Oh dear, that whole "parental influence" thing again, responsible for C's absolute unending adoring love of all things Beano shaped.

The little miss and I were on a day trip to Brighton, strolling through the Lanes and looking through comic shops I'd been a regular visitor to when I lived down there.

One place had a huge collection of (surprisingly reasonably priced) old Beano annuals. I'd already given C the choice of buying any of the other comics or books in the store but she zoomed in on these, and we ended up picking up half a dozen of 'em.

The Beano has been in print since 1938, and is still going strong today, mostly because it's a comic that keeps true to its core set of characters but isn't afraid to respin and reinvent them from time to time (though we won't talk about the 'trendy' Dennis the Menace they tried in the early noughties, that was an unmitigated disaster).

With a fantastic pool of talent to pick from, the modern Beano (including the annuals of course) has now woven its way into our lives and our bookshelves, and it's very rare to find C scoffing breakfast without at least one of her annuals in front of her, even though she's practically read the print off them several times.

For a while we religiously bought the weekly comic as well, until we began to run out of storage space for them. Characters such as the Bash Street Kids, Minnie the Minx and of course Dennis and Gnasher are now such a colossal part of Brit comic pop culture, iconic characters that have ensured every new generation of readers that discover The Beano will find a fave character or strip to pin their colours to (C absolutely loves Calamity James when drawn by Tom "Tam" Paterson, purely because of the utterly ridiculous and hilarious jokes and details he weaves into every strip).

She's still collecting the annuals, and just like when I was a kid, they're an absolute must for her christmas stocking (do other parents still buy their kids annuals for christmas?) There's no finer thing when the house is busy and bustling with christmas preparations than being a kid who can escape the craziness by wrapping themselves up in a nice warm blanket with a copy of a Beano annual to escape into.

Original review links: 

ReadItDaddy's Booky Advent Calendar Dec 2nd: The Beano Annual 2014 - 75 years of Beano Brilliance! (DC Thomson)

Booky Advent Calendar: Christmas Eve - "ANNUALS!"

Nearly a century of mischief, mayhem and fun - Happy 80th Birthday to The Beano, the generation-spanning comic.

This book is for autistic people, and it's rare to see a book that can make such a bold claim and deliver on its promise to introduce a series of interesting activities and helpful tips, designed by an autism expert.

"Autism and Me" by Haia Ironside and Ellie O'Shea brilliantly presents its content in a way that's engaging and stimulating for autistic children to dig straight into, and be proud to put their own stamp on.

The activities in this book explore what it means to be autistic, with each exercise designed to be relaxing and fun to do, with many that can be adopted and practiced outside of the book too.

The book also contains helpful advice and guidance for parents and carers, who will find the book a valuable resource to share alongside autistic kids and perhaps even work on some of the exercises together. 

What happens when things go wrong?

All the things you can do in the book are described in the opening pages

Hot on the heels of the superb "Cinderella" Animated Classics book is another iconic Disney film shown off in this superbly presented collectable book series, perfect for Disney fans like us.

"Disney Animated Classics: Mulan" with foreword by Paul Briggs, a director at Disney Animation Studios, once again tells the movie tale, illustrated with glorious character designs, background art, movie process art and stills from the animated movie itself.

"Mulan" is the powerful tale of a girl who ends up going to war against an evil warlord. Dressing up as a boy, Mulan shows that she's every bit as capable as her male counterparts. Tough, determined but also extremely clever, it's an inspirational tale that instantly became a timeless classic when it was released back in the 1990s.

As with all the Animated Classics books, Studio Press have dug deep into the Disney archives and have found tons of amazing drawings, paintings and designs that were fed into the visual look and feel of the movie, echoing traditional far eastern art influences and colour schemes.

Gorgeous backdrops and character art are woven into Mulan's story in the book

As we've said with all the other Animated Classics books, this is an absolute must for process fans who want to see exactly what goes into the making of a blockbuster animated movie.

Truly beautiful artwork nabbed from the Disney archives is an absolute must-see

We really love this series, and it's inspired us to dig out our copy of Mulan and sing along to "Be a Man!" all over again!

Look at the level of detail and effort that goes into designing the characters, even Granny!

Sum this book up in a sentence: Once again, Studio Press have nailed it with another gorgeous collectable movie homage chock full of gorgeous production art, and a great read-aloud story full of inspiration and positivity.

"Disney Animated Classics: Mulan" with foreword by Paul Briggs is out now, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review). 

We're absolutely in love with Disney, and though it probably looks like complete favouritism, our Book of the Week once again belongs to one of those gorgeous animated classics.

"Cinderella" comes with a foreword from Disney animator Mark Henn, who knows a thing or two about Disney's amazing heritage - and the early pioneers who helped to turn the studio into the behemoth it is today.

Cinderella was Disney's twelfth animated feature, released originally in 1950 and showcasing Disney's studio style for animating classic fairy tales.

The book tells the original story as depicted in the movie, but like the rest of the fantastic books in the series, dips into the archives to show amazing production artwork, stills from the movie and other gorgeous visual nuggets of set and character design.

We really loved this one, as it shows how that well-recognised studio style was firmly established by the time Cinderella was released, and how influential this movie was for generations of artists and animators inspired by the fabulous work here.

Sum this book up in a sentence: Beautifully cloth bound, it's another superb addition to Studio Press / Disney's book series, an absolute must for Disney collectors!

"Disney Animated Classics: Cinderella" with foreword by Mark Henn is out now, published by Studio Press / Disney (kindly supplied for review). 

With this year celebrating 80 years of amazing Marvel comics, one superhero in particular has remained our firm favourite - with fantastic runs in both movie and comic form, Spider-Man is still as awesome as ever.

Here's a fantastic book for younger Marvel fans, who can indulge in a bit of amateur detective work to spot their web-slinging pal in amongst a ton of busy scenes.

In "Where's Spidey? A Spider-Man Search and Find Book" you won't just spot Spider-Man himself, but hidden amongst the crowds are his super-pals and of course Aunt May, J Jonah Jameson and various characters who inhabit the spider-verse.

Each scene is fizzing with detail as super-villains have stormed New York City, intent on wreaking havoc, and it's up to Spidey and his pals to stop them!

You can help by solving visual clues and spotting goodies and baddies alike.

It's absolutely superb, let's take a look inside at a couple of the scenes...

Mister Negative is hiding, can you spot him?

Watch out for the Green Goblin and his dangerous pumpkin bombs!

It's a huge amount of fun this, and C was absolutely delighted to find her own fave Spidey character, Spider-Gwen in one of the scenes alongside Miles Morales and Spider-Ham.

Sum this book up in a sentence: An absolutely essential purchase for mini mites who love Spidey as much as we do!

"Where's Spidey? A Spider-Man Search and Find Book" is out now, published by Studio Press / Marvel (kindly supplied for review).

Our second book of the week is something very special indeed, celebrating a movement that arose from humble beginnings, but with a core aim that is still as relevant today as it was back at the turn of the 20th Century.

"Scouts: The Stories that Built a Movement" with a foreword by the chief scout himself, Bear Grylls, isn't just a celebration of Scouting as it stands today, but digs deep into scouting history to show how Lord Baden Powell began the movement way, way back in 1907.

The very first scout camp was on Brownsea Island, a place that is still in use by the scouts and guides, brownies and cubs, rainbows and beavers today.

We have a specific reason for being completely thrilled by this book's existence. Both my wife and I were part of the scouting movement (me as a cub, her as a brownie, guide and later a guide leader) and we always wanted C to join the movement as soon as she was old enough.

She progressed through Rainbows to Brownies and is now still in the Guides, and without a doubt the opportunities that have arisen from membership, and the amazing gains in her confidence and abilities have been in no small part due to the nurturing and development that is the heart of the modern scouting movement.

I would truly have liked the book to have slightly more of a balance for both the scouting and guide movements but there are sections in here that show the opportunities have always been open equally to both girls and boys, for kids of all creeds and abilities - stretching around the world to international scouting movements that at home and abroad have seen some of the world's most famous celebrities sharing stories later in the book of their own experiences as scouts or guides.

The book goes a long way to addressing some of the criticisms that have been levelled at the movement over the years. Misconceptions that it drums people into being religious or militaristic, things that we've never seen or experienced in the many years C has been a member.

It's something that she'll be able to take forward with her into all aspects of her life, and this book pays homage to scouting's origins, and the plans for the future to keep the movement as relevant and as fun for kids as it has always been.

Sum this book up in a sentence: A brilliant celebration of the scouting movement, a fascinating slice of history and anecdotes from many celebrities to whom scouting represented a happy time in their lives.

"Scouts: The Stories that Built a Movement" with a foreword by Bear Grylls is out now, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review).

If this didn't make our "Book of the Week" slot, I'd be doing Laura Howell a huge disservice - simply because this is a book that I've heard C sniggering and snorting over for days now.

"Where's Gnasher?" by Laura, one of the Beano's best comic artists, is more than just an homage to those old "Where's Wally?" books, it's actually a piece of comic entertainment in its own right.

Subtly hidden in a ton of different scenes from everyday Beanotown life, the scruffy munchy little hound and his faithful sidekick Dennis the Menace (wait what, isn't that supposed to be the other way around?) are up to mischief.

Can you spot Gnasher in every scene?

Can you also spot other classic Beano, Dandy, Beezer and Topper characters sneaking in too?

This is an absolute delight for Beano fans, C absolutely loves the comic - but more than just spotting Gnasher, she's been constantly dragging me over to look at some new tiny little detail she's noticed in Laura's brilliant illustrations, packed to the gills with detail and hilarity.

How many classic Beano, Dandy, Topper and Beezer characters can you spot (as well as Gnasher himself!)

Absolutely guaranteed to keep your kids occupied and quiet for days, so worth the entry fee on that basis alone!

This must've been so much fun to work on!

Sum this book up in a sentence: Spot the mischievous pooch and other amazing Beano characters in this brilliant spotting book filled to the brim with chortlesome details from comics maestro Laura!

"Where's Gnasher?" by Laura Howells is out now, published by Beano / Studio Press (kindly supplied for review). 

It's probably fair to start off this review by stating that we are completely clueless when it comes to football. Yet here is a book that, through truly brilliant and effervescent enthusiasm, manages to put across the brilliant skills, dynamism and passion of women's football.

"Changing the Game" with Casey Stoney, a former super-skilled pro footballer and now football manager herself, and illustrated by Emily Stead, begins with a historical look at the women's game and groundbreaking figures such as Lily Parr, who defied the government ban on women's football, to contemporary record-breakers such as Marta, and rising stars coming up through the ranks to take the game to new heights.

After the profile of women's football was raised stratospherically by the Women's World Cup last year, many are beginning to realise that the women's game may (entirely unfairly) not be dominated by money and huge player deals, but is definitely dominated by a passion for the game, and also a fantastic and inspirational determination to prove that the women's game is actually better / more fun to watch than the men's game.

With beautiful illustrations, inspirational stories, player skills and statistics, and Casey Stoney's motivational voice throughout, this is a must for girls and women who are not only interested in football, but are interested in any sport.

80 (seriously!!) years ago, the entire landscape of comics changed and in our third Book of the Week this week we're celebrating the mighty Marvel universe - not the billion-dollar money machine that is the Marvel Movie Universe - but the very comics that captured my imagination as a kid, and have been inspiring comic fans for generations.

"Marvel Museum: The Story of the Comics" is a colossal book packed with amazing information about the Marvel Comics Universe - and the pivotal figures that shaped characters that have now become such a huge part of our pop culture, that even non-comics folk know who they are (yep, even my wife could probably name a handful of MCU characters purely on sight, but confesses that her deep love for Wolverine is possibly largely to do with a certain Mr Jackman owning that role).

Comics aficionado Ned Hartley has brought his immense knowledge of all things Marvel into a book filled with gorgeous colour plates of comic covers and panels, here presented in a large format book that really brings those stunning early colour comics to life in a whole new way.

Along with Stan Lee, Jack "King" Kirby, Steve Ditko and many others, Marvel became a force to be reckoned with, producing comics like nothing anyone had ever seen before, and a diverse universe of characters that truly represented something for everyone, quite often championing causes and equality in a way that is still reverberating in importance today.

I love you 3000, Iron Man!

As a pair of self-confessed Marvel geeks, C and I absolutely loved this book, filled with amazing information and anecdotal nuggets that feed into the mythos that has sprung up around the "Bullpen" (as Stan Lee's studio of talent became known), with fascinating early glimpses of characters, timelines and tons more.

Our favourite Marvel character struts his webby stuff - The Amazing Spider-Man

Luxuriously bound in hardback, with fantastic chapter and end-papers, this is a fabulous gift for any Marvel or comics fan, one that you'll keep dipping into again and again.

Sum this book up in a sentence: Absolutely essential for the Marvel fans in your life, a superbly written and beautifully presented history of the mighty Marvel comic studio that spawned a billion dollar movie industry.

"Marvel Museum: The Story of the Comics" by Ned Hartley is out now, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review). 

Our third book of the week, yes third, once again dips into the Disney archives for a brilliant adaptation of a movie that didn't just break box office records, it completely destroyed them!

"Frozen (Disney Animated Classics)" begins with a foreword from production designer Lisa Keene, one of the many, many talented individuals who worked on this amazing movie.

You'll probably be a tiny teeny bit familiar with Disney's version of The Snow Queen - a classic tale but given Disney's usual amazing story treatment, turning it into a complete phenomenon.

The story of sisters Anna and Elsa is so well known that most kids can probaby rattle it out by heart. Their lives tinged with early tragedy as an accident imbues Elsa with mystical icy powers, before both their parents are lost at sea, the movie chronicles their lives as they become queen and princess in a kingdom in an icy grip, with nefarious ne'er do wells ready to sieze power at a moment's notice.

As the movie's sequel begins to build momentum, this is a truly beautiful book filled once again with those gorgeous production and design illustrations, showing off the amazing talent at Disney studios.

Baby Anna is so cute, and Olaf steals every scene

Sum this book up in a sentence: Definitely one you won't want to let go!

"Frozen (Animated Classics)" by Studio Press / Disney Studios is out now

We've seen quite a lot of books on the blog that cover one of the quirkiest parts of children's formative years, but this story - reworked and reprinted from Verna Wilkins' original 1993 classic - is something of a treat, particularly when you consider just how ahead of its time it really was.

In "Dave and the Tooth Fairy" by Verna, with new artwork from super-talented Carl Pearce, young Dave has a problem that's common to quite a few kids. He has a wobbly tooth, perfectly natural, nothing to worry about.

Only there's a problem. When Dave's tooth finally does come out, it's as a result of a humungous SNEEZE!

The tooth shoots across the room never to be seen again.

The real issue is that Dave doesn't have that shiny bit of enamel to tuck under his pillow. And no tooth means no loot from the Tooth Fairy.

Will Dave's plaintive wish be heard, will the tooth fairy somehow find it within her heart to cough up even though the tooth is long gone?

Thankfully Dave's tooth fairy is super-smart - and won't let a little thing like a missing tooth phase her at all!

Carl Pearce's artwork is just so, so good in this brilliant book!

Straight off the bat, this instantly feels like the grandaddy of so many other "tooth fairy" tales that followed (and are still being written / illustrated today).

Somewhat annoyingly, in our 'switched on' diverse world, this is also still one of the few tooth fairy tales with an all-black cast.

We've campaigned long and hard for children's picture books to feature more diverse characters, and how this is so important for kids - to be able to see kids just like them doing things just like they do. Why are we still having to campaign like this 26 years on from a book that was so inspirational and ground-breaking at the time it came out?

Oh no! No tooth, no loot!!

The whole flow of the story is full of neat little nuances that again mark it a cut above so many similar titles. Dave himself is a fab character, and we really feel for him when he initially ends up losing his tooth - and his angst at perhaps missing out on the financial reward that he'd been banking on from trading in his old holey gnasher for a shiny coin.

It's stylish stuff from cover to cover, largely thanks to Verna's original tweaked story and Carl's superb new artwork. Very highly recommended.

Sum this book up in a sentence: A fab version of the tooth fairy story told in a way that was immensely ground breaking at the time it originally came out, with a brilliant central character who boosts this book's appeal high above the norm.

"Dave and the Tooth Fairy" by Verna Wilkins and Carl Pearce is out now, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review). 

Marvel pretty much have "Mighty Girl" all sewn up, and if you want a truly fantastic example of how much work they've put in to providing one of the most diverse and brilliantly feminist comic universes in the world, take a look at our second book of the week this week, the stunning "Powers of a Girl: 65 Marvel Women who Changed the Universe" by Lorraine Cink and Alice X. Zhang.

For a long time, C has definitely been a "Marvel" girl and has soaked up a huge number of comics from the MCU, nearly all of them featuring truly kick-ass and brilliant female characters, all of which feature in this book.

Fabulous bios written by self-confessed Marvel fangirl Lorraine Cink, with stunning new illustrations for the book by comic artist supreme Alice X. Zhang gather together a whopping roster of female Marvel superheroes you may have heard of, and a truckload you may not have (but definitely need to find out more about, trust us on this).

C's favourite characters Spider-Gwen (Ghost Spider) and Squirrel Girl are just two of the characters detailed in here, and there are brilliant sections on superhero power couples and supermoms too!

Let's take a look at a couple of spreads:

Captain Marvel, Carol Danvers. Ace pilot, kickass fighter, not to be messed with whether you're Kree or not!

Each character bio digs into their comic and movie history, and gives you tons of juicy nuggets of information about them from their nicknames to their known aliases, supporting characters and of course their superpowers.

Thor. No, not the one with the massive beergut, the cooler one!

Girls and boys will love reading about these hugely inspirational and influential characters, and there's no better way of seeing just how amazingly diverse comics have become in the last decade or so.

Make ours Marvel, nuff said!

Sum this book up a sentence: A truly stellar line-up of incredible female comic characters from the Marvel comics and movie universes, showing just how brilliant their current roster is.

"Powers of a Girl" by Lorraine Cink and Alice X. Zhang is out now, published by Studio Press / Marvel Comics (kindly supplied for review). 

Imagine for a tiny, tiny moment how super-powered you'd feel if you sat down with all your favourite pens and pencils and began to make your very own comic!

We love comics, and we love drawing and making our own so we were delighted to see "How to Make a Comic" from Nigel Parkinson and Emily McGorman Bruce. Not just any comic mind you, but a BEANO flavoured comic - drawing on the amazing skills and experience of two of the best artists working on the comic at the moment.


Though we always get a bit twitch about vandalising our books, this draw-in activity book has everything you need to learn how to make your own comic strips. 

Draw him, ink him then colour him - The mighty Dennis the Menace

"What is a comic?" It's actually a portal to a whole other universe of COMPLETE AND UTTER AWESOMENESS, that's all!

Once again, Studio Press have a winner on their hands, and even though this isn't one of our favourite animated movies (I know, I know, shoot us down, go on!) "Disney's The Lion King" is still one brilliant book.

Using the same format as the other brilliant Animated Classics books, once again you'll learn all about Simba the curious little cub, his father Mufasa and the animals who live in the vast African plains.

Simba's evil uncle Scar seizes power, exiling Simba and enslaving the lion pride, until the young cub realises his destiny...

There's some fantastic concept art from some of the finest artists at Disney Studios who all worked on the production.

These books are so highly collectable, and brilliantly presented in gorgeous cloth-bound foil-inlaid covers with a ribbon bookmark so you don't lose your place when telling the story of Simba to your own little cubs.

Gorgeous stuff once again!

"One day son, all this will be yours!"

Sum this book up in a sentence: A glorious and collectable addition to the fantastic "Animated Classics" range, full of amazing concept and production art.

"Disney's The Lion King (Disney Animated Classics)" is out now, published by Studio Press

I must admit to not knowing a thing about the TV prog that this book is based on, but C assures me it's something rather special.

"The Dengineers: Build your own Dream Den" takes den building to a whole other level, with expert advice and a ton of inspiration from the genius designers and builders behind the hit CBBC show.

Laura and Ian take us through the basics of drawing up some nifty Den designs, taking on a theme, and crafting brilliant 'makes' to enhance any den, whether it's a tucked away nook in the back of a cupboard, or something more purpose-build in your back garden.

Every theme imaginable is covered here, from wizardly wonderful magic dens, to high tech computationally brilliant coder caverns.

The book is packed with awesome illustrations, and photos from the hit TV show.

Let's delve inside to see what the page spreads are like:

From the easy to the extremely challenging. There's a den build for everyone!

There's a really good mix of projects in here, perfect for crafty kids who love making things.

Some of the most impressive den makes from the series. Wow!

Such an inspirational book in fact, that C disappeared off to her room and built her own blanket den as soon as she'd finished reading it!

Sum this book up in a sentence: A brilliant book full of inspiration and awesome projects for would-be Dengineers!

"Dengineers: Build your own Dream Den" by Laura Baker and Ian Upstone is out now, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review). 

Studio Press produces some really brilliant activity books for kids, and their latest "Be" range is full of amazing ideas.

At the start of the year we really hoped we'd see lots and lots of books about saving the planet, being more ecologically minded, or even going green so the first title we looked at in the new "Be" range is "Be Green" by Mandy Archer and Katie Abey.

With zany eye-catching journal-like artwork, "Be Green" encourages kids to do their bit for the environment with some simple activities that can make a huge difference.

Perfect to dip into on your own, or perhaps rally friends and your classmates into some of the more involved activities, this really is completely timely for what's going on with the younger generation who are taking a stand against environmental damage, climate change and our changing world's reliance on single-use plastic and fossil fuels.

We've only got one of these, let's look after it better!

With attractive illustrations and tons and tons of facts and exercises to dig into, this is brilliant stuff.

"Be Green" by Mandy Archer and Katie Abey is out now, published by Studio Press.

There's also "Be Kind" by Stephanie Clarkson and Katie Abey...

This time the emphasis is around caring for others, celebrating our differences, but also celebrating what makes us unique.

Again, this one's full of brilliant ideas and activities that can be enjoyed alone or with friends or in class, taking a look at how we can all do our bit to look after others and be more mindful of their feelings and needs as well as our own (and that's definitely a lesson quite a few adults could do with learning as well, right?)

We really loved the design of these books, with tons of pages to colour in, draw on or note down your own ideas and action plans to really get organised and do something about each topic.

Absolutely brilliant stuff!

The "Be" range is out now, from Studio Press (both titles above very kindly supplied for review). 

It's becoming something of a habit for these glorious little books to fetch up in our "Book of the Week" slot.

We make no apologies, they really are that good, and so collectable too.

"Aladdin (Disney Animated Classics)" from Studio Press once again showcases the story of Aladdin, and of course a ton of glorious production stills and preproduction art from the hit animated movie (which is STILL one of our all-time favourite Disney films).

As with the other titles in this series, this beautiful hardback book's presentation is top notch with a gorgeous clothbound hard cover, gold gilt page ages and full end-paper illustrations to make it a real treat for the eyes. 

No apologies from us for once again featuring these glorious cloth-bound Studio Press books in our Book of the Week slot.

If you're getting excited about the new live-action Dumbo movie from Disney Studios, take a moment to revisit the classic animated movie instead, with another truly beautiful storified version of the movie with that utterly glorious production art and animation stills illustrating the story throughout.

The story of a young elephant with a difference - born into a circus, but separated from his mother (in a scene that still reduces me to tears even after all these years), Dumbo soon realises his huge flappy ears mean that he can do something that no other elephant can.

He can fly, he can fly, he can fly!

This highly collectable book once again extends Studio Press's impressive range of books chronicling the processes and sketches that led to the final movie. As we said before, this is nigh on essential for Disney fans, but also fans of animation and art as the illustrations in this are just absolutely gorgeous. I mean take a look at them!

Special delivery! One large-eared ele-baby!

I love the way these feel like classic storybooks I had as a kid.

Don't listen to 'em Dumbo, you're special!!

It's also great to hear that more are on the way in this fab range, including Aladdin, which should be out in the blink of a Genie's eye! YESSSS! Can't wait!

Sum this book up in a sentence: You'll believe an elephant can fly with this superb collectable edition of one of Disney's best-loved classics.

"Dumbo (Disney Animated Classics" is out now, published by Studio Press / Disney Studios (very kindly supplied for review and thanks for the hat-tip in the presser, folks!)

Love 'em or hate 'em. Disney's versions of classic fairy tales have worked their way into our collective consciousness with so many brilliant animated versions over the years...

Blimey! Did this one ever kick off a fizz-crackling debate at home with all three of us weighing in with an opinion or two on "The Mega Magic Hair Swap" by Rochelle Humes and Rachel Suzanne.

I must admit that I really don't know who Rochelle Humes is, but she's apparently a celebrity TV presenter and is about to add "children's book author" to her CV too.

We were initially grumpy that the press release that accompanied this book made absolutely no mention of the illustrator - concentrating on Rochelle rather than Rachel Suzanne, which is a bit of a shame considering that without the illustrations, this story would feel even more disjointed than it already is (#PicturesMeanBusiness - Come on, it's not hard to give credit to the illustrators in press releases, but hooray for putting a cover credit on at least!)

Before we get into the nitty gritty of the disjointedness of this story, let's focus on the positives for a moment. Sharing a house with two ladies with BIG hair, there was a lot of nodding and 'me too' stuff going on about the core theme of this story. My wife, in particular fully identifies with Mai and I'm sure an awful lot of little girls do too.

Mai, you see, has big curly hair. It's frizzy, voluminous and beautiful but just a bit unruly and difficult to tame.

Rose has poker-straight hair. It's long, flowing but Rose thinks it's utterly boring and it takes a LOT of brushing (again, furious nodding from the ladies present).



Mai loves Rose's hair. Rose loves Mai's hair - and thanks to Mai and a magic coconut the two manage to swap hair!



The problem is, Mai's little Sibling Raine bursts into tears, unable to recognise their sister! This is just the start of the two girls coming to the conclusion that perhaps it's just better to be happier in your own skin (and your own hair, at that!)

Both C and her Mum fully understood and nodded lots at the points that Rochelle was trying to make in her story, but we all agreed that the story felt like it needed a good solid edit and a far better 'flow' to it.

For example there's a whopping great big plot hole when the magic coconut is 'magically' produced by Mai as the mechanism for performing the magic hair swap (which, without the illustrations as we said, would not appear in the story at all until the swap occurs - we never see Mai actually winning it!) I wasn't sure why the actual worded story didn't feature Mai winning the coconut, perhaps it was to keep the page word count low? It felt like a hole though.

The end of the story also seems to wrap up rather quickly with little or no resolution other than "We've swapped back, and we're happy again". Almost like the story could have been a trifle longer, with a couple more examples of why the swap wasn't successful.

Admittedly we're probably being over-fussy for what is essentially a book for a much younger audience than ours (3-5 year olds will defintiely love this, particularly if they too have to sit through mum or dad combing tangles out of their hair! Owch) but kids can see through McGuffins and plot-holes just the same as adults so this is our attempt to be constructive about an essentially 'good' core idea, and I think with a tweak and a tease here and there, this could have actually been very good indeed.

As it stands, it falls a little bit flat, like Donald Trump's barnet when he forgets to pack his extra cans of Elnette Super-Hold Hairspray.

Sum this word up in a sentence: A good attempt to write a story with an important core message about being happy with what you've got and happy in your own skin that could've done with a better edit and a little more work to polish and perfect it.

"The Mega Magic Hair Swap" by Rochelle Humes and Rachel Suzanne is out on 7th Feb 2019, published by Studio Press (kindly supplied for review).