Just So Stories

Harper Collins Australia

June 2025

ISBN: 9781460766521

ISBN 10: 1460766520

$16.99

It’s one thing having a strict but kind and fair Nanny who is alive – and quite another when that Nanny is dead.

Nine-year-old Albertine is a sweet child, who is without a mother but with a very loving and protective father. He is, in fact, perhaps over protective of her in many ways. One of these, is that she is unaware that her mother is actually dead or what that means. She only knows her mother is no longer here, more like a star in the sky. She has no memory of her so therefore can’t really miss her.

Her father, a close friend of Prince Albert, is devoted to her however, and she has Nanny Tobbins. Until, that is, Nanny Tobbins has an accident and breaks her neck. Albertine knows Nanny has been injured, but she has no idea that she is dead. Really, she has no conception of what that might even ‘look like’. Not even when she sees a strangely shaped box being carried out of Nanny’s room and down the stairs, does anything occur to her. She is not a stupid child. She just doesn’t understand or know the ‘signs’ of such things.

So when Nanny Tobbins shows up in Albertine’s bedroom in the middle of the night to begin lessons as usual, the child is surprised at the timing, and the fact that Nanny looks a little different but goes along with it all. It’s the start of complete chaos really. Because the dead Nanny Tobbins is not quite as ‘normal’ as the living one was.

At the same time, Papa has gone away and come back with The Stepmother, who appears to be every bit as horrid as any stepmother that Albertine and Papa know from their much-loved fairytales. The discord between Albertine and The Stepmother is certainly not helped by supernatural Nanny Tobbins’ interference (for which Albertine gets the blame!).

With lots of historical references to the Victorian age, the Great Exhibition, manners and social customs of the time and the whole business of Albertine’s gradual realisation that Nanny is, in fact, a ghost, and then, trying to lay her to rest, this is both informative and downright quirky.

It has a little of everything for any discerning reader: the historical aspect, humour, creepiness, family and family changes, friendship and resilience. It was an absolute pleasure to write teaching notes for this one because I loved everything about it.

What a debut for Lucie Stevens! I feel we have much more pleasure to come from this new author. Your able readers from Year 4 upwards would love it and it would make a fabulous serial read, with much to discuss and chew over – as well as some fun follow-ups to consider. It’s a spooky 5 👻👻👻👻👻rating from me for this fun-filled ghostly adventure.