There’s a Hamster in my Pocket

There's a Hamster in my Pocket
by Franzeska Ewart

When Yosser hears her parents saying Auntie Shabnam is coming over to save the family shop she finds out she is going to have to share her bedroom with her. Yosser’s best mate Kylie has a problem with her big brother Sniper and his mates because Kylie saw them on the street with big bags around the back and their hoods up making sure nobody would see them. When Yosser finds a box among her Nannie’s things she tries to get to the bottom of Sniper’s behaviour and the mysterious box.

review by Kirsten

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Little Darlings

Little Darlings
by Jacqueline Wilson

This book is about a girl called Destiny who lives with her mum, and a girl called Sunset who lives with her rock star dad Danny Kilman and her mum and her sister and brother Sweetie and Ace. Destiny is an eleven year old girl and doesn’t have a lot of money but Sunset’s family are very rich. The two girls meet at the premiere of a movie that Danny Kilman is featured in. Destiny and Sunset become very good friends. Destiny performs in a school talent show and her dreams start to come true. I enjoyed this book because I could relate to the characters and I really felt they were living their dream.

review by Amy

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From the Heart

From the Heart
by Coleen Murtagh Paratore

From the heart continues the story of Willa Havisham, the wedding planner's daughter. Willa lives in Cape Cod with her mother and her step-dad Sam, helping to run their guest house and the occasional wedding.

This year, Willa is given the opportunity to plan a wedding by herself and she is so very excited. The wedding is for her dad's sister, a true eco-warrior.

Along with the excitement of planning a wedding there is unrest in the town over nesting birds and an oddly acting boyfriend to contend with as well as friendships new and old.

I just love this series of books. They are just so comforting. They really give you a glimpse of Cape Cod and a whole different lifestyle. The differences between Cape Cod and Scotland are very apparent as you read these books.

My one word of warning would be, watch out for the title 'Forget me not : From the life of Willa Havisham', as it is actually the same book. I noticed as we have both titles in the library. Coleen is branching into the pre-teen market and the new books have been published with photographic covers for an older audience instead of the familiar, rather sweet illustrations we are used to. So this story has been published twice with different covers and titles. On further investigation I found there is a slight twist at the end of Forget Me Not : From the life of Willa Havisham', which makes me think the wedding planner's daughter is finishing with From the Heart and The Life of Willa Havisham is taking over.

Small Persons with Wings

Small Person with Wings
by Ellen Booraem

When Mellie Turpin was in Kindergarten, her best friend wasn't of the human variety. Her best friend Fidius was a fairy small person with wings (they hate to be called fairies).

Mellie isn't popular at Kindergarten, but once she announces she has a real live fairy living in her bedroom, everyone wants to be her friend. However, as soon as she tells Fidius she has promised to take him in for show-and-tell, he disappears, leaving Mellie with a very red face and more unpopular than ever.

Mellie is now thirteen and is still trying to live down the shame. She has persuaded herself that fairies don't exist and that it was all just her vivid imagination.

Then, when Mellie's grandfather dies, her father inherits his dilapidated inn, so the whole family up-sticks and move to an area where no-one knows about Mellie and her fairy. A fresh start for Mellie or so she thinks until she discovers the basement is overrun with small persons with wings and the nightmare begins again.

Throw out all your ideas and opinions about fairies and read this amusing tale. It will leave you feeling glad that there are no fairies in your basement!

The Secret of the Dread Forest

The Secret of the Dread Forest
by Gillian Summers

Keelie has reluctantly travelled to the Dread Forest with her dad. The Dread Forest is home to Keelie's haughty grandmother, who doesn't approve of Keelie because she is half elf and half human. For that matter, none of the other elves approve of Keelie either.

How is she going to survive in this unfriendly place with only her grouchy guardian cat Knot and a demanding treeling for company. Even her gorgeous, would-be boyfriend Sean o' the Woods is no longer interested in her.

Things start to look up for Keelie when she begins sword fighting lessons, although her tutor is less than could be desired, but with the good there comes the bad and once more Keelie is called upon to save an ailing forest.

This is book three in this wonderful, hard-to-put-down series.

Book 1 The Tree Shepherd's Daughter
Book 2 Into the Wildewood
Book 3 Secret of the Dread Forest

Keelie's adventures are due to continue in a new trilogy - The Scions of Shadow. I will keep you updated on it's publication.

Into the Wildewood

Into the Wildewood
by Gillian Summers

Yay! I finally got my hands on book two of the Faire Folk Trilogy and guess what? It is even better than the first book.

Keelie has moved on with her father to the Wildewood Renaissance Faire and is living in his dinky little homemade cabin. It is not an ideal situation as far as Keelie is concerned. It is so small that you couldn't even swing a cat in it, although you would never want to try that out with Knot. He would have your hand off!

Still there is plenty to occupy Keelie. On her first day at the faire Keelie makes the mistake of ordering a pair of the most beautiful, hand crafted, leather boots. It is love at first sight and she has to have them, but she soon learns the error of her ways when her dad says she must take a job at the faire to pay for them. And so begins a comedy of truly dreadful jobs, beginning with a giant purple dragon suit that smells of sick. Yeugh!

All is not well at this faire, the trees are angry and blocking Keelie and there is a strange white cat following her about. What is making the trees so angry and how is she going to explain her rather strange gifts to her friend Laurie, when she arrives for the summer?

I just can't wait for the next book. It is scheduled to be out in the Summer. Let's hope the UK publication isn't too far behind that.

Breaking News
Book three The Secret of the Dread Forest is out on the 1st of July and just to top off that good news, Gillian Summers has just announced that she has signed up to write another three books about Keelie.

Dumb Creatures

Dumb Creatures
by Jeanne Willis

This is a short book, but a memorable one. The main character is eleven year old Tom. Tom can hear, but he can't speak. He has a lot to say about everything, but the only way he can communicate is by sign language. It is all very frustrating! He can have a conversation with his teacher, but his classmates don't make the effort to learn sign language and even more infuriating, they talk to Tom as if he is stupid. Tom isn't stupid, in fact he is very smart.

Tom loves visiting the zoo. It is the one place he feels really content. Tom can even tell how the animals are feeling by watching their body language. One day Tom is at the gorilla enclosure with his mother, when the female gorilla Zanzi points at Tom's mother who is pregnant and signs to Tom, "Baby". Tom's mother is leaning against the enclosure resting, with her eyes closed, so she doesn't see, but Tom does. He wonders if he has imagined the whole thing, but then Zanzi points to her own stomach and signs "baby here too".

Tom keeps Zanzi's secret. She doesn't want anyone to know, not even the zoo keeper, but when Zanzi's baby goes missing Tom decides it is time to speak out.

The Tree Shepherd's Daughter

The Tree Shepherd's Daughter
by Gillian Summers

Keelie is a true Californian girl. She likes fashion, manicures and hanging out at the mall with her friends. That is until her mom dies and she is sent off to live with the dad she hasn't seen since she was little.

Keelie's dad lives a hippy lifestyle travelling around medieval festivals, plying his trade as a carpenter, whilst dressed in clothes from the dark ages. Keelie thinks she will never fit into this odd place. There are people with pointy ears, a boot wearing cat and the trees are trying to talk to her! Thank goodness she has an escape plan to ditch this medieval geekland.

I have had this book sitting around for a while. I would pick it up and put it down again, only to select something else to read. I knew I wanted to read it, after reading a great review, but I think what put me off was the cover. It just didn't excite me at all, but I am so glad I picked it up. It is such a great tale of friendship, love and moving on with life and I just loved Knot the cat. He reminded me of the cat in Sabriel called Mogget, who is bound to serve the Abhorsen, whether he likes it or not. I can't wait to lay my hands on the next book in the trilogy.

Faire Folk Trilogy

Book 1 The Tree Shepherd's Daughter

Book 2 Into the Wildewood

Book 3 The Secret of the Dread Forest

How Kirsty Jenkins Stole the Elephant

Kirsty Jenkins Stole the Elephant
by Elen Caldecott


....she does, Kirsty Jenkins really steals an elephant! It's true! Why does she steal an elephant, that's what I would ask?

Here is Kirsty's story.

Kirsty enjoys spending her free time with her grandad on his allotment. It is a happy place to be and full of adventure (if you have enough imagination to see all the wild animals that live there), but then grandad takes ill and has to go to hospital. Grandad makes Kirsty promise that she will look after his allotment for him when he is gone, but then along comes trouble in the form of Mr Thomas from the Council. He says that Kirsty is too young to look after the allotment and that it should go to the next person on the waiting list. Kirsty isn't going to take this lying down, a plan has to be hatched and it does indeed involve an elephant!

Visit Kirsty's blog to find out what happens to Kirsty after she steals the elephant.