Anita Loughrey's blog. This is my journal about my experiences and thoughts on writing. As well as news about me and my books, it includes writing tips, book reviews, author interviews and blog tours.
For more information about me and my books see my website: www.anitaloughrey.com. Follow me on Twitter @amloughrey, Facebook @anitaloughrey.author and on Instagram @anitaloughrey
Spread Your Wings is a heart warming book about growing up. A cockatoo is talking to their child in rhyme about how much they love them , but they will soon be big enough to fly and explore the world themselves.
As we snuggle here together,
gazing at the sky,
I know that soon the day will come
when you’ll spread your wings and fly.
Spread Your Wings by Emma Dodd
The cockatoo reassures their child that where ever they go they will still be in their heart and can come home when ever they want. The stunning illustrations are embellished with gold to give the book a magical,. sparkly feel that glistens as the light hits it.
This would be a lovely book to cuddle up with your child to read at bedtime or on cold wintery days.
By The Sea – Life Along The Coast is a creative non-fiction book aimed at children 8+ but would also be suitable for use in the classroom with younger readers. Coasts have always been the starting of discovery whether by explorers searching for new lands or children sifting through the sand for beautiful shells.
The book starts by explaining how the Earth and the first coasts were formed.
The reader is then taken on an extraordinary journey around the world’s oceans. Each double-page is highly detailed and jam-packed with fascinating information on historic events, famous people and scientific facts. I particularly liked the spreads on the art of navigation, history of sailor’s tattoos, exotic sea life, myths and legends and pirates.
The book also provides a Twenty-First Century corrective to Western-centric narratives about exploration and colonialism including immigration and traditions.
By The Sea – Life Along The Coast looks at every aspect of critical coastal habitats, including the ebb and flow of tides; life in a coastal settlement; artistic depictions of seashores; native animals and plants; the whaling industry; tourism; and climate change.
Readers can spend hours exploring the accompanying maps and scenes to discover fun bites and facts which will satisfy the most curious minds. This is indeed an ” informative, vibrant book that takes readers on a trip around the globe to foster a feeling of connection between their lives and the world’s coastlines.”
A great book for exploring during quiet reading times or to support a topic on the coastlines at all ages. A modern day encyclopaedia of the sea that will keep the children engaged and turning the pages.
You can buy copies of By The Sea – Life Along The Coastby Judith Homoki and Martin Haake from your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org which supports local, independent bookshops.
Wheels – The Big Fun Book of Vehicles is another fun modern style encyclopaedia for children aged 8 upwards. The book is divided into extremely detailed double-page spreads.
“From prehistoric carts to cars of tomorrow, this big, fun book takes a historic journey through a world where everything has wheels, from the Trojan horse to the Harley Davidson; from the stagecoach and the steam train to the Vespa and the Ferrari; from skateboards to electric scooters.
Every spread of this deliriously entertaining and educational book is filled with Tom Schamp’s quirky and colourful art. His sly, subtle texts will make older readers smile. Younger readers will return again and again to these playfully crowded pages to discover what different countries’ emergency vehicles look like; to learn about buses of every imaginable dimension and weight; and to choose which bike they’d use to win a race. Each viewing will reveal charming new details that are as absurdly funny as they are educationally rewarding.”
Blurb from the press release
Wheels explores in picturesque detail different forms of wheeled transport through the ages from stage coaches to limousines and into the future. A child will enjoy dipping in and out to glean snippets of information. At the beginning of the book it includes illustrations of wheels that are antiquities and toys and moves on to wheels from Rome, China and the middle ages. There are no boats in this book. It is about wheels only.
My favourite spreads were the ones on bicycles, race cars and the emergency services.
Children will enjoy exploring the meticulous images during quiet reading time and this book would support a topic on transport at all ages.
Tom Schamps has written and illustrated more than thirty book for children, including It’s A Great Big Colourful World, also published by Prestel.
Wheels – The Big Fun Book of Vehicles is another exciting encyclopaedic omnibus that will keep children engaged and turning the pages.
It is my stop on the epic Do Penguins Like the Cold? blog tour. So grab your life jacket and wrap up warm – it’s time to go polar!
In this entertaining and highly informative book, expert field guide Huw Lewis Jones and nature illustrator Sam Caldwell take readers on an intrepid voyage to meet the eighteen species of penguin and to witness the conservation work underway to protect these incredible birds and their native habitats.
By observing penguins first hand, readers will discover whether penguins truly like the cold, how their diving skills make up for the fact that penguins can’t fly, and how to tell what a penguin had for dinner based on the colour of its poo!
You’ll travel by ship across mighty oceans, visit remote islands and trek across icy landscapes to discover all the different types of penguin, from emperors and kings to chinstraps and rockhoppers. This book is packed with facts, fun and everything there is to know about penguins and gives readers a taste of what it’s really like to work in the wild.
Huw Lewis Jones is an expedition leader, naturalist and award-winning author of books for adults and children, including Do Bears Poop in the Woods? He teaches natural history at Falmouth University and is lucky to have met many penguins in the wild.
Sam Caldwell is an illustrator based in Glasgow, Scotland. He studied painting at the Edinburgh College of Art and is the illustrator of several books for children, including Do Bears Poop in the Woods?
My stop on the tour takes the form of a book review.
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Title: Do Penguins Like the Cold?
Written by: Huw Lewis
Illustrated by: Sam Caldwell
Published by: Thames & Hudson
Do Penguins Like the Cold? by Huw Lewis and Sam Caldwell is a fascinating tour to Antarctica with tour guide Huw and expedition illustrator Sam. On our trip we can learn lots of incredible facts about penguins and where they live, how they survive and what we can do to protect them in their natural homes and habitats. This creative non-fiction picture books contains everything you want to know about penguins and more.
Some of my favourite parts was discovering where the word ‘penguin’ originated from and learning the differences between the eighteen species of penguin, what they eat and how technology can help them.
The illustrations are bold with bright backgrounds and borders that bleed to the edges of the page. There is a lot of action in the pictures to keep young readers turning the pages and encourage them to explore. Included throughout are images of Huw and Sam and their band of excited children who are accompanying them on the expedition.
This entertaining picture book would be perfect for children interested in wildlife and conservation and useful in the classroom to support a project on contrasting environments or Humans and Animals.
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You can buy copies of Do Penguins Like the Cold? by Huw Lewis and Sam Caldwfrom your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org which supports local, independent bookshops.
To follow the rest of the tour check out the schedule below:
I would like to thank Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in this blog tour. Thank you.
To read my other reviews of children’s books published by Thames and Hudson see:
Title: Goddesses and Heroines: Meet More than 80 Legendary Women from Around the World
Written by: Jean Menzies
Illustrated by: Katie Ponder
Published by: Dorling Kindersley (a subsidiary of Penguin Random House)
Goddesses and Heroines: Meet More than 80 Legendary Women from Around the World by Jean Menzies and Katie Ponder is a carefully crafted, hard-back illustrated non-fiction in the style of AA Publishing’s The Woman Who Rode a Shark and 50 More Wild Female Adventurers by Ailsa Ross and Amy Blackwell and A Galaxy of Her Own Amazing Stories of Women in Space by Libby Jackson, published by Century , which is another subsidiary of Penguin Random House. I found this to be a slight diversion from Dorling Kindersley usual familiar encyclopaedic format.
Jean Menzies has divided the book into four chapters: Goddesses, Magical Being, Mortals and a final shorter chapter entitled About the Myths, which discusses how the stories have been shared over the eras through story telling and art work and how they have been recorded in scrolls and famous books like The Mabinogion, often in poetry form. This chapter briefly gives a mention to some of the temples, monuments and festivals there are to worship the goddesses.
The first three chapters have been segmented into sections for example there are sections on creator goddesses, goddesses of the stars, moon and sky and goddesses of animals to name a few. Each of these sections has an introduction and then a couple of the mentioned women from each introduction are elaborated upon with a significant story about the heroine or goddess to explain why they were worshipped. Katie Ponder’s pastel coloured illustrations compliment the stories and highlight the main parts bringing the stories alive. There is also a useful pronunciation guide, glossary and index to help the readers at the back of the book.
Unlike other books of this calibre the women included have not been confined to a double page spread of facts, which makes it stand out as unique. Jean Menzies has been given the freedom to explore why the female entries were revered and often feared just as much as their male counterparts, throughout the ages. It contributes to filling the gap of equality in the world of myths and legends and highlights the diverse nature by showing how each culture worshipped similar goddesses or idealised strong female heroines each one with their own story and achievements.
Goddesses and Heroines: Meet More than 80 Legendary Women from Around the World would be a fantastic resource in the classroom and ideal for any young reader interested in myths and legends. The sections can be read in any order and is great for dipping into and for exploring the stories. Individual stories could be read aloud during story time, in assemblies or even at the end of the day before bedtime.
A beautiful celebration of the contribution women have made to their heritage.
The latest addition to the wildly popular series of bedtime stories imagines what it would be like to have a polar bear for a pet.
What would it be like to have a polar bear as a pet? It might be an unconventional choice, but it would be sure to give the best bear hugs…
Polar bears are cuddly but they’re also very strong. As marine mammals, they can swim for days at a time – that’s serious perseverance! So if Santa ever needed help delivering his presents, guess who he would call?
Join our funny female protagonist as she wonders ‘what would life be like… if I had a polar bear?’
Blurb for If I Had A Polar Bear by Gabby Downay and Alex Barrow
Gabby Dawnay is a writer and poet. She is a regular contributor to OKIDO magazine and a script-writer for children’s television.
Alex Barrow is a London-based illustrator, and the art director for and a regular contributor to OKIDO magazine.
Alex and Gabby are the duo behind children’s picture books If I had a dinosaur, A House for Mouse and A Song for Bear, all published by Thames & Hudson.
My stop on the tour takes the form of a book review.
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Title: If I had a Polar Bear
Written by: Gabby Dawnay
Illustrated by: Alex Barrow
Published by: Thames & Hudson
If I Had A Polar Bear by Gabby Dawnay and Alex Barrow is a heart-warming picture book about love and imagination. A young girl dreams of owning a polar bear and all the things they could do together. As well as being a lovely story it is full of interesting facts about polar bears.
I enjoyed the way the illustrations are part of the text. This worked perfectly on the pdf I was sent but not so well in the e-book as my e-reader did not format the pages properly. This meant the illustrations were all out of place so the text unfortunately did not make sense.
Written in rhyming couplets this book was easy to read aloud. The illustrations of the polar bear as a faint pencil outline gives the desired effect of the polar bear being imaginary. but also highlights how a polar bear’s fur is translucent not white. I particularly liked the addition of double-page spreads with no text. The pastel colours add to the magical feel of the story.
A highly entertaining read. A great book for reading at bedtime and for encouraging young children to use their imagination.
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To follow the rest of the tour please see the schedule below:
You can buy copies of If I Had A Polar Bear by Gabby Dawnay and Alex Barrow from your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org which supports local, independent bookshops.
I would like to thank Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in this blog tour. Thank you.
To read my other reviews of children’s books published by Thames and Hudson see:
A Very Curious Christmas by Maddie Moate and Paul Boston is full of a wide range of Christmas trivia divided into four sections:
Traditions and Cultures
Animals and Nature
Food
Fun and Decorations
Told from the viewpoint of YouTuber, Maddie Moate, with the assistance of Nigel the abominable snowman, Puddles the Adélie penguin and Big Elf this book is a fun read that you can dip in and out of with no need to read it from cover to cover. There are also twenty-five gingerbread men hidden within the pages and some extremely corny Christmas jokes.
If you want something to keep the children amused during the weeks leading up to Christmas this is the perfect book. There are plenty of activities for them to get engrossed in such as a folded magazine Christmas tree, Birdseed cakes, Snowy Owl pine cones, a table top ice hockey rink and a cool quiz at the end of each section.
A Very Curious Christmas incorporates information on environmental issues such as the effects of climate change and has a fantastic multi-cultural approach to celebrations around the same time as Christmas. At the back of the book Maddie Moat lists her many sources and there is a useful glossary.
Ideally this book should be bought and shared with your children before Christmas. It would also make a great classroom resource for activities to do at the end of the winter term, where you can compare different celebrations, discuss pantomimes and do your own performances or try some of the many craft ideas.
A treasure trove of information.
You can find out more about A Very Curious Christmas by Maddie Moate and Paul Boston in my Spotlight here: Spotlight – A Very Curious Christmas.
A Bad Day For Bear reunites readers with a character favourite from Duncan Beedie’s picture book The Bear Who Stared, which was shortlisted for the Waterstone Children’s Book Prize 2017 and No Sleep for Bear published by Templar Books in 2022.
Bear has an important job to do. He has to build the bonfire for the forest party. But he is having a bad day as he gets a splinter, a bump on the head, rained on and slips in a muddy puddle.
It takes a visit to his friend Frog to help put his problems into perspective. The illustrations are bold and simple with some brilliant facial expressions.
A Bad Day For Bear highlights an important message of how talking about your problems can help. It would be suitable for use in a PSHE lesson to encourage discussion on the children’s bad days and how their problems were solved. This book would also be ideal for stimulating memory games and literacy lessons on making lists.
With an underlying themes of being positive, A Bad Day for Bear is an ideal book for young readers at pre-school and in KS1.
You can buy copies of A Bad Day for Bear by Duncan Beedie from your local bookshop, or online at uk.bookshop.org which supports local, independent bookshops.
This book has previously been reviewed on Amazon .
This is another of the beautifully illustrated picture books in the Hello Seasons series about four friends who take it in turns throughout the year to wear the crown and lead the games they play. Now it is Winter’s turn but instead of passing her the crown, Autumn passes it to Spring instead.
As you can imagine Winter is very upset and trundles off to play her games by herself only to discover they are not as much fun when she has no one to play with. Her friends miss her and feel guilty about missing her turn. So they set about trying to find Winter, visiting all her favourite places to go.
They eventually find her sad and miserable on top of the Slippy Slopes. Their quest to find her is made more interesting with the addition of a map at the back and front of the book. The children are able to follow their route around the Season Isle, developing their comprehension skills.
This is a brilliant book to discuss friendship, takin git in turns and how it makes you feel when you are left out out. It encourages empathy and consideration. I found the children’s interactions and reactions to be realistic and the illustrations portray each character’s personality expertly.
Another magical book from author-illustrator Jo Lindley.
Another blog tour and this time it is for a beautiful Christmas book by Rose English and Pablo Rodriguez, A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time.
To get a feel for this book take a look at the blurb.
A seasonal treat, a modern, lyrical re-telling of the Charles Dickens classic – ‘A Christmas Carol’
The book is specially designed for families to share during the Holiday Season, or for young competent readers to try for themselves. This is a beautiful picture book to treasure, with full colour images on every page.
Grandfather Time is a magical clock ~ he brings us the story of young Ebenezer, a boy who is not very caring and really hates sharing. One Christmas Eve, not so very long-ago Grandfather Time decides to teach the boy a lesson. So with the help of his friends; the Ghosts of Past, Present and Future and with lessons to learn he brings forth the first tutor – a little golden-red King Charles spaniel, called Miss Ruby Heart.
Will this unlikely pair be able to teach the boy the error of his ways? Or will he be doomed to be a scruffy, lonely teenager stuck forever in his own little world?
Blurb for A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time by Rose English and Pablo Rodriguez
The author, Rose English, lives in ‘England’s Green and Pleasant Land’, among the gentle rolling hills of the Herefordshire Countryside, Rose’s house is wall to wall books. She even has a ‘Leaning Tower of Paperbacks’. Rose is a dreamer, preferring a simple & quiet life. Often spending time alone, although never lonely, being ever surrounded by great characters when lost in a good book. Working as a school librarian, and sharing her love of books with children, was the best job she ever had. However, life moves on and another chapter was only a page turn away.
Now working in an entirely different library, in Hereford’s Wye Valley NHS Trust Hospital, Rose spends her day cleaning and issuing ‘Medical Equipment’. For Rose writing is a hobby, she is more a Read-a-holic.
However, after winning FIRST PRIZE in a short story competition with The Magic of Grandfather Christmas featured in Seasonal, Sweet and Suspenseful she is inspired to transform the story into books for the young and the young at heart. Her children’s books are often written as stories in verse with a general theme of friendship, caring and sharing with a touch of fantasy and magic.
My stop on the tour takes the form of a book review and I am also hosting a fantastic Christmas Giveaway.
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Title: A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time
Written by: Rose English
Illustrated by: Pablo Rodriguez
A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time by Rose English and Pablo Rodriguez is a clever modern lyrical re-telling of the Charles Dickens classic. Written entirely in rhyming couplets, young Ebenezer is given the Christmas Carol experience by a grandfather clock called Grandfather Time. The gorgeous picture book is written from Grandfather Time’s point of view.
The first ghost to appear is Miss Ruby Heart a ruby red King Charles spaniel that has appeared in other books written by Rose English. She is featured peering in the window on the cover of A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time. She also has her own social media websites @MissRubyHeart1 on Instagram.
The other ghosts are Santa and a reindeer. Each have a message for Ebenezer about how caring is sharing and if you are selfish you will be alone with no friends. This persuades the young lad to change his ways.
The beautiful illustrations provide a warm and inviting experience in this elegant picture book. The good pacing and fun rhymes that help tell the story, make this an easy book to read aloud and so will be accessible to even very young children who can not read yet.
Although, we never actually see Ebenezer being selfish in the book we do witness him refusing to go to bed in a similar way to does an excellent job of showing kids and adults alike how people will avoid someone who is not kind. It practices what it preaches in that at least £1 from every book purchased will go towards donating a book to each child in Hereford County Hospital over the Christmas Season 2023.
Overall, an engaging lyrical picture book which would make another brilliant stocking filler, or book to cuddle up and listen to with your young children on Christmas Eve.
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Giveaway To Win a lovely book bundle (Open to UK only)
Prize includes –
Hardback picture book ‘A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time’ (4 – 8 years average)
Paperback ‘Young Ebenezer ~ A New Christmas Carol’ (8+ years)
Paperback ‘Young Ebenezer ~ Confronts the School Bully (8+ years)
Paperback ‘The Magic of Grandfather Time’ (older readers to adults)
This is where the stories all began a short story of love and loss
Paperback/Pocket Treasure ‘Ruby’s Christmas Gifts’ (Families to share) short stories, poems, puzzles jokes.
Grandfather Time bookmarks, pen, fridge magnet, sticker
Miss Ruby Heart glitter sticker, badge, heart/pawprint bracelet
Sharing is Caring necklace
Christmas keyring
*Terms and Conditions –UK entries welcome. Please enter using the Rafflecopter box below. The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then Rachel’s Random Resources reserves the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will passed to the giveaway organiser and used only for fulfilment of the prize, after which time Rachel’s Random Resources will delete the data. I am not responsible for despatch or delivery of the prize.
You can buy copies of A Christmas Carol with Grandfather Time by Rose English and Pablo Rodriguez from Amazon Kindle here: https://mybook.to/GrandfatherTimeXmas
I would like to thank Rachel from Rachel’s Random Resources for inviting me to take part in this blog tour. Thank you.
Much To Do About Writing 