Oh, Armadillo! This Party’s All Wrong!
Ellie Irving and Robert Starling
Happy Yak

Kind, gentle Armadillo lives deep in the rainforest and longs to make friends: however he has a tendency to get everything wrong. One day he has an idea: perhaps if I throw a party I will make a few friends, after all everyone loves parties. Having made invitations off he goes to deliver them. The first goes to Jaguar who is hoping a large springy sponge cake will be on offer. Back home goes Armadillo, creating so he hopes, the perfect sponge cake.

Out he goes again, next stop the Apes: they want games especially musical chairs, pass the parcel and hide and seek. Armadillo rushes home and gets to work …

Then for the balloon loving Lemurs, Armadillo fashions what he hopes is the perfect balloon, sufficiently large for lots of passengers.

On party day our host eagerly awaits his guests and having welcomed them all, announces the fun and games. Seemingly though Armadillo’s ideas are rather different from what the other animals are anticipating: shock horror! He’s devastated by their reactions, so is this the end of his party and hoped-for friendships?

Happily not. An accidental trip that sends him hurtling onto the sponge cake and thence into the air and finally back to earth doesn’t just render the guests speechless but it makes Armadillo see things in a different light; he’s ready to acknowledge and even take pride in his divergent thinking and creativity.

Will he persuade the others to join him in some truly original ways of having fun? You bet … And as for finding friends, certainly, but Armadillo stays true to himself, muddled and different. Hurrah!

A smashing story to show children, especially those who like the protagonist think differently, that rather than a problem, it’s something to celebrate.