Pirates and Drummers and Treasure

Here are some fun fiction reads that have just hit the shelves - just right for younger readers who love illustrated chapter books.

Dragon Blood Pirates #1-6 Dan Jerris (Lothian)
Pirates lovers, ahoy there. You will love these books.

Death Diamond (#1)
One minute Al and his best mate Owen are searching through a trunk in the attic and the next minute they find themselves stranded on a rocky outcrop - in the middle of the ocean with no means of escape. A ship appears and rescues them (along with a three legged cat that has also appeared) but this ship is a pirate ship and soon the boys are sailing islands in search of treasure, encountering more pirates and becoming prisoners (and escaping) and riding out wild storms and finding out the mysteries of Dragon Blood Island!

This series of six short books (all issued at once) are great reads. Each book comes with a fold out map and a dragon blood tattoo. There is also a supporting Dragon Blood Pirates website with activities and things to discover.

A new Aussie Bites or nibble is always fun ... and these are two more.

The Lion Drummer Gabrielle Wang & Andrew McLean (Puffin)
Lulu wants to learn to play drums. She wants to be a Lion Drummer, even though she is told drumming is only for boys. She wants to lead the parade. She pretends she is drumming at every available opportunity - even at the dinner table with her chopsticks. But drums make too much noise and will drive everyone crazy. She even copies the rhythms of master Li and the GongFu academy. How will she ever learn to play the drums?


Tilly's Treasure Sue Walker & Chantal Stewart (Puffin)
Skipping ropes, mood rings, hula hoops, dangling things for bags ... each week there is a new craze at school. Tilly joins in with her wonderful treasure she has found, or created, but each time the other kids at school think hers is never as good as the real thing - that is until Tilly's dad shows her something he learnt at school. Soon everyone wants to join in with Tilly's craze!


Enjoy, read and read some more!

More New Picture Books

Here are more new picture books to read and share and enjoy!

The ABC Book of Lullabies (ABC Books)
Thirteen wonderful Australian illustrators have each chosen their favourite lullaby to illustrate -- and this is their book. It features the glorious illustrations of Tamsin Ainslie, Jonathan Bentley, Gaye Chapman, Janine Dawson, Wayne Harris, Ann James, Stephen Michael King, Alison Lester, Caroline Magerl, Kilmeny Niland, Cheryl Orsini, Anna Pignataro and Emma Quay. A luscious book to be treasured and cherished. A wonderful gift book for a new arrival.


Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport Rolf Harris (Scholastic Australia)
Written, recorded and illustrated by the amazing Rolf Harris ... Here is his picture book, complete with the DVD of his classic 1960s Aussie song.
The illustrations are all new and in Rolf's unique painting style.
Readers of all ages will love this book!


Donald Loves Drumming Nick Bland (Scholastic Australia)
Drummers love drumming (sometimes all the time - even in their sleep) and every drummer has been told more than once that they are drumming TOO LOUD! This is a book just for them.
Donald loves drumming, all day and all night. But his family says he is TOO LOUD. So Donald searches for a new favourite activity but nothing 'beats' drumming. And then Donald had an idea. Fun!

Picture Books Galore (mostly for the young)

Lots of wonderfully delightful picture books have been hitting the shelves. They are great for sharing at any time of the day.

Sophie Bakes a Cake Tina Burke (Penguin Books)
Sophie and her cheeky doll Scarlett are helping to bake a cake. With all the ingredients ready she prepares the mixture but along to way Scarlett informs Sophie that the cakes needs some extra ingredients ... like vegemite and peanut butter and a green crayon and Sophie of course adds the extras. Together they watch the cake bake and then its time for tasting. How will this special cake taste? Sophie is gorgeous and this is a yummy story!

Big Red Hen and the Little Lost Egg Margaret Wild & Terry Denton (Penguin Books)
Big Red Hen loves looking after everyone else's babies but she longs for her very own baby to look after and kiss goodnight! One morning when she was scratching for seeds she found some hay and in that hay was a warm egg. She sets out to discover the egg's owner but when no owner is found the other adult birds decide that big red hen is the best one to look after it! She decides that she will love the baby no matter what type of bird it is but when it hatches she is in for a very big surprise. This is a tender loving story of unconditional love.

The Two-Hearted Numbat Ambelin Kwaymullina & Ezekiel Kwaymullina (Fremantle Press)
A beautiful story with stunning and vibrant illustrations. Numbat has two hearts, one of feather (making him soft and gentle but exhausted from helping others) and one of stone (making him powerful and strong but tough). But having two hearts was troublesome so Numbat sets out on a journey to find out which heart to keep. Eventually he discovers the truth about strength and about gentleness and what his true heart really is.

Double Trouble Deborah Niland (Penguin Books)
The perfect book for twins and the perfect book for exploring the wonderful chaos of the daily life of twins.
There's double trouble in the morning and double trouble getting dressed. There’s double trouble at breakfast and playing and all through the day. so much trouble is there that at night time mummy is all worn out and falls asleep ... but there’s still a little more double trouble!

Sunday Chutney Aaron Blabey (Penguin Books)
Imagine living all over the world. Sunday chutney does and it is the most extraordinary life. It would be great, new places, new people and new schools ... but being the new kid in school - that isn't so much fun. And not living in the same home - well she doesn't care about that, there are so many good things to do ... or does she? A lovely book from the creator of Pearl Barley.


Pilgrim Jo Oliver (New Frontier)
This is a story about a boy and his father and sharing their first sea adventure together. The boy unsure of the adventure ahead relies on the strength of his father who reassures and protects his son.
It is also the story of love and family and memories, of remembrance and of returned soldiers and the places they have been - and of coming safely back home.


DO grab some of these lovely books and enjoy the time sharing them!

More Great Fiction

Dangerous Games: Fletcher Smith, Sports P.I. Jonathan Harlen, (Scholastic)
This is sport, criminal investigations and detective work all rolled into one great read.
How did Don Bradman have a test average of 99.94? Was it because he had a good luck charm that the Don had now passed to Tom Baker who was scoring remarkably well until he lost the charm. Now it is the task of Fletcher Smith PI to find the lucky charm and restore it to its rightful owner ... but how do you find a lucky pig's foot when it was lost in a crowd of cricket enthusiasts? Will soemone new grab hold of it and become a sporting megastar?


One Beastly Beast, Two Aliens, Three Inventors, Four Fantastic Tales! Garth Nix (Allen&Unwin)
Garth Nix writes wonderful stories and this book is a collection of four shorter stories. there are stories about a pirate and a beastly beast, strange inventions, rats, aliens, enchanted penguins and of course a princess, and a serpent and a dragon.
These are magical adventures and wonderful reads.



White Crane: Samurai Kids Book 1 Sandy Fussell & Rhian Nest James (Walker Books)
Set in the time of feudal Japan this is the story of Niya Moto a one legged boy training to be a great samurai warrior. When all other samurai schools reject him, the Cockroach Ryu, headed by Sensei Ki-Yaga, takes him in to join other rejected students -- Kyoko an albino girl, Mikko a boy with one arm, Taji a blind boy, Yoshi a huge boy who refuses to fight and soon Nezume. Under their legendary samurai warrior training they develop their skills in all of the samurai arts from sword fighting to calligraphy. Together, they make the treacherous journey to the Samurai Games and confront the mighty Dragon Ryu to compete for the trophy and the honour of being the best Ryu. Will the students master their strengths and their weaknesses and work as a team?


UFO Afloat Dave Hackett (Penguin)
The family is at it again on another unavoidable family outing and this time they end up on an ocean liner ... Jess has taken off with Brad (a wannabe rock star who is off to film a music video in front of a live volcano) on their 'love' journey. When the family chase the love birds and end up on the ocean all matter of craziness sets in ... and a little nausea too for mum who is struck with a contagious virus that confines her to her cabin for the cruise.
This is a ship load of fun and laughter and giggles.

Grab these wonderful books for fun reads.

Fun Fiction Reading

Three new fiction titles for fun reading!

The Detachable Boy with One Loose Foot Scot Gardner (Allen&Unwin)
This book is truly funny. a great read that will have kids in stitches ... stacks of kids have asked the questions what if my body parts could come apart ... well this book is one example of what would happen!
John Johnson's body parts fall apart he can be dismembered quite easily ... a sneeze can blast his head off, his feet can wriggle free and his hands can walk around all by themselves. So when Crystal, one of his best mates is kidnapped by men in vinyl suits and ends up being held in the USA as a prisoner what does John do ... he packs himself into a suitcase and is posted to the USA to rescue Crystal - aided by his other best mate Ravi.
A crazy wonderful read full of silliness and body bits!


10 Rules for Detectives Kierin Meehan (Penguin)
In a small country town its hard being an awesome private detective - there's nothing to be detecting at first. Soon Boris and Kev and the 'worst girl in the universe' Julia - are on the search for a bushranger's hidden treasure, find out about a horse riding ghost appearing, discover creepy bats appearing in town, find ancient letters and caves and mysterious people and of course come up with ten rules for detecting along the way.
Another fun read.


Don't Kiss Girls Pat Flynn (Penguin)
Tony Ross is in lurve with the most popular girl in school. Unfortunately for Tony he is not the best looking guy, girls don’t like him much and he's not too smart either. And as often is the case the path of true love is not too smooth! There is the school musical and kissing and braces all are part of Tony's story. And as Tony learns the art of kissing ... things go from bad to worse!
The six small stories that make up this book are fun! As well as the great read kids will be flipping pages to see the kids run at the top of the page!

Don't be surprised if there is lots of laughter and giggles when kids read these books.

New Picture Books for younger and older readers

Here we go with new picture books - including one for Christmas .... it's not that far away!

An Aussie Day Before Christmas Kilmeny Niland (Scholastic Australia)
Before the NIGHT before Christmas comes the DAY before Christmas and this is the book that explains everything that happened on that day. This glorious picture book is from the creator of the hugely successful An Aussie night Before Christmas.
'Twas the day before Christmas and in his beach shack,
Santa was snoozing flat on his back.
'Shake a leg, love,' Sheila Claus said.
'Time to get ready for the big night ahead.'
This is the book that tells how Aussie Santa gets ready to deliver his presents.

Cheeky Monkey Andrew Daddo & Emma Quay (ABC Books)
Cheeky monkey, sleepy head, funny bunny, lucky duck, silly billy ... they are all names that adults call their children and these words (and more) are all part of this delightful book. Explore life for a family as they move through the day beginning with a 'cheeky monkey' pretending to be asleep. This book comes from the team who created the award-winning Good Night, Me.

A Little Bit Christine & Peter Maniaty & Claire Richards (Scholastic Australia)
This book is a little bit of fun that celebrates growing up!What make up a three year old ... a little bit of everything rolled into one! it looks at all the little bits that go into making a person - the good and the bad, the kind and the mean - and there is story in the art work too for each 'pair of bits'.

And a picture book for older children that will surely pose many questions and much discussion...

Home And Away John Marsden (Lothian)
The refugee situation in Australia is well known. Many refugees arrive here from war torn lands or from lands where their lives are threatened.
Here is a different presentation of the refugee situation shown in a very different and shocking light. What if the refugees were a typical Australian family? How would they cope surviving the harsh realities of living life as refugees? What would happen? How would we feel? This book begins with an ordinary family on a typical day which rapidly changes the next day when the war begins -- the family soon become refugees.

Picture books are great for sharing - reading the words and exploring the wonderful artwork - enjoy!

National Literacy and Numeracy Week

Yes ... it is. It is National Literacy and Numeracy Week.

Follow the link to find out more about National Literacy and Numeracy Week.

Do make sure you also check out the Reading to your Children page especially compiled for parents that links to my new list - Wonderful New Australian Kids Books for 2008 - my favourite books that I have seen published since NLNW last year.

Book lists from previous years are also there along with the Read Aloud Hints for Parents and Caregivers.

And don't forget that on Wednesday it is National Reading Day READ!!!

Have a great National Literacy and Numeracy Week.