Just So Stories

Random Reviews and Ramblings from Redcliffe

  • Stanley – Louise Zirbel. Rachel Salmon. Illustrator: Barry Patenaude.

    Boolarong Press October 2025 Imprint: Watson Ferguson Publishing ISBN: 9780645504644 RRP: $24.99 The ubiquitous and much-maligned brush turkey – bush turkey, scrub turkey, whatever your preferred terminology is certainly a character. We have plenty around here, including my regular I see on my morning walk, who has built a glorious mound in the scrub down… Read more

  • If I Could Eat the Stars and Other Poems – Chosen by Rebecca. M. Newman & Sally Murphy. Illustrated by Briony Stewart.

    Publisher: Fremantle Press April 2026 ISBN: 9781760996482 RRP: $17.99 It is no secret that I love a great poetry book and, remarkably, after not having had one for review for quite some time, suddenly I have two stunning ones! The first is this absolute little cracker from Fremantle Press and a stellar cast of contributors. Here’s just… Read more

  • Lila MacKay is Very Misunderstood – Gill Sims

    Harper Collins Australia December 2025 ISBN: 9780008513788 ISBN 10: 0008513783 Imprint: Farshore Fiction GB RRP: $19.99 If you have followed and shrieked with laughter over Gill Sims’ FB posts Peter and Jane over the years or read her books e.g. the Why Mummy Drinks series , you will know instantly that this book is utterly hilarious. It is… Read more

  • Letters from the Upside – Katya Balen

    Bloomsbury Publishing January 2026 ISBN: 9781526663931 Imprint: Bloomsbury Children’s Books RRP: $16.99 I have eaten up every Katya Balen title that has come my way and they never disappoint. Each new story has its own fresh and original approach and, without fail, her characters are astonishingly vibrant and so completely authentic. Each and everyone pulls… Read more

  • UnBEARable – Kathryn Apel/Beau Wylie

    Scholastic Australia January 2026 ISBN : 978176152884 Imprint : Scholastic Press RRP: $19.99 We love a fractured fairytale – we do, we do!! By ‘we’ I mean those of us who teach – and regularly teach fairytales. And that’s as much a part of secondary literacy as it is primary-based. Traditional tales – in all their guises: fairytale, folk… Read more

  • I can’t review my own book..

    Well, I suppose I could but I won’t. However, I was super-excited yesterday to get a box from America with my author copies of my first book for the Creative Company which is also the first ever book written about the Roulettes. It is a beautiful hardback (library quality in US publishing jargon) and it… Read more

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