Just So Stories

Harper Collins Australia

July 2023

• ISBN: 9781803701349
• ISBN 10: 180370134X
• Imprint: Usborne GB
• RRP: $19.99

I’ve had this one at the ready, in my bag to share with a class for the last week and, as luck would have it, just didn’t have the right opportunity to do so. But today, while I have some time of my own, I thought it was high time to check it out properly, and, honestly, I could probably spend the rest of the day dipping in and out of it!

For your lovers of fact books, this one will be a joy, and they will never have read such fascinating details about weather before, I am confident.

Where to start? What did I love most? Well, there was the fungi ‘growing ice hair’, and there was the pink snow in the Antarctic and Arctic, or the red rain that emanates from the Sahara Desert. There were the different types of rainbows, and the categories of clouds – the familiar and the unfamiliar rare ones. There was the weird fact that the warmer the weather, the bigger the spiders (some of my arachnophobe friends will not be happy about that). There were the details about weather gods from different cultures and amazing weather records.

In fact, there is just about every conceivable bit of information any non-fiction nerd could desire. And all of it, packaged up beautifully in Usborne’s always remarkable and engaging way. If you are looking for books to support your teaching on weather and climate, it will be a real boon, but there will be many children picking this one up for the sheer pleasure of it. No doubt, there will be much sharing of salient information afterwards!!

Loved this and will use it numerous times with classes I visit. Highly recommended for your avid information seekers from around 7 years old.