Sticker Dressing - Shakespeare by Rachel Firth and Diego Diaz (Usborne Publishing)

This is how things usually go at ReadItDaddy Towers when a new sticker (dolly) dressing book arrives from Usborne.

"Hey Charlotte there's a new Sticker Book from Usb...."

(Before I've even finished the sentence, a whirling curly-haired dervish has snatched the book away, and proceeds to bury herself in it for HOURS.

We'd heard of the Sticker Dressing - Shakespeare book before Usborne kindly offered to send us one. I was rather keen to see it because I was interested to see how Usborne could make Shakespeare's plays and sonnets more kid-friendly.

Knowing that Charlotte loves history helped a little, she particularly loves exploring what people did and wore in ancient times but with Shakespeare's plays often crossing time, often set in different periods, how would she cope and adapt?

"Sticker Dressing - Shakespeare" is beautifully illustrated by Diego Diaz, with a whole brace of quotable quotes from Shakespeare's works. Lots of background is given along with a typical scene featuring characters from the plays.

Charlotte already knows who Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet are (Thanks largely to Gnomeo and Juliet, alas!) This book was great for introducing her to some of my favourite works (The Tempest and King Lear) and the plays she'll undoubtedly be familiar with once she hits senior school.

The main lure for a six year old though are the fantastic characters and costumes. It's not exactly easy to explain what a codpiece is or what Leg Hoses are for, but with Usborne's peerless sticker books, one little girl now knows a little bit more about the bard, and can't wait to find out more about Shakespeare's works and the period he lived in (I'll leave all that controversy about whether the Bard wrote all those plays till we can have a good debate about them one day! Go Chris Marlowe!) With over 200 stickers to get busy with, once again you're guaranteed hours of peace and quiet while your little ones work on this (well, until they start asking about those hoses!)

Charlotte's best bit: The beautiful Lady Macbeth (I didn't fill in some of her less...er...desirable characteristics)

Daddy's Favourite bit: What a fantastic way to introduce children to Shakespeare, perfect for the Bard's 450th Annivesary, kicking off the upcoming Shakespeare Weeks planned for throughout 2014.