Tag Candy Gourlay

Little Rhino Lost

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Little Rhino Lost
Candy Gourlay and Jamie Bauza
Otter-Barry Books

As she wanders in the huge grey urban jungle that is her home city, Maya comes upon a lost baby rhinoceros. She wants to help the creature but needs to know what his home looks like. The baby rhinoceros describes a place full of green plants and trees but as they wander, nowhere looks anything like that,

so May takes the rhinoceros back home with her. She feeds him and with the help of her kind neighbours, does her best to make him feel at home.

The following morning there’s no sign of baby rhino but instead a note to her from the mother rhino thanking her for her care. Despite knowing that her little friend is safely back home she misses him and wonders if he might come a visit. To that end she sets about turning her garden into a wonderful green space and her neighbours do likewise so that the city gradually becomes somewhere a little rhino could call home.

This charming story about determination, kindness, community and environmentalism, is set in the Philippines, the author Candy Gourlay’s home country. Would that urban dwellers be they in Manila, (the city depicted in some of Jamie Bauza’s scenes) or elsewhere in the world, come together in a similar way to help make all our cities greener.

Wild Song

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Wild Song
Candy Gourlay
David Fickling Books

This brilliantly written book is a companion to the author’s Bone Talk. It transports us back to 1904 and is set in the same world but herein the focus is on Luki and it’s her voice that tells the story as if she’s speaking to her mother who has been dead for a year.

Having lived her life in the mountains of the Philippines with her people, the Bontok tribe, Luki has reached the age where it’s expected by the tribal elders that she should marry her best friend Samkad. However, instead she wants to be a warrior. So, she decides to leave her village home and accepts Truman Hunt’s offer to go to America to be part of the World Fair in St Louis. Missouri. It will be a grand adventure, she tells herself.

However, despite America being called the land of opportunities this isn’t the case for everyone and after an arduous journey by train and by foot, Luki is effectively trapped in the Igorot Village. She’s made to feel dehumanised by having to perform serious rituals as entertainment: we Bontok people are exhibits, she realises losing her trust in Truman Hunt and strongly suspecting he’s only interested in making money out of them.

It really feels as though we are inside Luki’s head living her aspirations, her doubts, her reluctant acceptance of the truth about those she meets including someone she thought had become a close friend. I felt myself gripped by such emotions as hopefulness, fear, shock, disgust, horror and shame. Shame because although this book is set in America in the last century, here in the UK even now, people who are considered ‘different’ for whatever reason be it way of life, appearance or skin colour, are subjected to appalling racial attitudes.

Utterly compelling, this novel will maintain its intense grip on you be you an adult reader or a youngster. Girls especially will understand the dilemma of those among them who, like Luki, try to balance a respect for their cultural and religious traditions with the constraints these may impose on them in today’s world.

Unmissable! And make sure you read the ‘What happened next’ pages at the back of the book.

Mort the Meek and the Monstrous Quest / Mike Falls Up

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These are two new fiction titles from the Little Tiger Stripes imprint – thanks to the publishers for sending them for review

Mort the Meek and the Monstrous Quest
Rachel Delahaye, illustrated by George Ermos

According to the introduction to this second adventure of Mort, I am mad, for it warns readers not to proceed to the first chapter if they suffer from seasickness, which I most definitely do. Nonetheless having enjoyed Mort the Meek and the Ravens’ Revenge, I was prepared to swallow some anti-nausea tablets and board ship along with the founder of Brutalia’s pacifist society and vegetarian protagonist, as eager as he, to leave the ghastly shores of Brutalia with its gruesome Queen. In fact it’s partly on account of said Queen that Mort sets sail on the Salty Sea for she has issued a challenge that would give him the opportunity to search, not for the treasure she desires, but for his missing father and sibling twins Gosh and Gee.

However, find an amazing treasure – the three tentacled Belgo – is just what Mort and his tough companion Punky, daughter of a rock crusher, do.

That happens only half way through this story though, by which time Mort has more or less convinced himself that said Belgo has consumed his missing family members, What of his pacifism now? Will it lose out to his anger?

The fact that Rachel Delahaye is a wonderfully humorous wordsmith is part of what makes this dark tale a smashing read; she’s replaced those chapter opening ravens with masters of misinterpretation, Bruce and Larry, a pair of lobsters. There’s danger aplenty too, but the story isn’t without hope: after all where there’s pacifism there’s always hope, all of which George Ermos brings out in his plentiful black and white illustrations.

For slightly younger readers is:

Mike Falls Up
Candy Gourlay, illustrated by Carles Ballesteros

This addition to the Stripes series of full colour fiction for newly independent readers begins in the Chocolate Hills, in the Philippines. It’s a very hot day, too hot really to do anything much and Mike’s mama has sent him and his dog Bowow out for some fresh air while she prepares dinner. They’re sitting on a hill when a sudden earthquake occurs, the ground splits open and Bowow leaps into the hole.

Soon after an anonymous note blows up on which is written BIRTHDAY. COME NOW. JUST FALL UP.
The boy has no idea who sent it, nor how to fall up but he does know that he has to find Bowow, so into the darkness he plunges. The next thing he knows Mike is roused by a dog with an unfamiliar face and a voice shouting, “Foofoo! Is he awake?”

What follows results in an altogether different kind of birthday party but it isn’t for the little girl Kaneisha in whose London room he finds himself. Nor does it take place in a setting either child recognises; suffice it to say that their host is exceedingly happy to see the unexpected guests, a fun time ensues and friendships are forged.

The author has certainly left gaps for readers to fill in this strange story that Carles Ballesteros has made even stranger with his almost surreal, computer game style illustrations.

Interestingly, this is the first in the series to be published as a paperback original, which I think, the target audience might prefer.



Is it a Mermaid?

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Is it a Mermaid?
Candy Gourlay and Francesca Chessa
Otter-Barry Books

When is a mermaid not a mermaid? That is the question explored in this enchanting picture book.

Bel and Benji are playing on the beach one morning when they spy something emerging from the sea: Bel wonders what it could be. Benji says it’s a Dugong, which the creature immediately denies, insisting she’s a ‘beautiful mermaid’ and pointing out her tail – a rather large one.

Benji is having none of it even when the Dugong bursts into song – not very tunefully.

Into the ocean plunges the ‘mermaid’ – not very elegantly – intent on demonstrating her graceful swimming, immediately followed by Bel and Benji,

the latter firmly pointing out the Dugongness of the creature’s anatomy and calling her a “SEA COW”.

This results in a tearful Dugong, an apology from Benji and the forging of a new friendship as children and sea creature spend a happy day frolicking in the ocean waves before bidding one another fond farewells.

Beautifully portrayed in richly coloured scenes and told with gentle humour, this slice of tropical life will delight and amuse young listeners – it’s a treat to read aloud.

There is however a serious side to the book: the final page gives factual information about Dugongs explaining how their seagrass habitat is being destroyed, thus placing the creatures on the list of vulnerable species.