We do love a spooky read or three at Halloween, and Penguin have a dazzlingly brilliant selection of books to tempt kids this year, truly something for everyone and all ages.

We'll kick off with "First Prize for The Worst Witch" by Jill Murphy.

Released back in September, this is the latest outing for Mildred Hubble, the titular magical mighty girl who never seems far away from chaos and cauldrons.

Even though she's the worst witch at Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches, her heart is always in the right place and she's the best friend anyone could ever wish for.

The story begins as summer term has started at Miss Cackle's Academy. Astonishingly, Mildred has made it through to Year 4 without being kicked out - and this year she has her eyes firmly on a very particular goal. 
But the Detective Society is never far away from danger, and it's clear there's trouble afoot at the Rue.

Jealousy, threats and horrible pranks quickly spiral out of control - and then a body is found.

Now Hazel and Daisy must take centre stage and solve the crime before the murderer strikes again.

Here's a book that's absolutely perfect for today's spooky halloween goings-on....

Here's a rather nifty idea for a children's book, adapting a classic song into a dreamy journey around the world...

Welcome, welcome to another packed bag of amazing chapter books in our October Chapter Book Roundup. Though the cold weather is pressing in, and the spookiness of Halloween is just around the corner we're bringing you another devilishly awesome selection of books to tempt you away from Pumpkin Spiced Latte and all those trick-or-treat sweets.

So let's kick off with the third book in the awesome "Royal Rabbits of London" series by Santa Montefiore and Simon Sebag Montefiore, with glorious illustrations from Kate Hindley.

"The Royal Rabbits of London: The Great Diamond Chase" is a rollicking romp packed full of adventure and fantasy.

The biggest, most beautiful diamond in the whole world has been stolen from Buckingham Palace!

Nobody knows how the sneaky thief managed to take the Siberian Diamond from right under the Queen’s nose – but Shylo and the loyal Royal Rabbits of London will do whatever it takes to solve the case and return the jewel to its rightful place.

Then they discover that Russia's elite sharp-toothed secret-agent minks are in London, could they have anything to do with the theft...?

But nothing is quite what it seems, and the Royal Rabbits soon realise they might need a bit of help from an old friend to solve this mystery...

A brilliant story, a taut plot and tons of character, "The Royal Rabbits of London" by Santa Montefiore, Simon Sebag Montefiore and illustrated by Kate Hindley is out now, published by Simon and Schuster Children's Books. 

We love covering titles that ease the transition between picture books and chapter books (not that kids should really ever give up on picture books!) and so it seems apt that a picture book superstar should be the genius behind a fab little series that are definitely purrrfect for younger readers beginning their solo reading journeys.

"Nice Work for the Cat and the King" by illustrative genius Nick Sharratt is the second book in the "Cat and the King" series.

This time though, all is not well in the Royal Kingdom.

Alas and alack, The Royal Money Box is almost empty and the King is faced with the prospect of hocking the family jewels just to pay the bills (and of course purchase a few tasty treats for both Cat and King to enjoy in the meantime as well).

There's nothing else for it - the king has to get a job - but what kind of job would be fit for a king? Butcher? Baker? Candlestick Maker?

Morrigan is a much-feared Wundersmith. So, instead of the Society helping Morrigan to embrace her power, she is only taught that all Wundersmiths are evil and she must suppress her mysterious ability at all costs.

To make things worse, Nevermoor is quickly turning from a place of safety into one of danger. Society members are going missing, someone is blackmailing Morrigan's new friends, turning them against her. 

It's not often we get to kick up a stink about a poo-based book, this one is 'turdally' brilliant though...

Sam Usher's brilliant seasons series of books continue with our most favourite season of all...

With possibly the sparkliest cover we've seen in a long time, meet Oscar, a mythical creature with a heck of an appetite!

Our Third Book of the week (and no, we make no apologies for needing to stretch BOTWs to cover 3 PBs at this time of the year) is monstrously brilliant!

Have you ever had that nagging annoying feeling that you don't belong where you are? This week's Comic of the Week is a deep delve into that feeling...

Our Chapter Book of the Week this week fuses together a whole stack of our favourite elements to create a stunning new fantasy series that really draws you in with magic...

Our Second book of the week this week is a fascinating slice of videogame history, that's the perfect way for old-skool gamers like me to clue their kids up on some awesome innovators...

WhooooahhhOOOHoooahhOOOHHHAA!

Creative writing is pretty tough, right? Creative writing for children? Heck, it's the literary equivalent of this little fellah...


(Yeah, that'll be me in the cowboy hat and the unconvincing moustache).

The thing is, it's not really the course's fault. Through the two assignments we've had so far (writing a 'funny' story - brutally tough, then writing an adventure story in 500 words - even tougher still) a few things have become clear. I know you love these ReadItTorial list-marathons so here's ten things I can self-critically see are wrong with my writing.

1) I cannot do the '500 words' thing. 

Honestly, when anyone even breathes the phrase "500 words" I'm like this...


500 words? I've barely GOT GOING in 500 words. Particularly with the adventure story I ended up having to cheat things a bit, hacking out huge chunks of my scene setting, character building and world building to leave the slimmest of skeletons behind. Though I hate 'em, I can see the clear need for word counts. All the great advice about 'writing more' then trimming your work down really doesn't seem to work for me.

2) I suck at coming up with character names. 


Thankfully I haven't fallen down the Ian M. Banks hole of naming all my characters without the use of vowels, but still it's durned hard to come up with names that fit a particular story. I've written several things where I've even resorted to calling characters "Character A" or "Character B" simply because I've had no inspiration for names whatsoever. I liked J.K. Rowling's approach of 'grave robbing' - ie nicking character names from Greyfriars Cemetery but I don't tend to hang around graveyards that much.

3) If one idea gets 'stuck' in my head, I can never seem to get rid of it to move onto something else.


This happened with the "Adventure Story" assignment. I knew the idea I'd had was sucky, I knew that I should've just dropped the idea like a hot potato and moved on - but I kept coming back to the same damned thing, absolutely convinced that I could fix it or pep it up in some way. It's like having gum on your shoe and convincing yourself that you'll just make it to that park bench over there before it irritates you so much that you want to take your shoes off and hurl them across the road. Sometimes it's great to try and salvage a story. Other times you wish you could just fire that sucker into the heart of the nearest sun.

4) I'm far too easily led - or influenced by - other things...!

Yep, just about every week I listen to other people's stories as part of the course - and I'm completely blown away by how talented these folk are. Everyone has their own reasons for attending the course, most seem to want to be published - quite a few are members of SCBWI and other organisations, but what strikes me is just how durned FRESH their stuff sounds to my ears.

In the scope of book blogging I'm well and truly used to seeing the same ideas over and over again, and I always try to inform my own writing by making sure it's as far distanced from other children's writing that I've been exposed to as possible. But dang, I'm totally in awe of my classmates who seem to be able to spin up stories with such ease. Genuine hat tip to them all.


6) I regularly break every single one of the rules I set myself when I started out trying to write for children.


I hate cliches. I hate defaults. I hate seeing the same themes cropping up again, and again, and again in children's books and writing - yet here I am a few weeks into the course, writing 'under pressure' (well, you try writing something new every single week for a few weeks, good luck with that) and I'm all over those defaults (the bumbling dad, the two dimensional futuristic dystopia), all over the same themes (Friends are great, generational gaps are insurmountable etc etc). Some of those may be brilliant subjects for children's writing but I can't help feeling a bit disappointed with myself that I'm falling into a great deal of 'lazy writing' this early on.


7) I'm absolutely convinced I can do this. Perhaps wrongly. 


Self-deprecation for fun and profit. Nah, honestly there's still this stupid belief that I can somehow produce something that will work, will catch an agent's eye, and perhaps will eventually make it into print. I have absolutely no basis for that belief other than the tiniest smidge of ability as a creative writer who has progressed from 'never being able to finish a story' to 'can finish a story but it'll need a ton of Mister Sheen to polish it before it can be submitted'.

8) I'm harshly self critical, but hate being critiqued!


Oh yars, that is so me. I'm quite fortunate that I live with the two most amazing women on the planet (my wife and daughter) and that they aren't exactly backwards in coming forwards with an opinion on anything. I know that if I get a tired shrug, a "s'ok, I spose", that this is the closest to critical gold as I'm ever going to get at home.

This is good though, having the two toughest critics to please means that when I take something out to my course every week, I should be ready prepared with a teflon skin for even the sharpest criticism, right?

Wrong. I just can't take it. I squirm inwardly when receiving even the most polite and constructive criticism of my work, it just breaks me - and yet it's the only way I'll learn to break the cycle of writing something junk that is junk and will end up in the junk pile, right?


9) I have absolutely no idea to write for particular age ranges. 


Again this is something I thought might be a lot easier than it actually is. Writing for a specific "Middle Grade" age group sounds like a doddle, right? But it's far too easy (for me at least) to assume that all middle graders or my prospective audience has the same level of understanding, same vocabulary skills and perhaps is as well-read as my own daughter.

Of course, that means that quite often my writing meanders between being "OK" for lower / middle grade but then will veer off at a tangent into YA / Adult territory.

It's so subjective, there are obvious things that you can avoid and need to avoid to hit the MG range (no swearing, no vices, and absolutely no woo-hooing!) but I have the same problem trying to fit age categories to books we review, so it's no real surprise that I can't actually write to a given age range either.


10) I'm too stupid to give up now.



I don't know what it is. It's idiocy, perhaps there's a tiny bit of egotistical vanity in there, perhaps there's still the raging fist-shaking belief that "IF THEY CAN GET THAT PEESACRAP PUBLISHED THEN SURELY I CAN WRITE SOMETHING THAT WILL GET PUBLISHED TOO" (hey, I'm not the only writer who's ever fessed up to that particular character trait) but I feel like I'm actually too dumb to give up. I haven't been writing in earnest for that long, some writers (depressingly) love sharing those anecdotes about how many rejections, how many years they spent shilling their book before an agent took it on and now they're highly respected authors who can command up to 5 free sandwiches and an inordinate amount of free hot beverages at book events (getting paid? That's another thing entirely).

I am going to maintain my idiocy for a while longer. I said this course would be make or break, and I'm exactly half way through it. Will it all somehow click? I may write another readitorial in 5 weeks time to let you know..!

Here's a highly illuminating atlas, using a fabulous three-lens system to really immerse kids in learning about their world...

It's certainly been a year where a lot of people have finally and thankfully sat up and taken notice of what they put in their bins...

When you're used to dealing with the utterly unbelievable but true gruesome facts scattered throughout history, surely writing a terrifying fiction story should be easy, no?

Time for another truly amazing non-fic title from mega publishers Big Picture Press...

Here's an awesome way to introduce your children to the wonderful world of Alice in Wonderland...

Q: What's small, book-shaped and will make your parents go "AAAAAARGGGGHHH" every five seconds?

Great Scott! This is a book that really does feel like it's packed with absolutely everything...!

Yes, yes I know you might feel it's still a little too early to start Christmas Shopping, but time is ticking by...

Oh dear folks! I've just done something really stupid, and selected the wrong year accidentally while filling in my profile on Twitter. So until I can provide an official document to prove I'm not 8, I'm blocked!

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible (hopefully!)

See you back online soon!

Yes, once again we had to stretch things to a third picture book of the week this week - but this one's well worth stretching for...!

HEY YOU! Yes, you at the back surreptitiously picking your nose and wiping it on the underside of your chair. Pay attention! Its "Comic of the Week" time...

Our Chapter Book of the Week is the literary equivalent of having a cold ice-pop dropped down your back by a miscreant child...

Our second Book of the Week arrived amidst the early September "Bookapocalypse" with such a huge flood of titles all arriving on the same day...

Our first Picture Book of the Week this week performs an impossible feat, cramming the entire universe into a book...