Book Reviews
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She Rex
She Rex is a picture book dinosaur story with multi colours, giant teeth and tons of girl-osaurus attitude! A spirite...
Sulwe
Sulwe is a children’s book of rare power and beauty. Dealing with colourism, self-esteem and learning that tr...
Pre-school Books on Diversity
On your search to include more diverse books for your kids, check out the wonderful range of local books from South A...
Ruby Red Shoes Goes to London
Ruby Red Shoes is a sweet little hare who lives in a colourful caravan in the country with her granny. Now she’...
Sophie Johnson: Unicorn Expert
Who doesn’t love a unicorn? Sophie Johnston: Unicorn Expert loves them so much she ‘owns’ 17 unic...
Harry’s Stormy Night
“All evening the North wind roared.” These evocative words set the atmosphere for the story about the nig...
Oi Frog!
Oi Frog! is a fun rhyming caper though all the places animals sit. It starts with Frog saying he does not want to d...
Swimming in the Sun
What a delightful, happy little book by South African author Jenny Hatton. Swimming in the Sun follows a typical da...
Here We Are – Notes for Living on Planet Earth
Acclaimed illustrator and author Oliver Jeffers has a new book to share with little children everywhere: an introduct...
Richard Scarry’s Best Treasury Ever
This Richard Scarry classic is a happy primary-coloured trip filled with illustrations and much-loved characters to k...
My Daddy Says
By Justine Smith and illustrated by Angie Stevens (Pan Macmillan) Lets cuddle up for bedtime with My Daddy Says ̵...
Nyambura Waits for the Bus
Nyambura is a little girl who is going to visit her Gogo (granny). To get there she has to take a bus all on her own....
What’s Up, Thoko!
This series by South African author Niki Daly is a collection of wonderful, every day events that occur in the life o...
She Rex
She Rex is a picture book dinosaur story with multi colours, giant teeth and tons of girl-osaurus attitude! A spirite...
Sulwe
Sulwe is a children’s book of rare power and beauty. Dealing with colourism, self-esteem and learning that tr...
Lots – The Diversity of Life on Earth
Lots is a beautifully illustrated introduction to biodiversity for younger readers. This story of nature is so beauti...
Pre-school Books on Diversity
On your search to include more diverse books for your kids, check out the wonderful range of local books from South A...
Grandad Mandela
Who are great men when they are at home? Grandad Mandela is sensitively seen through the eyes of his great grandchild...
Mizz President
Mizz President is a delightful South African story about a young girl who finds herself thrust into leadership when h...
Wanda
Wanda is a little girl with a big beautiful head of hair. While her mother thinks her hair is ‘strong and bea...
Ruby Red Shoes Goes to London
Ruby Red Shoes is a sweet little hare who lives in a colourful caravan in the country with her granny. Now she’...
Julian is a Mermaid
Julian is a Mermaid is a beautiful and powerful book about finding the safe space to joyfully and jubilantly be yours...
Sophie Johnson: Unicorn Expert
Who doesn’t love a unicorn? Sophie Johnston: Unicorn Expert loves them so much she ‘owns’ 17 unic...
Harry’s Stormy Night
“All evening the North wind roared.” These evocative words set the atmosphere for the story about the nig...
The Worst Witch Series
The much-loved The Worst Witch series, about a boarding school for witches and the adventures and mishaps of a clums...
Katie Morag Series
Katie Morag is a feisty tomboy adored by children for over 30 years. Katie lives on the island of Struay, which is l...
Early Chapter Book Series For Girls
Read our top 11 early chapter book series for girls. Perfect for moving into new reading levels and growing reading c...
Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them
Fantastic Beasts brings the wizardly world from England to the streets of New York. When Magizoologist Newt Scamande...
Middle School Series
Rafe Khatchadorian is the unlikely hero of the Middle School series about an 11 year old boy who takes on rules, bull...
Igor – The Bird Who Couldn’t Sing
We took this book out the library and Joe, 8 loved the simple story of a bird who for the life of him cannot sing. W...
Milly-Molly-Mandy’s Family
This is all about Milly-Molly-Mandy (her real name is Millicent Margeret Amanda which is too long to shout out so her...
Timmy Failure – Mistakes Were Made
The success of Diary of a Wimpy Kid (DOAWK) has inspired a flood of books about happy underachievers illustrated with...
Library Lion
Everyone knows libraries have special rules. So what to do when a lion enters the library and doesn’t want to ...
Angelina Ballerina’s Christmas Stories
Angelina Ballerina is a firm favorite in our house – the endearing tales of a little mouse called Angelina who ...
Kids’ Market Day
Now you have an answer to that eternal question: “Mom, what can I do?” “Make something and sell it!” is the...
Christmas Decorations to Cut, Fold and Stick
Making Christmas decorations has always been one of our favourite family traditions and it takes us the first few wee...
Rainbow Magic – Mary The Sharing Fairy
The Rainbow Magic series of books is perfectly aimed to take your beginner reader through to a chapter book reader le...
Because of Winn Dixie
“It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humour.” When ten-ye...
Why Must I Go To School?
Why must I go to school? Why must I do as I am told? Good question. Said no parent ever. Now you can direct them to t...
Little Cakes and Cookies to Bake
A gift from the grandparents, this book has been an absolute winner in our house of little cooks. Quick and easy reci...
What’s Up, Thoko!
This series by South African author Niki Daly is a collection of wonderful, every day events that occur in the life o...
The 13-Storey Treehouse
The best thing about this book is its very funny. Andy and Terry live in a very cool treehouse with 13 floors and on...
My First Book of Seashore Life
A great companion to rock pool adventures and seaside holidays in the Southern Hemisphere. The book introduces over ...
Discover Through Craft: The Seaside
Craft books are perfect for long holidays and this series educates children about seaside habitats while offering gre...
The Paper Dolls
I was immediately attracted by the image of paper dolls, which I used to love cutting out as a child. I still make t...
A Passionate Vision – The Story of Irma Stern
The story of Irma Stern, one of South Africa’s most famous artists, is shared in this wonderfully written biography...
Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls
Do you wish there were more books about kick-ass female role models to share with your kids? Superwoman is all well a...
A librarian’s recommendations
We chatted to Bette Mosher Geci, a retired librarian from Connecticut in the States whose passion for children’...
Party Time
If you love to throw themed birthday parties for your children and want fun ideas on decor and food – this is a...
Oliver and the Seawigs
I got this book on holiday at The Book Lounge in Cape Town. Hooked on Books came to talk to us at our school and whe...
Penguin’s Hidden Talent
It was time for the big annual talent competition and everyone was practicing their talent. Except Penguin. “Pengui...
Unstoppable Me!
This book came just in time to save me from yet another argument in our house around taking responsibility. Subtitled...
Dragon Slayers Academy series
The Dragon Slayers Academy is a fantasy adventure series about an unlikely hero called Wiglaf, the soft-hearted, oft-...
London (Not-For-Parents) Everything you ever wanted to know
This is not a guidebook, states the opening page. It’s more of an introduction to everything London is famous for a...
Mummy & Me Cook
Few activities are as much fun as cooking with mom or dad. This lovely cookbook offers the perfect balance of quick b...
Skin We Are In
The Skin We Are In is an exploration of why humans have different colour skin, and how people’s thinking about ...
Winnie the Witch series
Winnie the Witch is something of a celebrity in children’s literature. What makes Winnie a winner is her friendly, ...
Lets make More great placemat art
Making art fun is Marion Deuchars’ calling. Her range of Let’s make Great Art books inspire creativity, ...
El Deafo
El Deafo is a funny and moving graphic novel memoir about a young hearing impaired girl and her adventures at school ...
Lots – The Diversity of Life on Earth
Lots is a beautifully illustrated introduction to biodiversity for younger readers. This story of nature is so beauti...
Diary of a Minecraft Zombie
A popular easy-reading series for fans of the Minecraft books – kids love to follow 12-year old Zombie’s ...
Drawing Made Easy
By E.G Lutz (Lom Art – an imprint of Micheal O’Mara books) First printed in 1921, this is the book credit...
Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Oh how I love this book. It so perfectly sums up how every child (and adult!) feels once in a while. Alexander̵...
The Songbird Cafe Girls: Aurora and the Popcorn Dolphin
Aurora and the Popcorn Dolphin is the third book in the Songbird Cafe Girls series for preteens about friendship, fam...
I Like Myself!
This charming Dr Seuss-inspired rhyming book about a little girl who likes herself no matter what is the perfect gif...
Dinosaur Cove Series
A fun adventurous series about two young boys, Jamie and Tom, who come across a cave with a secret and magical entran...
Sulwe
Sulwe is a children’s book of rare power and beauty. Dealing with colourism, self-esteem and learning that tr...
Loot: How to Steal a Fortune
Written by Jude Watson (Scholastic) Guest reviewed by Nathalie Hosten, Grade 8, Aka`ula School, Molokai, Hawaii Loot...
Secret Kingdom Series 1-6
When a book has an over abundance of words like ‘giggles, pink, magical, spells, sparkles, rainbow, glittering, mer...
Journal of Inventions: Leonardo da Vinci
Considering he drew the designs for some of the objects we now use most often, Leonardo da Vinci is the perfect inv...
Madeline
“In an old house in Paris all covered with vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. In two straig...
Junie B. Jones and the Stupid Smelly Bus
It’s Junie B Jones’ first day in Grade 0 and she has to ride on a bus. She manages to get to school but when it...
A Dog’s Purpose: Ellie’s Story
Ellie is a puppy with a purpose. Trained as a search and rescue dog she will be able to track down a lost child in a ...
4 Kid’s Activity Books
Activity books are a great way to get kids to do some light reading and keep them busy. We tried out a few this holi...
Discover Through Craft: The Seaside
Craft books are perfect for long holidays and this series educates children about seaside habitats while offering gre...
A Tribe of Kids
Follow a young boy as he discovers the collective nouns for animals, plants and the world and comes to find his own c...
Wanda
Wanda is a little girl with a big beautiful head of hair. While her mother thinks her hair is ‘strong and bea...
Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them
Fantastic Beasts brings the wizardly world from England to the streets of New York. When Magizoologist Newt Scamande...
Lots – The Diversity of Life on Earth
Lots is a beautifully illustrated introduction to biodiversity for younger readers. This story of nature is so beauti...
Why Must I Go To School?
Why must I go to school? Why must I do as I am told? Good question. Said no parent ever. Now you can direct them to t...
Unstoppable Me!
This book came just in time to save me from yet another argument in our house around taking responsibility. Subtitled...
Badger’s Parting Gifts
When badger dies his friends are heartbroken, especially Mole who feels ‘lost, alone and desperately unhappy.&#...
The Crocodile Who Didn’t Like Water
‘Once upon a time there was a little crocodile. And this little crocodile didn’t like water.’ So b...
The English Roses Series
Madonna’s books about The English Roses have done well. With cute names, Grace, Nicole, Binah, Amy and Charlott...
Drawing Made Easy
By E.G Lutz (Lom Art – an imprint of Micheal O’Mara books) First printed in 1921, this is the book credit...
The Paper Dolls
I was immediately attracted by the image of paper dolls, which I used to love cutting out as a child. I still make t...
Mr Men and Little Miss Series
The series offers a very clever way of getting children to discuss emotions and personality types and how we need all...
Early Chapter Book Series For Girls
Read our top 11 early chapter book series for girls. Perfect for moving into new reading levels and growing reading c...
The Kissing Hand
Chester Raccoon doesn’t want to go to school. He wants to stay at home with his mom, and play with his toys, a...
Sebastian’s Roller Skates
Sebastian is shy. When people talk to him, he freezes up, even thought he has lots to say and plenty to share. When ...
Diary of a Minecraft Zombie
A popular easy-reading series for fans of the Minecraft books – kids love to follow 12-year old Zombie’s ...
Loot: How to Steal a Fortune
Written by Jude Watson (Scholastic) Guest reviewed by Nathalie Hosten, Grade 8, Aka`ula School, Molokai, Hawaii Loot...
El Deafo
El Deafo is a funny and moving graphic novel memoir about a young hearing impaired girl and her adventures at school ...
Timmy Failure – Mistakes Were Made
The success of Diary of a Wimpy Kid (DOAWK) has inspired a flood of books about happy underachievers illustrated with...
The Day I Swapped my Dad for Two Goldfish
This is the off-beat tale of a boy who is left with his younger sister in his dad’s care while his mom goes out...
Dinosaur Cove Series
A fun adventurous series about two young boys, Jamie and Tom, who come across a cave with a secret and magical entran...
The Lotterys Plus One
The Lotterys are a unique and diverse family with four parents, seven kids and five pets – all living happily toget...
Angelina Ballerina’s Christmas Stories
Angelina Ballerina is a firm favorite in our house – the endearing tales of a little mouse called Angelina who ...
Journal of Inventions: Leonardo da Vinci
Considering he drew the designs for some of the objects we now use most often, Leonardo da Vinci is the perfect inv...
Thank you, Mr Falker
A little girl grows up with huge excitement about learning to read. Her grandfather takes a book and pours honey ove...
Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls
Do you wish there were more books about kick-ass female role models to share with your kids? Superwoman is all well a...
Ottoline and the Yellow Cat
This is the first in a wonderful series about a quirky young girl who loves collecting odd shoes, writing notes about...
101 Great Science Experiments
Next time your kids utter those two dreaded words: ‘I’m bored’ we have a new answer for you: ̵...
A Passionate Vision – The Story of Irma Stern
The story of Irma Stern, one of South Africa’s most famous artists, is shared in this wonderfully written biography...
Lets make More great placemat art
Making art fun is Marion Deuchars’ calling. Her range of Let’s make Great Art books inspire creativity, ...
Greta Zargo and the Death Robots from Outer Space
The story of a quirky 11-year-old aspirant journalist who sets out to solve the mystery of missing cakes so she’...
Christmas Decorations to Cut, Fold and Stick
Making Christmas decorations has always been one of our favourite family traditions and it takes us the first few wee...
Rainbow Magic – Mary The Sharing Fairy
The Rainbow Magic series of books is perfectly aimed to take your beginner reader through to a chapter book reader le...
The Word of Mouse
The Word of Mouse is about a sky-blue mouse called Isaiah “whose life has been one big fright fest”. Isaiah g...
Rainbow Magic: Elsa the Mistletoe Fairy
Just in time for Christmas look out for Elsa the Mistletoe Fairy. Rachel and Kirsty are looking forward to spending C...
Igor – The Bird Who Couldn’t Sing
We took this book out the library and Joe, 8 loved the simple story of a bird who for the life of him cannot sing. W...
A Walk in London
This retro style introduction to famous cities like New York, Paris and London gets huge points for its artistic styl...
The Guinness Book of Records 2015
One of my children’s favourite things is to pore over The Guinness Book of Records and read out some of the mos...
Mummy & Me Cook
Few activities are as much fun as cooking with mom or dad. This lovely cookbook offers the perfect balance of quick b...
Know My Name
Know my Name is an early chapter book about twins Rorisang and Morena , who move to a new school and have to face all...
Winnie the Witch series
Winnie the Witch is something of a celebrity in children’s literature. What makes Winnie a winner is her friendly, ...
Madeline
“In an old house in Paris all covered with vines lived twelve little girls in two straight lines. In two straig...
The Misadventures of Max Crumbly Series
Young readers will love the easy-to-read tales of Max Crumbly and his daily ups and downs in middle school by best-se...
Little Cakes and Cookies to Bake
A gift from the grandparents, this book has been an absolute winner in our house of little cooks. Quick and easy reci...
Where’s Wally? Takes Flight
Long journeys and lazy holidays are always easier with one of the Where’s Wally? Activity Books. Look out for t...
Wolf Brother
Wolf Brother is the first book in the gripping series Chronicles of Ancient Darkness. The story takes place 6000 year...
Middle School Series
Rafe Khatchadorian is the unlikely hero of the Middle School series about an 11 year old boy who takes on rules, bull...
Poems to Perform
Poetry gets a rough deal with most children. Being forced to learn a long poem can take the joy of the rhyming words ...
A librarian’s recommendations
We chatted to Bette Mosher Geci, a retired librarian from Connecticut in the States whose passion for children’...
Spilling Ink – A Young Writer’s Handbook
Spilling Ink is one of the best handbooks for young writers you’ll find, with everything from finding your writ...
We Rise, We Resist, We Raise our Voices
A collection of diverse tales from creative writers, poets, artists and thinkers living with prejudice, judgement, bu...
Soul Surfer
Soul Surfer is the bestselling inspirational autobiography of a talented young surfer girl who lost her arm in a near...
All the Bright Places
A compelling, beautiful and heart breaking young adult story about a girl who learns to live from a boy who wants to ...
El Deafo
El Deafo is a funny and moving graphic novel memoir about a young hearing impaired girl and her adventures at school ...
Children of Blood and Bone series
The Children of Blood and Bone is a highly celebrated West African inspired fantasy for young adults that mixes dark ...
A Passionate Vision – The Story of Irma Stern
The story of Irma Stern, one of South Africa’s most famous artists, is shared in this wonderfully written biography...
The Thing About Jellyfish
“Not everything makes sense, Zu. Sometimes things just happen,” says Suzy’s (Zu’s) mom when h...
The Private Blog of Joe Cowley
This is about a 14 year old teenager who is desperately wanting to sort his life out because everything is going wron...
Orbiting Jupiter
Written by Gary D Schmidt (Penguin) Guest reviewed by Aimee (13) Orbiting Jupiter is a heartwarming story about a te...
Wolf Hollow
An award winning book about a young girl called Annabelle coming of age during the 2nd world war. While the war rag...
Letters to the Lost
Letters to the Lost is a beautifully written exploration of grief, loss and acceptance explored through the lives of ...
Know My Name
Know my Name is an early chapter book about twins Rorisang and Morena , who move to a new school and have to face all...
The Haunted Library: An Anansi Mystery
The new Anansi Mystery series is a well written afro-centric adventure and fantasy series for pre-teens. When twin...
What’s Up, Thoko!
This series by South African author Niki Daly is a collection of wonderful, every day events that occur in the life o...
How to Make Your Own Book
This is an easy home craft for children to make on their own. The joy is in writing and creating your own story. Perf...
Early Chapter Book Series For Girls
Read our top 11 early chapter book series for girls. Perfect for moving into new reading levels and growing reading c...
Middle School Series
Rafe Khatchadorian is the unlikely hero of the Middle School series about an 11 year old boy who takes on rules, bull...
Sulwe
Sulwe is a children’s book of rare power and beauty. Dealing with colourism, self-esteem and learning that tr...
We Rise, We Resist, We Raise our Voices
A collection of diverse tales from creative writers, poets, artists and thinkers living with prejudice, judgement, bu...
Adventure Books for 8-13 year olds
Check out our selection of 7 Awesome Adventure Books guaranteed to get your middle school children reading. Let the a...
Growing Writers: Write Your Own Story Book
When children get inspired to write their own stories, this is the book you can steer them towards. Growing writers...
Pre-school Books on Diversity
On your search to include more diverse books for your pre-school kids, check out the wonderful range of local books f...
Soul Surfer
Soul Surfer is the bestselling inspirational autobiography of a talented young surfer girl who lost her arm in a near...
“So it is with children who learn to read fluently and well: They begin to take flight into whole new worlds as effortlessly as young birds take to the sky.”
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