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Cloud. Wind. Wave. Atlas -Sarah Zambello. Susy Zanella.
Thames & Hudson 2024/2025 ISBN: 9781760764500/ISBN: 9781760764524/ISBN: 9781760764517 RRP: $34.99 I have often mentioned that Small Person Me was a bit of a non-fiction nerdy kid and as such I had a passing interest in all sorts of topics. Most usually from my brother’s ‘general’ non-fiction books though I did have some of my own that were specific…
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Into the Bewilderness – Gus Gordon
Hardie Grant July 2025 ISBN:9781761211287 Price:AU$24.99, NZ$27.99 Publisher:Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing Where to start with this piece of magnificence, I ask myself? I know! I’ll start with this anecdote. A week or so ago, the estimable Gus Gordon was going to be at Quick Brown Fox in Grange and I had determined I would go.…
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Cock-a-doodle-doo! – Pamela Allen
Penguin Australia August 2025 Or as Penguin have titled it on their website: Cock-a-Doodle-Doooo! What a living treasure is Pamela Allen! Now in her 91st year and still giving children such enormous pleasure. This is another of Pamela’s deceptively simple but so cleverly done narratives that will have your Smalls in fits of the giggles…
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Cocka-two!
Synchronicity is an odd thing at times, isn’t it? Just as one of my friends [hello, Sonia!] was telling me about her trials and tribulations with a manic cockatoo since moving into her new house, these two books arrived within a couple of days! We laughed – in that bitterly ironic way that one does…
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Board books for Smalls
Little Miss Daisy is just about too big now for board books, but I’m so happy to be able to share these ones with her before that cut-off! Wibble, Wobble, Walk! – Mike Dumbleton & Sarah Boese Little Book Press Distributed by Simon & Schuster June 2025 ISBN: 9781923141285 RRP: $AU$ 14.99 / NZ$ 29.99…
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Yoko’s Diary – by Paul Ham. Translated by Debbie Edwards.
Harper Collins Australia July 2025 SHORTLISTED in the 2014 CBCA Awards SHORTLISTED in the 2014 NSW Premier’s History Awards I’m embarrassed to say that though I’ve had this book in every single one of my primary libraries, as far as I can recall, I had never read it. But it is a welcome new edition…
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The Mushroom in the Sky – Jackie French
Harper Collins Australia July 2025 If there’s anything more exciting than new Jackie French historical fiction, it’s getting your hands on it before anyone else and writing teaching notes for it. In light of the 80th Anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing coming up (and ergo, the end of the War in the Pacific), Jackie French…
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Anna’s War – DJ Taylor
Riveted Press Simon & Schuster July 2025 Aside from, of course, Anne Frank’s diary I knew very little about life for the Dutch during the war. I did glean some from Tulips for Breakfast when I read and reviewed it. But this astonishing debut novel from DJ Taylor has certainly opened my eyes to even…
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The Year We Escaped – Suzanne Leal
Harper Collins Australia June 2025 Suzanne Leal’s Running with Ivan was a book that took me to a very different part of the Second World War, and it was a privilege to write the teaching notes for it. I was lucky enough to be asked to write them for this new book as well. And…
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Back to Business!! – 2025: 80th Anniversary of the end of World War II
Thanks for your hanging in there while I took a little break. I got four readers drafted for the American publisher – let’s see how much editing will ensue! And I’ve picked up three new commissions for teaching notes in the space of two days (!!): one direct from one of our leading authors, and…
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