"Ding Dong Gorilla" by Michelle Robinson and Leonie Lord (Orchard Books). Who ate all the pizza!

Two of our previous "Book of the Week" winners have just arrived in paperback format for the first time, courtesy of Orchard Books.

First up is "Ding Dong Gorilla" by Michelle Robinson and Leonie Lord. The sad tale of a young boy, a cross-dressing Gorilla with a penchant for chaos, and a pizza, it's a hilarious book that's sure to have your young ones giggling.

You can read our original book of the week winning review right here!

From one big hairy beast to another, in a neat little segue...

"Beauty and the Beast" by Ursula Jones and Sarah Gibb (Orchard Books). Just beautiful!

Ursula Jones and Sarah Gibb have delivered probably one of the most beautiful retellings of the classic fairy tale "Beauty and the Beast" - A book that found its way into Charlotte's christmas stocking last year and has been loved to bits ever since. Deservedly, it became our first book of the week for 2013. Wonderfully told, the illustrations are just brilliant so if you've been putting off picking up this gorgeous book, there's no excuse now!

You can find our original review of Beauty and the Beast right here!

(Review copies kindly sent to us by Orchard Books)

Crazy, zany, chaotic and just a little bit naughty - the Witch's Children are the tearaway stars of a series of books by Ursula Jones and Russell Ayto. We hadn't read any of the series previously so weren't quite sure what to expect, but as big Ursula and Russell fans, we had to take this one home with us from the Library.

So the three witch's children are - as you'd probably have guessed - a wee bit naughty, and a wee bit prone to using magic for things that you probably really shouldn't use magic for. Everyone scarpers as soon as they appear, and even the Number 16 Bus quakes in fear (and hides behind a lorry) when the kids come out to play.

The three children, along with their friend from school, are off to see the Queen at Buckingham Palace - but the poor girl from school has forgotten her money! Never fear, the three witch's children have a solution. A whizz, a pop and a magic spell and the girl is transformed into a golden egg-laying goose. Surely a golden egg will cover the fare?

Events spiral into a well of zany misbehaviour as soon the children are using their magic to turn the grumpy bus conductor into a sultan, the passengers into his courtiers and the bus into a magic carpet to ride all the way to the palace.

In the presence of the Queen herself, you'd expect the children to behave but the magical miscreants don't stop there and there's soon chaos at the palace. What on earth can everyone do to get things back to normal? Sometimes only a mum can help...

Wholly original, fizzing with fun and energy, and just a little bit cheeky (just how we like our books), this is marvellous stuff and we want to read the rest of the Witch's Children books now.

Charlotte's best bit: Corgis eating jam tarts! Eeeeek!

Daddy's favourite bit: I absolutely love the zaniness of this, feels very Roald Dahl-esque. Utterly love Russell Ayto's art style too.

My lovely other half The Strolling Mum first spotted this book on one of our regular visits to our fab indie bookstore Mostly Books and we all fell in love with it more or less instantly. It was high on the wishlist so just before Christmas we made sure this was going to be in Charlotte's stocking. She absolutely loves the Beauty and the Beast Disney treatment, and recently also went to see an astonishingly good stage production of the Broadway musical, so it's really no surprise to find this book becoming our first Book of the Week of 2013.

Sticking to a fairly traditional treatment of the story, Beauty and the Beast tells the tale of a merchant with three beautiful daughters who seeks refuge in a mysterious castle one evening. Making free with the facilities and hospitality, the merchant is entirely unaware that the castle holds a dark secret. A beast is lord and master of the castle, and demands that the merchant pays a terrible price for stealing one of the beast's prize roses to give to his youngest daughter, named Beauty.

The beast is intrigued by Beauty and rather than demand the merchant's life, he asks the man to bring his daughter to the castle so she can take his place instead.

Beauty is charming, intelligent and well read - and instantly wins the Beast over. Rather than kill her as agreed, he holds her captive.

Her family fear her lost forever, and though her (rather shallow and annoying) sisters mourn for a little while, her father is devastated at the loss of his favourite daughter.

A magic mirror in the castle shows Beauty her family day by day, and she watches - grief stricken - as her father wastes away pining for her.

If your only exposure to the Beauty and the Beast story is the Disney treatment, do yourself a massive favour and pick this book up - and treat yourself to a far better version lovingly told and paid homage to by Ursula Jones. Sarah Gibb's haunting and exquisite artwork perfectly accompanies the story, doing away with the over-cute Disney-fied imagery in favour of something that virtually leaps off the page with vibrant colour suffused with cameo-like shadowy scenes. In essence, this is the sort of beautiful book that harks back to an era when brilliant story collections based on the works of Hans Christian Andersen and The Brothers Grimm were often bound together in huge volumes and deliciously illustrated.

Perfect in virtually every way and a very well deserved book of the week.

Charlotte's best bit: Beauty's amazing dresses (including a certain yellow number that Charlotte just fell hopelessly in love with).

Daddy's favourite bit: Luxuriously presented with the sort of artwork that makes your jaw drop.