The "Meg and Mog" books were another example of me remembering books I'd loved as a child, and surreptitiously introducing them into C's reading pile as soon as I possibly could.

The first "Meg and Mog" is an absolute timeless classic, now 48 years old which means it came out when I was four. That sounds about right as that would probably have been around the time I was being bought books like this from my junior school's brilliant "Puffin Book Readers" newsletter - Does anyone else remember those in school?

It's a really simple stripped down tale of a witch and her scritchy-scratchy (but scene stealing) cat, getting on their glad-rags and heading out to the annual Halloween Party with the rest of the witches. Mog is the best kind of witch. Slightly madcap and haphazard, her spells sometimes work but sometimes misfire, but in the end she manages to win the day (in fact watch out for a VERY SIMILAR witch coming up in our keepers list soon).

The beauty of the Meg and Mog books is that Helen and Jan worked so brilliantly together as a creative team - the perfect fusion of a simple low word count story with simple but hugely effective (and still widely admired) artwork. In fact these books were way, way ahead of their time.

Helen and Jan collaborated on many Meg and Mog books covering a huge selection of different themes, but never preachy moralistic tales, always stories that were just plain good fun.

Sadly Helen passed away in 2012 - but the books continued, with Jan Pienkowski working with David Walser on all new Meg and Mog tales

"Meg and the Romans" showed that the stories could still work, even when spun around into something altogether more educational.

It's quite daunting to step into the shoes of another creative, but David managed to capture the tone of the original stories, adding additional dimensions to the characters of Meg, Mog and Owl - but thankfully not detracting anything from the entertainment value of these books.

Jan's artwork still worked beautifully, slightly more complicated and 'busy' than the older books but still absolutely bang on point, ensuring that early readers could completely engage with each story and find all sorts of fun elements to help the stories bounce along.

They're still great books, even now, particularly for kids who love a bit of spookiness in their books.

Original Review Links

Mog in the Fog

Meg in the Jungle by David Walser and Jan Pienkowski (Picture Puffin)

Meg goes to Bed

Our Spooky Halloween Book Blowout with witches, ghosts, and things that go "BOOK" in the night!

Helen Nicoll R.I.P

Meg, Mog and Og

Meg's Car

Meg on the Moon

Sometimes a book's popularity with little miss would completely take me by surprise, as was the case with Edward Ardizzone's "Little Tim" series.

These are classic books, no doubt about it, but when lined up against modern picture books they look slightly quaint and out-of-date, and the core themes in each book are also so far removed from what children experience in their own lives, that you'd really struggle to understand why they appeal.

Of course, there's the answer. It's precisely BECAUSE kids can live vicariously through Little Tim's adventures as a would-be sailor, and experience the excitement of what life would have been like on the ocean waves over 80 years ago - when these books were written and set - and when most boys wanted to be one of two things, an Engine Driver or a jolly Jack Tar.

In "Little Tim and the Brave Sea Captain" Tim wants nothing more than to go to sea aboard a ship. He's given his wish on a day trip aboard a fine vessel, with a sea captain friend to show him the ropes. But soon there's a massive storm and the ship is in danger - and it takes all the captain's nerve (plus a little help from Tim) to rescue the crew and set foot safely back on shore.

What we liked about these books are their length. Again I am here ranting about the length of children's picture books, and the bleated excuses that the reasons picture books aren't longer is purely because children's attention spans can't cope with wordier books. It has nothing to do with the economics of printing more than 32 pages / 12 spreads, oh nossireee!

These books are indeed long, their language may seem a bit prissy and old-fashioned but Edward Ardizzone's innate talent in both illustrating and describing the scenes within is why he's such a legend, and why he's cited as such a huge inspiration to a lot of authors and illustrators, even those whose work is popular today.

(One word of caution. If you're looking for copies of these, try and find the originals before they were 'messed around with' and recoloured. The colour versions are horrible, completely ruining the effect Ardizzone's original inky drawings had).

For sheer escapism if nothing else, these books are well and truly worthy keepers and the sort of future family heirlooms you'll want your own kids to pass on to theirs eventually.

Original Review Links: 

Little Tim and the Brave Sea Captain (80th Anniversary Collector's Edition) by Edward Ardizzone (Frances Lincoln Children's Books)

Exciting action and adventure on the high seas with the Little Tim series by Edward Ardizzone (Frances Lincoln Children's Books)

Tim in Danger by Edward Ardizzone (Francis Lincoln)

I love it when a #Booky100Keeper crops up that elicits such a sharp and happy memory of our book blogging journey.

This one arrived without fanfare, without prewarning (we literally saw no hype, no build up, not even a polite "Do you want to review this book?" but nevertheless "The Book With No Pictures" by B.J. Novak arrived and was instantly met with "no way, not reading it, don't like it!"

I don't know if other booky folk / book bloggers ever go through this with their young bosses. When they dig their heels in about something, it sometimes takes a lot of cajoling before they'll give something a try - but when they do they fall instantly in love with it...

...as was the case here. Of course the main reason comedian and writer B.J. Novak's 'celebrity' book outstrips just about everything else you'll read by a sleb in kidlit is that he fully understands the audience he's writing for. He's a smart guy, and he knows kids are brilliantly smart too - so figured out a way to capitalise on the idea that a book without pictures that makes your adults look like complete nincompoops as they read it aloud to you would be a stroke of absolute genius, and wildly popular. And it is.

Let's see why shall we?


Nothing problematic so far....oh, wait a minute, what?


Oh no, this doesn't look good!


GAHHHH! So of course by the end of the book you (the adult reader) feel like you've been 'had' and your children feel like they've managed to deliciously get one over on you as you robotically follow the instructions laid out in front of you.

It makes for a superb, engaging and brilliant performance piece if you enter into the swing of things properly - and it's guaranteed to put a big old smile on your kids' face for sure. I'm slightly sad that we've never seen any follow-ups or anything else from B.J (I haven't googled to see if he ever did another). But this is a keeper and one we still wheel out if I'm getting too ahead of myself and C wants to bring me down a peg or two!

Original Review Link:

The Book With No Pictures by B.J. Novak (Puffin Books)

Oh dear, this poor poor book. It's barely hanging together but we can't bear to part with it!

"Knick-Knack Paddywack" by Paul O. Zelinsky was one of the first books C owned, bought for her by her Grandad Dodo when she was a tiny, tiny mite.

Unfortunately, tiny mites have very little respect for gloriously complicated, delicate but truly mesmerising paper engineering - which is Paul's trademark, and in this bouncy dog-filled version of the famous rhyme, a young boy encounters some very odd little old men - and their pooches - as he recites the rhyme.

It's really designed as a fun counting book but of course the devil is in the details (and yes, you will see this theme again, and again, and again in our Booky100Keepers list - super-detailed books really are us!) and each page spread not only features tons and tons of cool little in-jokes and illustrations, but the whole book encourages play through innovative paper mechanics, helping to drive the whole story along with a real bounce.

C used to insist on 'helping' with the moving bits, which is why the book is just about still in working condition, but needs a bit of restorative TLC in places (we've never had the heart to try and stick ripped or bent or broken bits back together with sticky tape but have managed to at least keep the thing in one piece).

Dogs scoffing bones is a common theme throughout the book, aided by a deft tweak of a paper tab

Sheer brilliance with some of the 'lift the flap' bits and rotating cardboard dial bits (more bone scoffing)

The riotous finale, filled with tons of amazing movement from the child's clapping hands to the little dancing figures and dogs. Amazing work of genius!

If you can track down a relatively good condition copy of this, consider yourself extremely lucky!

Thanks for tuning in for the first of a very special set of articles and a deep-dive into our shelves for books that have stayed with us through ten years of book blogging.

We're starting with an absolute classic, a book that is a gigantic best seller, and one of the first books we bought for my daughter when she was a tiny, tiny mite small enough to fold herself into our laps for a bedtime story.

"The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle is the book we usually buy for folk who are having kids for the first time (if they don't already have a copy themselves), and still as entertaining and brilliant as it was when it first appeared back in 1969.

It's a hugely influential book, with the sort of sonorous gentle storytelling that works beautifully as a bedtime story, but enough surprises (including a cracking ending) and fun bits to keep a tiny tot (or a surly 12 year old) entertained.


The book opens with such a simple and restful scene before it gets down to the important business of introducing the many-legged multi-scoffing hero of the story, the caterpillar!


The section with the foods munched through by the caterpillar is beautifully done, those holes are a stroke of genius (as are the overlap pages) - Just big enough for toddler fingers to poke into (though we almost wish we'd bought the board book version of this, it might have lasted a bit more rigorous prodding by C when she was little).

Both my wife and I have many happy memories of reading this one to her when she was tiny, and it was demanded again, and again, and again. The book is obviously so well known - both as a book and as a brand (the range of merchandising that sprang up around this book around about the same time was we were buying baby things for C was incredible). To us it's part of where C's reading journey and love of books began all those years ago. We still giggle over the 'fat stomach-ache caterpillar' bit, and I still can't resist reading that bit in a slightly pained voice, just as I did 12 years ago (and yeah, it still makes her giggle though accompanied with a side order of eye-rolling!)

One strange thing - I realised that this book actually predated the blog, and for some reason we never actually reviewed it at all - so happy to feature it finally as one of our keepers, an absolute timeless classic we just can't bear to part with.

Original Review Link: N/A

Oh my! I'd completely forgotten about this week's picture book of the week, until C discovered it languishing in a dark grime-infested corner of the library, hidden underneath a pile of cobwebs and discarded lizard skins (actually it wasn't - our Library is lovely, but this was definitely a well-loved copy barely holding together as we read it).

"Fungus the Bogeyman" by Raymond Briggs recently celebrated its 35th Anniversary (which technically means I must've been far too old for it when I first read it to my little brother) but of course it goes without saying that the mix of glorious grime and grimness brought to green-hued life so expertly by Raymond has stuck in the memory for a very long time.

In fact I wasn't quite sure C would like this one at all. It's a weird book, more like the insane journal scribblings of a crazy old monster as he rumbles and rambles, poots and farts his way through an average monstery day.

Fungus and his 'gorgeous' wife live a very happy life in their mucky house. Their son knows better than to come to the table for dinner with clean nails and teeth though!

I think despite the haphazard nature of this, it wins out purely because it came out at a time when 'diaries' were quite the thing (Adrian Mole, I blame you!) and it taps into that part of a child's psyche where the idea of leading a grimy slimy gross-out life is still hugely attractive (yes, even C would probably go for months without a bath if she could avoid it - You know what it's like when kids get to that 'pongy' age, ewww!)

This is glorious though, and I still think to this day that though Shrek was also based on a book, a lot of the ideas that turned up in the movie were stolen wholesale from this book. It's disgustingly hilarious, brutally brilliant and grimly grimy as ever.

Sum this book up in a sentence: If you've a penchant for bogie sandwiches, or love nothing better than lounging in a bath full of slime, and you have three weird nipples (!) this is the book for you!

"Fungus the Bogeyman" by Raymond Briggs is out now, published by Picture Puffin (loaned from the library, not supplied for review). 

Every now and again you just want to dive into a book that instantly restored your joie de vivre. If it's a rainy monday and you need a lift, or if you (like many kids) might wonder about your place in the world, or what makes "you" special, then this is like a soothing balm in book form.

"Super Duper You" by Sophy Henn once again feels like it exudes joy from every single page spread.

Let's take a journey through all the things that make you wonderful, unique, talented, amazing and special...

Sometimes you're louder than an elephant as you stomp around the house.

Sometimes you're as quiet as a mouse. Sometimes you're cuddly and clingy or spiky and moody but always brilliant you!

Filled with gorgeous coloured illustrations and a superbly positive message, this is just the sort of book we need at the moment.

Step into joy, crack open the cover of "Super Duper You!" and thank us (and Sophy of course) later!

Sum this book up in a sentence: Just a riotous fabulous and colourful celebration of you, wonderful you and all the things that make you utterly amazing!

"Super Duper You" by Sophy Henn is out now, published by Picture Puffin (kindly supplied for review). 

Our Third Picture Book of the Week this week is a scintillating and thoroughly mischievous future classic from an incredibly talented duo...

We're celebrating Roald Dahl Day, the great man's birthday with a roundup of some of the titles released with this year's theme...

Can there possibly be 100 dogs and dog-related things in this book? Better get your counting head on, we're about to find out...

Our Picture Book of the Week this week is definitely one for fellow daydreamers. Here's "How to be a Lion" by Ed Vere...

Our Second Book of the Week this week corrects a huge oversight on our part. I can't believe we've never reviewed this book on the blog...!

Here's a fun picture book that lets you get away with being naughty - at least for a few pages....

It's time for a delicious dragon-flavoured slice of picture book interactivity, courtesy of Messrs Fletcher and Abbott...

Sophy Henn is back, and we're delighted to have her guesting on the blog in a wee short while. But first, let's take a look at "Almost Anything", her new book with a fantastic bunny character and a wonderful positive vibe...

Our second Picture Book of the Week this week serves us durned right for bemoaning the lack of atmospheric and dark children's books...

Let's zoom out into the stratosphere in a colourful and vibrant journey of discovery - You Choose your adventure in "You Choose in Space" by Pippa Goodhart and Nick Sharratt...

I have to bow to my wife and daughter's expertise on the subject of Chocolate Cake...

Here's a madcap race and chase across town with a dizzying array of crazy characters, and one lovable chap called Zack...

Oh yes indeed, we were cheering and hooraying at the core theme of this book. If there's one thing we can't stand it's drippy princesses!