Lola and Larch Make a Winter Wish
Sinéad O’Hart, illustrated by Rachel Seago
Nosy Crow

It’s approaching the end of term for Lola with both characters in team Lola and Larch preparing for a special date on their respective calendars. As the two walk through the snowy forest to celebrate Turningtide with the other fairies, Lola endeavours to explain to fairy Larch (who has no experience whatsoever of the Christmas celebrations of humans) what Santa does. Lola then talks of how excited she is about her class’s Christmas concert to which Larch has been invited. However Larch doesn’t approve of the way fairies are portrayed in the performance and so turns down the invitation, causing disappointment to Lola.

So angry is Larch that she wishes for Lola to know what being a fairy is really like. An unwise thing for sure, especially as Euphorbia was watching and heard her words.

The following morning both Lola and Larch wake up feeling peculiar; they’ve swapped bodies which means that Larch has to participate in the performance she’d refused to attend. This gives Euphorbia an opportunity to gain more power – a risky one for sure – and she seizes the fairy form of Lola from the concert.

Can Larch get back in time to stop Euphorbia doing something awful with her magic? What will happen about Lola’s role? Can Larch and Lola find a way to unscramble things and return them to normality?
Magical, albeit sometimes shocking, seasonal happenings, with lots of dramatic drawings by Rachel Seago.

There’s magic aplenty too in

Mirabelle and the Baby Dragons
Harriet Muncaster
Oxford Children’s Books

Mirabelle and her family are invited by Mum’s witch friend Gladys to stay at her dragon sanctuary during half term week. A dream come true for Mirabelle, so she thinks, but her notion that she’s a dragon expert is about to be put to the test.
Mirabelle’s countless fans will delight in her latest adventure with its lesson about guidance from someone who knows better when it comes to undertaking a tricky task.