In the first session of a workshop, particularly one with a heavy name like "Language and Literature Workshop", I like to start on a light note. Humour is a great place to begin, and I turn to an all-time favourite - Roald Dahl.This time, I chose five of my favourite poems - "The Crocodile", "The Porcupine", "The Tummy Beast", "The Anteater" and "Little Red Riding Hood". I divided the participants into groups of five, and gave each group a poem to read. I gave them ten minutes to read and understand the poem, and then asked them to perform a little skit based on it.(Spoiler warning: This blog post spoils the punchline of Roald Dahl's "Little Red Riding Hood".)In Dahl's version of "Little Red Riding Hood", after the dutiful comments on Grandma's big ears and big eyes, Little Red Riding Hood says, "... what a lovely great big furry coat you have on." To this, the irate wolf replies, … [Read more...]
Language and Literature Workshops in Schools
Moving on from reading workshops in libraries to Language and Literature Workshops in schools is a lovely step! Working with 250 children was a whole new experience for me ... … [Read more...]
Spellbound
Too much telling and too little showing. Never mind. I'll read some more. This is strange and unbelievable. Never mind. I'll read some more.That is exactly how I ventured into Spellbound. And before I knew it, I had finished reading it.Athene and Zach are opposites in every possible way. They just happen to be brother and sister. Athene hates Zach. She hates him, resents him, and takes joy in bringing him grief. Zach, on the other hand, is a happy-go-lucky kid and never seems to mind that his sister Eeny is always nasty to him. Everything changes when Athene meets Humdudgeon and Huffkin, two members of the Humble Gloam. In a world where Athene, a day creature, is called a 'Glare', the young girl finds the perfect way to get rid of Zach. But she does not account for the guilt that kicks in and compels her to take risks she would never have dreamed of facing for herself, let alone for … [Read more...]
Too Small to Fail
I read Now a while ago and I was not impressed. When Too Small to Fail caught my eye, I realised that it was by the same author, Morris Gleitzman, so I put the book away again. When I visited the library, it caught my eye again. And again. It was time to read it.Too Small to Fail was sweet and pacy. I am not a fast reader. I like to mull over books I read as I read them. I don't devour books, unless they capture me wholly.I read Too Small to Fail in one sitting.Oliver's parents own a bank, but he wants more. Not squillions of dollars. He just wants a dog. When the dog is used to blackmail Oliver, he gets immersed in the murky world of investment, banking, liabilities, assets and credit default swaps. He realises that being "nice" and "kind" are not part of an investment banker's job description. The problem is that he wants his parents to be nice and kind. Unfortunately, they are … [Read more...]
Madame Pamplemousse and the Time-Travelling Café
What takes you back to old remembered places and half-forgotten memories? What makes you revisit forgotten parts of your life?Madame Pamplemousse and the Time-Travelling Café explores the idea that taste can make you go back in time and visit parts of history. A contraption that looks like a coffee-machine, fed with the right ingredients, can recreate in your imagination a time that is so vivid that you go back there yourself!In this sweet book set in Monsieur Moutarde's French café in Montmartre, we meet a white cat called Camembert who wears an eye-patch, a young girl, a scientist - and of course, Madame Pamplemousse herself. A quick and easy read, it uses a lighthearted style of storytelling to take you on a crazy adventure.Title Madame Pamplemousse and the Time-Travelling CaféAuthor Rupert KingfisherGenre Adventure/FantasyRating (out of 5) 3Age-group 7+ … [Read more...]
The Story-Catcher – Kindle Edition!
After three years of good old paperback sales, we now have an e-book! For all those who said you did not buy the hard copy, here's your chance! … [Read more...]
Being Billy
When I started reading Being Billy, I felt uncomfortable, but I did not know why. I just could not lay my finger on what made me draw into myself and step back from the book.After a few pages, I realised I was supposed to feel uncomfortable. The book wanted to reach within me and squeeze something that I had buried deep within. For as long as I resisted that, the book made me uncomfortable. The moment I allowed it to touch me, I sobbed my heart out. Sitting in a train, oblivious to the world around me, I sniffed and licked the salty tears that poured down my cheeks.Billy is a young boy forced to be older than he is. A 'lifer' at a home, surrounded by carers whom he calls 'scummers', Billy has only one soft point: his twin siblings six years younger than he is. Other than that, Billy is just a mix of violence and anger, unwilling to be loved, deliberately shoving people out of his … [Read more...]
Clover Twig and the Incredible Flying Cottage
Clover Twig is a very tidy girl with very neat hair. She is very particular about things being clean and proper. She won't do anything she is told not to do. In other words, she has a little bit of an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.When Clover begins to work for the witch Mrs Eckles, she welcomes the challenge. But working with a witch is never easy, however nice the witch may be. Worst of all, good old Mrs Eckles has a nasty sister who wants to steal Mrs Eckles's cottage! It could all have been a nice domestic legal dispute if it hadn't been for the fact that 'stealing' the house in witch language is actually stealing the whole thing and taking it to Castle Coldiron.When you try to summarise the story of Clover Twig and the Incredible Flying Cottage, it sounds incredibly like the kind of boring, outdated fairy tale that should have been lost to collective memory years ago, but it is … [Read more...]
Witch Fire
I always judge a book by its cover, and this one said: Ancient witchcraft. Modern world. And then the title Witch Fire.It intrigued me immediately, and it did not let me down. I did not do any research before I started reading. I did not find out whether Witch Fire was part of a series. As I read on, I realised that the book either had an awe-inspiring back-story, or it had a prequel. I only just discovered that the second is true, and therefore the first too.Witch Fire makes a world come alive. Lucas Stearne and Gloriana Starling are worlds apart, almost cruelly drawn together in the world of witchcraft. Fae is not something that one can choose to have, in the world of Witch Fire. Lucas, coming from a long line of Inquisitors, is nearly ashamed of possessing fae. Gloriana, on the other hand, delights in it, brought up as she is in an East End coven. Bravery, truth and circumstances … [Read more...]
Apache
It's been a while since I wrote about what I was reading for some reason. I did read quite a bit, though. Some of the books were worth sharing, but I was too lazy to talk about them. Some were important for me to read - like The Perks of Being a Wallflower. The Perks of Being a Wallflower taught me, finally, what a 'coming-of-age' novel is. Honestly, I was not old enough to read it when I was physically coming of age. Maybe children today are; maybe they aren't. I could, at best, have read it seven years ago, definitely not in my teens.The novel that now brings me back to writing about books is Tanya Landman's Apache. With a workshop on books coming up tomorrow, I have been reflecting again on how little we read. There's so much variety in the world, and we put everything into little boxes that we label 'fantasy', 'historical fiction', 'school … [Read more...]