Just So Stories

Random Reviews and Ramblings from Redcliffe

  • Bear to the Rescue – Romane Cristescu and Nic Gill. Illustrated by Sylvia Morris.

    Hardback | October 2025 | $ 26.99ISBN: 9781486314904 Publisher: CSIRO Publishing With splendid synchronicity, I had both Dogs with Jobs and this charming new CSIRO Publishing title to review and schedule together! Huzzah! I love it when a plan comes together – even by happenstance. And doubly fortuitous because Bear is one of the Dogs…

  • A Box Full of Murders – Janice Hallett

    Penguin Australia June 2025 ISBN: 9780241636183 Imprint: Puffin RRP: $16.99 It was actually quite serendipitous that as friend, Zanni Louise, mentioned she was enjoying a Janice Hallett murder-mystery – an author whose work I didn’t know – I replied by saying, I had just got a review copy of her first kids’ book, also a murder mystery. And…

  • Quoll – Christopher Cheng. Illustrated by Cindy Lane

    Walker Books Australia July 2025 ISBN13:9781760655679 Australia RRP:$26.99 New Zealand RRP:$28.99 You know before you even open the book that it’s going to be magnificent when the Christopher Cheng name is on the cover. And with quolls excitingly in the news in the last few months, this is a very timely and most excellent new…

  • The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Extinct Animals – Sami Bayly

    Hachette Australia September 2024  9780734421395 | RRP $32.99 Watch this interview with Sami from The Morning Show to hear more about this latest book. It seems almost incredible to realise that Sami Bayly is not yet 30 ! [maybe that’s me because I’m so senior citizen now], given her amazing catalogue of titles thus far. This is…

  • The One and Only Family – Katherine Applegate

    Harper Collins Australia All good things must come to an end so they say [and of course, as a Buddhist, I do know that everything is impermanent], but I am, along with many others I have no doubt, sad to say goodbye to Ivan and his friends, and now family. It has given me such…

  • Purinina – Christina Booth

    CSIRO Publishing  September 2024 | $ 24.99ISBN: 9781486317264  Taking its cue from the 2007 Notable picture book Purinina, a Devil’s Tale, this new devilish tale from Christina Booth follows Purinina’s life from her birth through the death of her mother to her producing her own offspring. It is written in simple yet very evocative terms…

  • The Golden Swift – Lev Grossman

    Bloomsbury July 2022 ISBN 9781526647634 Imprint Bloomsbury Children’s Books RRP: $14.99 A couple of years back I enthusiastically endorsed The Silver Arrow and I am very pleased to say that this second instalment is equally as enchanting for your middle school readers. A year after they first encounter The Silver Arrow and begin their mission…

  • Wandi – Favel Parrett

    Hachette September 2021 ISBN: 9780734420633 RRP: $19.99 When Wandi, the tiny dingo pup, was found in a Victorian backyard in 2019, it was unlikely that anyone would have predicted the lucky canine’s rise to social media superstar status. “Since then he is currently on about 47,000 followers on Instagram — and that’s across the world.”…