...and thereby lies a bit of a problem. Only a tiny teeny insy-winsy bit of a problem because Jonny's books are so durned good that it makes us raise a quizzical eyebrow every time we see a pirate book by anyone else.
Jonny's "The Pirate Cruncher" was one of the first picture books C pulled out of the stacks when we would dive into the library every couple of weeks, grabbing an armful of books to take home and enjoy.
We followed that up with "The Pirates Next Door" and it's that book that "The Pirates of Scurvy Sands" follows as a sequel of sorts - and though Jonny's other books (The fantastic "Gigantosaurus" and our own uber-favourite JD picture book "The King of Space" as well as his superb early reader / chapter books with the same cast of characters found here) are of the highest quality, you can tell he just loves writing and illustrating these awesome pirate yarns.
Once again the super-cool pirate family and their friend Matilda are off on an aventure. Not much seems to happen around Matilda's home town (Dull on sea, twinned with Ennui Sur Mer - a gag that never gets old) so she leaps at the chance of sailing off on holiday with The Jolley-Rogers, and her best friend Jim Lad.
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| Time for fun and adventure on the high seas! All aboard you scurvy rats! |
They're off to Scurvy Sands, an incredible island-based pirate paradise filled with astonishing attractions - and of course a whole bunch of pirate coves who, for some reason, don't really like landlubbers fetching up at their favourite holiday destination.
Jonny expertly flips the situation in "The Pirates Next Door" on its head. This time Matilda, with her perfect teeth, lice free hair and complete ignorance of how to fire a cannon, is the fish out of water that the locals object to.
Matilda's definitely no dunce though, and she discovers something that might just win over all the pirates on the island - after all, who can resist a huge long lost treasure hoard!
The story jigs along nicely and as usual Jonny's art is really the star with some fantastic characters (eerily echoing the landlubbers who fetched up in the first book) and glorious cameos (watch out for a vending machine and a crackingly brilliant arcade cabinet, we'll say no more, there are so many awesome touches like that to discover).
I think if there's any honest criticism to make, it's that the message and the story are very very close to "The Pirates Next Door" - which isn't a problem in itself, as it still serves as a great message about accepting those we deem different to ourselves and the way we treat 'outsiders' in any walk of life.
I loved all the observational stuff though, with Scurvy Sands looking a lot like a Buccaneer-friendly Center Parcs.
As we said rather meanly on Twitter. This book is terrible. Terrible, because once again - just like with his previous Piratical tomes, Jonny has set a ludicrously high standard for others to follow and if we're really brutally honest, we wouldn't care if everyone did the right thing and just gave up on writing pirate stories, and left Jonny to do 'em all.
C's best bit: She loved going through all the cameos, and is still utterly convinced there are many more to find (and she's probably right at that).
Daddy's favourite bit: I loved the idea of this, flipping a story on its head to let it play out again from a different point of view and from different sides. The perfect sequel, the art just gets better and better and we're now agonising over how long we'll have to wait till we see more from this supremely talented fellah.
"The Pirates of Scurvy Sands" by Jonny Duddle is out now, published by Templar (kindly supplied for review).