"The Storm Whale" was undoubtedly one of the books that brought Benji's talents to a wider audience. The simple story of a young lad who lives quite an exciting existence with his dad (and umpteen cats) on a remote island. Noi always waits patiently for his dad to come back from his fishing trips - but while out adventuring on the island he finds a poor stranded whale. Nought but a baby but still quite a handful for Noi to wrestle back to the bath, until the whale can be properly nursed back into the sea.
Noi does his best, and then dad comes back and realises what has happened. Time for the baby whale to be reunited with its mum!
In fact the Whale might be the one doing the rescuing as Noi and his father realise just how harsh winter at sea can be.
Both books are really beautifully told, but it goes without saying that Benji isn't just some one-trick pony who bashes out a series of books with minor tweaks between each. Each story has its own charm, its own pace and a thrumming heartfelt message to convey.
Noi appears once again in our keepers list in the sublime "Grandma Bird"...
She seems a bit of a stern old bird, but begins to show Noi a side to her that he hadn't known existed.
She boils seaweed to eat, and is generally quiet and believes that children should be seen and not heard - but when Noi is swept up in a dramatic and adventurous rescue, Grandma Bird and Noi bond in an amazing way.
As much a book about our relationship with other generations, as a celebration of grandparents and how amazing they are to us, this one's another little beauty.
Then there's "Grandad's Island"...
Syd's Grandad lives at the bottom of the garden in a wonderful little grandad-house. Syd can come and go any time he pleases, but one day when he goes to visit Grandad, he can't find him anywhere - until he does finally discover Grandad next to a secret door in the attic - a door that leads to a fantastic and fabulously colourful island where Grandad wants to stay. Syd can't stay with him alas, and once he returns home he really misses his grandad very much. But always has the cherished memories of how happy they were together.
It's so beautifully illustrated again, full of colour and happiness - and in fact it's that rare thing, a book about loss and grief that doesn't dwell on the darker side of how those emotions feel, concentrating instead on the joy of having happy memories of someone who is no longer with us any more.
We feel it's also worth mentioning that Benji's collaboration with Linda Sarah ("On Sudden Hill") is also in our Keepers list but wanted to highlight Benji's books themselves, he's one of those folk who pushes the envelope for kidlit every time he puts pen to paper, so we hope if you've not heard of these you'll go track 'em down, they belong in every kid's collection.
Original Reviews (as you can see, no stranger to our "Book of the Week" slot!
ReadItDaddy's Book of the Week - Week ending 19th July 2013 - "The Storm Whale" by Benji Davies (Simon and Schuster)
ReadItDaddy's First Book of the Week - Week Ending 16th September 2016 - "The Storm Whale in Winter" by Benji Davies (Simon and Schuster Children's Books)
ReadItDaddy's Second Book of the Week - Week Ending 3rd July 2015 - "Grandad's Island" by Benji Davies (Simon and Schuster Children's Books)
ReadItDaddy's Third Book of the Week - Week Ending 19th October 2018: "Grandma Bird" by Benji Davies (Simon and Schuster Children's Books)
....and with Linda Sarah:
ReadItDaddy's Book of the Week - Week Ending 29th August 2014 - "On Sudden Hill" by Linda Sarah and Benji Davies (Simon and Schuster Children's Books)
We chat to the utterly awesome team behind one of the most beautiful children's books of the year - "On Sudden Hill" - Hi to Linda Sarah and Benji Davies