Just So Stories

Penguin Australia

July 2023

• ISBN: 9780143779278
• Imprint: Penguin
• RRP: $16.99

No one will be surprised to hear that after reading a couple of chapters before I went to sleep last night, I gobbled the rest up in one sitting today – and loved every single word! It’s not Friday Barnes, nor Nanny Piggins but Spratt’s sass and sarcasm, her unerring sense of the ridiculous juxtaposed with the tender and some echoes of her other books and characters make this unmistakably her work (I read the reference to throwing rocks at ducks/echidnas/platypuses and did my R. A. Spratt snort laugh!).

R. A. prefaces the novel with an explanation that she wrote this during covid times (won’t that just be an instantly recognisable label for that period in perpetuity?) and I love her explanation of this and her dedication to ‘storytellers who bring us joy, comfort and catharsis in turbulent times‘.

Selby Michaels is a loner, but not by choice. She just doesn’t quite fit in. Not with her family – both parents are academic professionals turned booksellers by choice, two older siblings who were stellar students now studying at university. Not with her peers – who don’t persecute her but also don’t include her, actually really don’t even notice her. Selby is not academic. Reading is a difficulty for her (one might infer dyslexia), and often she finds the school curriculum boring (now who does that remind me of? my friends from school days may have clues on that answer) but she does have imagination, and a passion for stories (albeit as it were via TV soap operas).

With her parents being totally consumed with the bookstore, Selby has managed to fly under the radar for a couple of years without doing homework or actually doing much at all really (except for TV) so their wrath after a parent-teacher interview is like a bombshell. They take action in a very vigorous way, and engage a nerdy friend of Selby’s brother to tutor her, and guide her through her first Shakespearean experience, Hamlet.

Unsurprisingly, Selby is very resistant to this, but Dan takes no prisoners and insists upon her putting every effort into reading the tragedy of the Danish prince – aloud. Imagine the astonishment of both, when Selby’s reading takes the pair to the battlements of Elsinore, inside the play itself. Dealing with Hamlet’s indecisiveness, his extreme emotions, the general bloodthirsty violence of the play and poor Ophelia gives rise to some very tricky situations – especially given the whole 21st century/16th century confusion at times.

Honestly, it is both hilarious and poignant, absurd and thoughtful, and anyone (kid or adult) who may have struggled with Shakespeare will gain just as much understanding and revelation as Selby. As I tell the kiddos to whom I’ve taught Shakespeare, he was the inventor of the soap opera, and still the greatest writer of all. I am continually fascinated by his genius, inventiveness and his insight into the human condition – in spite of what was essentially a very limited geographical and social experience.

Your upper primary kiddos will love this as much as your secondary kiddos – and this will most definitely give them the inside running on the Bard (whether or not it’s Hamlet they are studying). Don’t waste any time in getting this on your shelves – readers from around Year 6 upwards will love it.

Highly recommended for all readers of witty, warm and smartass humour – who also happen to love Bill the Bard. Classroom discusssion points.