Rude Cakes
Rowboat Watkins
Chronicle Books
If you’re looking for a quirky take on manners bad and good, then this entirely crazy confection is certainly one you should bite into. The tale shows what happens when the two-tiered character of the title – a far from sweet, indeed thoroughly ill-mannered, badly behaved object – that bullies and totally disrespects his four-tiered parents is whisked away

to a place inhabited by Giant Cyclopses and one of their number starts sporting “Rudey” as my audience named him as a ‘jaunty little hat.’

From upon a Cyclops’ head, the cake discovers a completely new way of being: one where sharing, politeness and respect for one’s elders is the thing and is then returned, a reformed character, to his bedroom safe and altogether sweeter.
Watkins has used watercolours in pastel shades, and delicate lines, to portray his wonderfully silly cakey characters and somehow manages to create sufficient solidity and gravitas in the Cyclopses to give them a powerful presence, a presence that began in the form of a toy stolen from a chocolate cupcake and a poster above the chief protagonist’s bed. (Observant readers will have noticed these.)

And the moral of the tale? Well, that’s pretty clear but the deliciously playful manner of telling means that there’s no preaching. Rather the whole thing is a cleverly concocted metaphor showing how greater forces for good can prevail.
Would that it were so in our world of conflicts and catastrophes.
Powerful stuff: I wonder what Watkins will cook up next.

A Gold Star for George
Alice Hemming and Kimberley Scott
Maverick Arts Publishing
I’m not a fan of the rewards and punishments system that is so prevalent in schools but I have to applaud, and wholeheartedly endorse George Giraffe’s endeavours in this story, set in The Heavenly Hippos Wildlife Park.
When the notice announcing Heavenly Hippos Gold Star Awards is posted George ponders the possibilities of getting a shiny gold star for that special place on his fence.

He’s always on hand to assist his pals in their endeavours but could he be a winner? All the other animals have talents to display but George cannot win that category; what about the most stylish animal perhaps? No – that’s goes to the only unadorned of the animals.
It’s a somewhat downhearted George that celebrates his pals’ prizes but goes to sleep without one of his own. What then is that sound he hears on waking … and that bright twinkle? …

Kindness and consideration win through in this story, which I envisage being shared as a prelude to circle time sessions in early years settings especially. Amusingly expressive illustrations grace every spread and celebrate an endearing character.

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