The Snow Bear by Holly Webb and Simon Mendez (Stripes / Little Tiger Press)

It's difficult to imagine how beautiful our locale looks when covered with a thick blanket of snow. At the moment we're surrounded by water, and the skies are grey and horrible but Holly Webb's "The Snow Bear" cuts through all that, instantly putting us in the mood for snuggling up in front of a log fire, mulled wine (or in Charlotte's case, hot chocolate with marshmallows) in hand, with a really good book.

"The Snow Bear" is a chapter book and it usually takes us a little longer to work through these but it was worth it. Setting such an atmospheric story out, it's the tale of a young girl called Sara who builds an igloo and a snowy little polar bear in her garden with her grandad as the first christmas snows fall.

As darkness falls, Sara settles down to sleep but is woken in the middle of the night. She looks out of the window to find that the garden has completely transformed into an icy landscape, the igloo has gone and her snow polar bear has come to life!

Nothing is as it seems as Sara embarks on a journey to find her way home, with polar bear cub in tow...

We really loved the illustrations in the book and these just add to the wonderful wintry atmosphere. If your child is just getting into chapter books, progressing from children's picture books then Holly Webb is definitely one of the most important authors producing work like this.

A book to take your time with, snuggle up and enjoy even if the snow hasn't quite arrived yet!

Charlotte's best bit: The way Sara loves her grandad as much as Charlotte loves all her grandparents (who are all awesome by the way, just in case they're reading this!)

Daddy's favourite bit: Holly Webb's luscious descriptive prose is superb, love the atmosphere of this book - akin to christmassy greats like The Snowman. Perfect for this time of year

(Kindly supplied to us for review by Little Tiger Press)