Penguin Australia
April 2024
- ISBN: 9781761343742
- Imprint: Penguin
- RRP: $17.99
This arrived last Friday (22/3), and on Sunday I took it with me when we went up the coast for two days of R&R to celebrate The Kid’s birthday. I read 240ish pages the first evening with only a break to head out for the birthday celebration dinner. I was a little tired the second night but finished off the remaining 130ish page before I went to sleep. I think that’s a pretty fair indication of how utterly engrossing it is.
It is, in fact, absolutely fantastic! I think this is one of Morris’ soon-to-be-classics.
The plot is really original, the characters are especially endearing and the themes are – to use the current vernacular – fleek. Jay (well played, Morris!) lives with his granddad, Poppa, and their beloved budgie, Clyde. Normally his parents would also be there, but they are doing their world-famous bird expert thing in Africa, are worryingly overdue home and, even more worryingly, have been out-of-touch.
Clyde is no ordinary budgie. He’s almost half-human, certainly by his own reckoning but also because he understands everything Poppa and Jay say, and has built up a vocabulary of his own which is pretty impressive.
Jay’s own domestic worries are bad enough but there is far more going on in the wider world. Thousands of birds are behaving in strange and disturbing ways, blocking traffic and attempting to intercept other machinery, congregating in vast numbers in human-dense places and, generally, being very un-birdlike.
Then disaster hits home. Poppa goes to hospital but doesn’t make it out, and suddenly Jay finds himself caught up in a maelstrom of pseudo social workers who are actually secret agents, classified underground laboratories and global travel, but not for pleasure. While Jay is scooped up by authorities, Clyde escapes their flat and accompanied by a sassy galah, who was a mistreated ‘cagie’, they begin to unravel the mystery of the birds’ behaviours. While there is drama and serious issues at play here, there is also Morris’ trademark humour which leavens moments in surprising ways, and to which children always respond positively.
How can one small, inexperienced and rather naive budgie (who is half-human) find his missing human brother and his equally missing parents, and help solve the avian crisis that is about to wreak havoc on the entire human population, and convince humanity at large that they need to do better? How can one small, inexperienced and rather naive boy (who is half-bird), find his missing budgie brother, as well as his missing parents, solve the avian crisis that is about to wreak havoc on the entire human population, and convince the rest of humanity that they need to do better?
This is all about communication between us all [whether human or animal], understanding the import of the ecological brink on which we are currently teetering, engendering respect for all life and our planet, solidarity, and the power of love.
It is an absolutely outstanding book that demands to be shared widely. I would strongly advocate for it to your next class shared read, or, at least, for you to put it into the hands of your children (and their adults as well).
As a self-confessed bird-nerd this had strong appeal for me, but even more than that, this is Morris at his very best. Nothing but loud applause from me on that score. Highly recommended for readers from around 9 years upwards.
Bravo Morris!! it’s a super 5 🐦🕊️🦅🦜🦉 rating from me.
Just So Stories 
Leave a reply to Childish – Morris Gleitzman – Just So Stories Cancel reply