Penguins seem to lend themselves well to amusing little tales for younger readers. Well they're just so durned cute...!
In "What's for Lunch, Papa Penguin" you'll meet an adorable father and son team who run a fabulous food shack down in the south pole.
The only problem is that the menu is a tad limited. Well there are no Waitrose stores down in Antarctica are there?
So Papa and Pippin's cafe usually has Fish on the menu. Fish in everything, even fish ice cream.
And little Pippin is fed up to the back teeth with fish (do penguins have teeth?)
So it's time for an epic road trip across the globe, searching out amazing new ingredients and foodstuffs to bring back to their cafe, to dazzle their customers with an entirely new menu.
It's a perilous trip for Papa Penguin and Pippin. But the end of this story has a nice little 'zing' that most parents will both identify with and inwardly groan at.
If you (like me) spend an awful long time in your local supermarket while your fussy child nitpicks every meal choice, this book will definitely strike a nice penguin-y chord with you.
"What's for Lunch, Papa Penguin?" by Jo Williamson is out now, published by Scholastic (kindly supplied for review).