Tooth Fairy in Training
Michelle Robinson and Briony May Smith
Walker Books

If you’ve ever wondered how tooth fairies hone their skills, then this magical tale will perhaps enlighten you.
Let’s meet the trainee Tate and her trainer, sister May who has much to teach her younger sibling.

First task is to perfect the ‘switcheroo’ – a doddle of course … unless that is, you happen to be performing it on a baby hippo.

Visit two is also pretty demanding and perhaps a tad alarming, especially when you’re being watched by the infant’s mother whose tail you have to avoid with some nimble footwork.

And so it continues over ground and under sea, on the shore and then having traversed almost the whole planet, the penultimate stop is in the jungle with the possibility of being swallowed by an anaconda – yikes! But snake teeth are a rarity so it has to be done.

Surely the final stop will be simplicity itself – it’s to a mere human girl. How could anything go wrong, and even if on the off-chance, it does, you can always resort to a touch of the old magic …

Does our novice pass the test though? That is after all, the purpose of the whole exercise: I’m not telling …

Briony’s illustrations are spirited delight, every one of them. Tate is totally adorable and her expressions and body language say even more than the lively rhyming narrative she (and Michelle) provides during the learning journey throughout which her big sister looks on benevolently and comments encouragingly.

I fell in love with this utterly blissful book.