know road safety and I like that you learn this as the story goes on. The words flow very well and engage the reader, leaving you wanting to know what happens on the next page. Yes I agree with the little people this is another fine book for our young readers out there and should be a book in every schools library.
So all in all a lovely read.
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From all at the Holyoake Homestead, it’s over and out for now. Be sure to pop by again for the next installment.
Sweet dreams xx
Weekly picture book blog for http://www.kidliteratureauthors.com/
