Feb/Mar 2012 - The Brilliant World of Tom Gates by L Pichon

Last month's read was Roald Dahl Funny Prize winner The Brilliant World Of Tom Gates by Liz Pichon.

This is the story of Tom; his friends, family, trials and tribulations. Dire camping trips, mean teachers, annoying classmates, crazy excuses for not handing in homework, and tips for winding up your big sister - they're all here; interspersed with Tom's doodles which decorate every page.

This was a big hit with the book group - the first unanimously postive reception we've had for a while! Here are some of their comments...

"The Brilliant World of Tom Gates is amazing. I would recommend it to anybody. It is very, very funny." - Poppy

"If you like funny books then you'll love this." - Tabitha

"It's really funny." - Freya

Everyone thought they'd read the other Tom Gates books; in fact Tabitha and Poppy have read all three and Ana has also read the second book!

Here are the book group's Tom Gates inspired doodle pictures:

Page Turners' rating for The Brilliant World of Tom Gates : 4.5/5

Loving Liz Pichon's website!
http://www.lizpichon.co.uk/home.htm

That's a not-so-subtle hint at our next book...! ;o)

December '11/January '12: The Salt-Stained Book by Julia Jones

Our last read was The Salt-Stained Book by Julia Jones, volume 1 of her Strong Winds trilogy.

Here's the blurb from the back of the book:

"In 1945, two brothers die in the icy Barents Sea and a book is all that survives of them. More than sixty years later Donny and his mother set out for Suffolk to meet his mysterious great aunt.
There is an accident and Donny is taken into care. But are the officials all that they seem and why won't they believe Donny's story? Soon he discovers that his life has been built on a lie. Only the new friendships he makes and an unsuspected talent for sailing help him steer his way through dangers that he cannot understand towards a knowledge of his own identity - and the secrets of a salt-stained book."

It made for good reading, but the group had several criticisms. They felt there were too many sailing terms used, and that you probably needed to have experience of sailing to be able to fully enjoy the story. The group thought that a glossary would have been helpful.
There were some interesting characters in the book, namely Donny's new friends "Awful" Anna, and sisters Xanthe and Maggi, but the "baddies" were not so convincing.

Overall, a good but not a great read.

Here are some comments from the group:

"If you like sailing and Swallows and Amazons you'll probably like this book." - Ana

"There are lots of good, strong, girl characters." - Tabitha

"A good book for budding sailors." - Lottie

Page Turners rating: it's another 3.5/5

Ana's treasure map

Book of the Year 2011

As we've come to the end of another year of book group, we did our annual vote for our favourite read.
The group found it particularly hard to choose between some of them, and as we have such wildly differing tastes within the group, the results were sometimes quite surprising. Several books were rated top by one or two members, and bottom by others!

Anyway, here are the results...

With the same number of points were four books- Sally Gardner's I, Coriander; JRR Tolkien's The Hobbit; Caroline Lawrence's The Case of the Deadly Desperados; and our last read, Debi Gliori's Pure Dead Magic.

In 2nd place was Gill Lewis' fabulous debut novel Sky Hawk. This heart-warming tale of friendship, hope and an amazing journey deservedly scored very highly with nearly everyone in the group.

And in 1st place was our read from way back in December last year to January of this year, Wilma Tenderfoot and the Case of the Frozen Hearts by Emma Kennedy. Wilma won everyone over with her adventures, and some of the group have gone on to read the following books in the series, which is always a good sign!

Looking forward to another year of discovering great books and new authors.

November/December: Pure Dead Magic by Debi Gliori

Our latest read was Debi Gliori's funny fantasy Pure Dead Magic.

Pure Dead Magic tells the story of The Strega-Borgia children, Titus, Pandora and baby Damp, and their efforts to rescue their father, kidnapped by his evil half-brother who wants to get his hands on the family fortune.

A new nanny with a big secret, an array of magical creatures living in the basement and Tock, the crocodile, who patrols the moat are just some of the larger than life characters we meet in this riotous mix of traditional fantasy and modern technology with a large dollop of madcap humour thrown in for good measure.

Again, we had some major differences of opinion over this book - some loving it, some hating it and the rest somewhere in between! Here are some quotes from the group:

"A very good book. I liked the animals." - Poppy

"It's alright, but I probably wouldn't recommend it." - Lilah

"I would recommend it - I really liked it." - Willow

"It's a really good book and I recommend it, but make sure you check the Dramatis Personae because there are a lot of long and complicated names to keep track of!" - Lottie

                                Tabitha's picture of Tarantella

Page Turners Rating: 3.5/5

Another catch-up!

I've been very bad and missed posting about our last two book group meetings, so I'm going to do a brief catch-up, then I can get on with a full post about our latest book. Sorry!

So, back in September/October we read The Sword in the Stone by T.H.White.

It wasn't the most popular of our choices, but some members of the group really enjoyed it.

Lottie said: "If you read it you should persevere, because it gets quite good."

Poppy said: "It's quite long, but it's a good book and worth reading."

The Sword in the Stone Page Turners rating: 3/5

In October the group voted for A Tale Dark and Grimm by Adam Gidwitz for our spooky Hallowe'en read.

This was a book that really polarized opinion! Willow liked it so much she read it twice, Lilah also loved it, but Lottie hated it. Funny and gory, it wasn't quite as scary as it made out, but it seems a love it or hate it kind of book.

A Tale Dark and Grimm  Page Turners rating:  4/5

Ruby Redfort Look Into My Eyes by Lauren Child

I am a member of my local Waterstones' Junior Proof Readers Club, who lend out proof (uncorrected) copies of books before they've been published in return for a short review. I was really excited when I heard that they had an advance copy of Lauren Child's new book, Ruby Redfort book and sent my dad and my sister out to get it for me right away!



This is what the book will look like.

I am an extraordinarily massive Clarice Bean fan and enjoyed reading about Ruby Redfort, the girl Secret Agent who is the main character in Clarice Bean's favourite books. I saw Lauren Child do a talk last year and she said that she was currently working on a Ruby Redfort book so I've been looking forward to it ever since!

Ruby Redfort Look into My Eyes is amazing, I absolutely loved it. It's really exciting, scary in places and has lots of action.

It's a bit different to how Clarice talks about her in the books, but maybe the actual book will have some changes when it's published.

Ruby Redfort uses secret codes throughout the book, and this inspired me to make up my own codes which was lots of fun.

I recommended this book to my sister Tabitha, who also loved it, and I would recommend it to children aged 9 - 12 who like exciting stories.

The front of the proof copy

The back of the proof copy