Butterfly Girl by Ashling Kwok, illus. Arielle Li. Pub. Exisle Publishing, 2024.

This beautifully illustrated picture book in watercolours, opens with Olivia’s Butterfly Garden with Olivia taking tea amongst the butterflies who are her only friends. A trifle sad I thought but Olivia can’t imagine a world without butterfly friends.

Then everything changes and Olivia moves to the gloomy city and an apartment on the top floor of a city block. No butterflies anywhere and little prospect of there ever being butterflies. Great sadness.

But Olivia is not a quitter and she quickly works on a balcony garden with her butterflies favourite things but still they stayed away. Olivia waits and dances and sings to attract them and she wonders if she will ever find a friend again. Read the rest and see what happens.

Well told and beautifully illustrated with a great message.

In the back are instructions on how to grow a Butterfly garden.

Faelan the Wolf Bk 2. Into the Lockjaws by Juliette MacIver. Pub. Scholastic, 2023

Faelan the wolf with a difference, goes on a mission into the Lockjaws, a dangerous mountain system that is part of the territory ruled by the ruthless and dangerous leader of the enemy wolf pack, Lord Varg.

Accompanying Faelan are the daughter of Faelan’s pack leader, Tala, plus friends Luna and Ralph. The mission is to avoid war with Varg by offering him territory and at Varg’s request to meet his son who is suspected to be Faelan.

Things don’t go as expected and there is a fight and an escape that will have you excited and breathless. Into the fray comes Avian the ninja chicken who has mastered fire, something feared by all wolves. But Avian has a mission of her own – she plans to free all 1008 chickens including her mother from the human farm and take them to safety and she needs Faelan to help her.

Like the first part this novel is short, easy to read exciting and with good messages about friends and loyalty. But there is much danger with Varg and his pack determined to wipe them out. Is Varg Faelan’s father, what will happen if the skulking Weylin becomes leader? Will Avian be able to free her chicken’s and is this a wise thing to do amidst a pack of wolves?

I look forward to Book 3 Faelan the Fearless.

Tails of Tangleby Gardens 2 by Sue Heazlewood, illus. Jane Smith. Pub. Auckram Publishing Ltd, 2023

When I picked up this hardback picture book sized creation I knew immediately I was in the presence of something special. It is the sequel to the first Tangleby Tails book which I never saw but have since viewed.

Tangleby gardens is a real garden and all the action takes place somewhere in this garden which is full of animated animal children. There are cats, mice, hedgehogs, frogs, rabbits, birds and they all love cooking and eating easily made food.

The book is full of recipes that children can make themselves and there are three stages of ability denoted by 1, 2, or 3 tomatoes. Children generally love to cook and create yummy food and that is what the animals do here.

Jane Smiths animated characters are a joy to read about. It begins just before Christmas when two ducks turn up after a bit of and accident. The picture of them top and tailing on the couch is a delight but then all the pictures are a delight. I loved the hedgehog with her little doll.

There is drama in the script as “the rats laughed their evil laugh and then left the little ones in the cage and in the dark”. Rats do that. A good lively story that concludes with a mysterious map at the grown-ups Ball.

Check it out, it is adorable. Good read-a-loud for pre schoolers and juniors and for kids up to 10 years old.

A quality publication.

Big Little Blue: SandyPants by Raymond McGrath. Pub. Scholastic 2023

This is madness and craziness on a stick but is well worth a read for juniors because it is about friendship and making friends.

Big Blue and little Blue are penguins and they are friends or best friends or bestest best friends or bestest, bestest best friends. I think you get the picture, what does it matter where you come as long as you are a friend?

Three stories about friends with a lesson about friends and friendship between stories. Give friends space, friends come and go through your life.

There is a hermit crab, a rock called Fred and a shag in the stories that add to the fun.

It is a graphic novel format with big text and lots of fun. It is the first of three planned books. Good for the junior library. kids will understand the fun while adults will roll the eyeballs.

Lopini the legend by Feana Tu’akoi. Pub. Scholastic 2023.

Reading should be about fun and enjoyment and this short novel for primary and Intermediate pupils fits the bill.

It is often said that success breeds success but is the reverse true that failure breeds failure? This is one of the themes of this entertaining Tongan-Palangi novel.

Lopini is a year 8 student and is a legend in his school. He has a good friend in Fi and he is successful in everything he does until he is replaced in the kapa haka group by a Maori boy who speaks Maori and by Lopini’s own admission is better qualified for the job.

Lopini doesn’t handle it very well and feels a failure which he is not used to. His friend Fi tries to bring him round but Lopini decides it is because he is not used to failure ‘I need to get better at failing and the only way to get better is to practice”.

He gets Fi to suggest things for him to do that he hasn’t got a chance to succeed at like asking a germ conscious girl to change lunches with him, to dance in public and in front of the school etc etc. Surprise surprise he becomes a success and enhances his reputation and gets involved in community projects. But is he neglecting his best friend? Read it and find out.

Very easy to read with chapter numbers in Tongan and English. There is a dour school Principle Mrs Pepper to contend with and some cool stuff that Pasifika and Maori students in particular will enjoy. I enjoyed it so it is not exclusive.

After reading it I thought gee I wish school was as cool as this when I went.

The winner of the Tom Fitzgibbon Award for 2022.

There Are No Moa e hoa by Melinda Szymanik. Illus. Isobel Te Aho-White. Pub. Scholastic, 2022.

One of the things I wish was still around in New Zealand is the Moa. It must have been an impressive bird. But hey in literature we can bring it back and that is what this picture book does.

That dynamic duo Batkiwi answer a call from the forest that suggests something weird has returned. tuatara is convinced of it and feels afraid that it will eat him. Batkiwi are not sure about it and wonder if tuatara has been eating mushrooms but he assures them not. He knows what he has seen.

The moon is big and shining could tuatara be seeing things. Read it and find out.

Excellent illustrations of New Zealand forest life with the ghostly moa memorable.

Little Tales of Hedgehog and Goat by Paula Green, illus. Kimberly Andrews. Pub. Puffin, 2022

Hedgehog and Goat are unlikely friends since goats are essentially day animals and hedgehogs run the night, but they become friends because both are lonely on a typical NZ farming environment.

Goat does what goats do and has a unique dancing style. Hedgehog sleeps and snuffles around but together they can make and tell stories. So they do.

Each story is headed by an aphorism or a saying that has a general truth such as “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth”, “Actions speak louder than words” “All that glitters is not Gold” and my favourite ” out of the frying pan and into the fire”. There are others of course and each is applicable to a story by Goat and Hedgehog about their relationships with other animals like Horse, kaka, cat, dog, pukeko and humans.

All the stories are linked and beautifully illustrated by Kimberly Andrews who gets the characters right and portrays a unique NZ scene.

Easy to read, short, large font and a lot of fun. A good read-a-loud for juniors and a bed time story.

Colour the Stars. Taea nga Whetu by Dawn McMillan, illus. Keinyo White. Translation Ngaere Roberts. Pub. Scholastic, 2022.

The 10th anniversary edition of this classic picture book for everybody with Maori language translation and stunning new illustrations.

Isaac and Luke are friends but Luke is blind and has no understanding of what colours are. Isaac takes Luke on a walk so that he witnesses yellow of the sun, the green of a fern leaf, the brown of the earth, the red of blood from a stubbed toe and the blue of the sky.

Luke in turn teaches Isaac the sounds of nature because this is his world. “when you can’t see, you have to listen”. At night when it is black, Luke knows all about black, Isaac and Luke get to know what the stars look like. A sensitive and moving story.

Valuable not only as a story to describe difference between sighted and unsighted but also to appreciate the Maori language

Skandar and the Unicorn Thief by A. F. Steadman. Pub. Simon & Schuster, 2022.

The first of a new series that has taken the publishing world of children’s books by storm and has already had the film rights acquired by Sony Pictures. It is being seen as the next big thing in children’s literature and compared to Harry Potter, His dark materials and Percy Jackson. Need I write anymore?

This first book establishes the scenario and the characters and if a phrase can describe the theme of the novel it is this “Two souls destined for each other can never truly be parted“

This is a story about unicorns but not the dreamy docile fantasy creatures you read about elsewhere. These unicorns have a horn that is razor sharp and they are creatures that are fundamentally bloodthirsty with a preference for violence and destruction. They have a shriek that is somewhere between a horses whinny, an eagles cry and a human scream and each is destined to be bonded to a human just as the human is destined to be bonded to the unicorn.

Each unicorn has an element-earth, air, fire or water, that they thrive in and their destined partners have that element too and the beginning of this novel has the human and the unicorn matched so that the human and unicorn are bonded from the birth of the unicorn from an egg.

Skandar Smith is bonded to Scoundrel’s Luck but they are different from the rest because both are from a secret and banned “spirit element”. Both have a destiny that neither knows about.

The novel opens with a race of unicorns and riders called the Chaos Cup a sort of Melbourne Cup or Grand National. It is gatecrashed by an evil being called the Weaver and the winner stolen. We learn that the Weaver is stealing other Unicorns, bonding them illegally with humans and has formed a powerful army to threaten the balance on the island of Unicorns which is out at sea by a pebble beach, surrounded by the Mirror Cliffs. If you want to know more you will have to read it yourself and you will not be disappointed.

Well written, excellent characters that you can relate to, Skandar is a good role model. An incredible world is created and of course those nasty unicorns. There are casualties along the way, an inevitable battle with the Weaver and big surprises. You will keep reading long after you want to put it down and watch out for the Silver Unicorn.

Roo and Vladimir (an unlikely friendship) by Minky Stapleton. Pub. Scholastic.

Roo is a big dog. Hairy and clumsy, with big teeth but loveable just the same.

All the other dogs in the neighbourhood are scared of him and he is lonely.

Then along comes Vladimir a little Pekinese who is smitten with Roo. They play and sleep and become best friends.

All the other dogs are bemused and think Vladimir is very brave but they keep their distance.

Then a serious storm comes and all the dogs are trapped on the wrong side of the river. Roo comes into his own and the dogs fears are gone for ever. read it and see what happens.

Excellent illustrations of all the dogs. Roo and his various moods and Vladimir with his confidence are superb.