#ReadItMD13 Theme Week - "Books about Space and the Stars"

The truly wonderful 'Laika' by Owen Davey (Templar Books). You need this book.

Phew! It's time for another theme week and this week for our #ReaditMD13 Theme, encouraging parents to read to their children we're looking beyond our little blue planet and out into space.

My wife and I are both real space nerds and have always encouraged Charlotte to be a mini space nerd herself.

When I was a child, mixing fiction and non-fiction 'space' books was an essential part of growing up. So I'd look at books like this...

The Usborne Book of The Future (Usborne Books). Let's all meet up in the year 2000

...which featured fantastical and sometimes factual visions of our future, with books like this...

Skylab, America's First Space Station (Hallmark Publishing)

Charlotte's interest in space mixes fact and fantasy too, and we've recently loved Owen Davey's brilliant "Laika the Astronaut" (Templar Publishing)  which tells the story of the first living creature in space, a brave little Russian dog called Laika - and how she paved the way for manned space travel. It's still a way off being released (you'll have to wait until November in the UK), but definitely get it on your preorder list, it's utterly utterly beautiful.

On the factual side, once again Usborne are still leading the way with brilliant books about space.

Look Inside Space (Usborne Publishing), a great introduction to all things spacey.

The Usborne "Look Inside" series has a space edition crammed with lots of facts and fun (and lots of little flaps for busy little fingers to lift and explore).

There's also a brilliant Usborne Solar System book for would-be planeteers...

The Solar System (Usborne Books). Take a trip around our  'back yard' in space.

We'll be looking at more spacey books as the week progresses, with reviews of space books coming up. If you've found a brilliant space book to stimulate children's curiosity, please let us know in the comments box, we'd love to share your spacey recommendations!