Animals Scare Me Stiff by Babette Cole (Red Fox)

By now, you'll probably already know that we love Babette Cole. Her books are deliciously rude, hilariously funny and quite often the exact opposite sort of book you'd want your little darlings to be interested in.

The thing is, whether you like it or not as a parent, kids find poo, wee, bottoms and farting extremely funny even at a tender age, and it's virtually impossible to wrap them up in cotton wool and keep them away from such things.

So why not just embrace it, have a good laugh about it and read a book like "Animals Scare me Stiff" which, compared to Cole's other books, is relatively low on rudeness but still manages to make youngsters giggle.

I'd love to meet her. I bet she's a hoot.

Anyway in this story, a young nervous lad is followed home by a group of animals. Why? No one knows but as the young lad finds out, animals can be scary and there's really only one way to deal with them when they are. You'll have to read the book to find out the secret, of course!

Charlotte's best bit: The end of the book, which I shall not spoil but is rather rude.

Daddy's favourite bit: Babette Cole is a great artist but, y'know what? That bull. That's an anatomically correct step too far I think!

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars