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[[Category:New Reviews|Confident Readers]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Maudie Smith1836285493|title= The Cake, the Wolf and the WitchDouble Life of a Wheelchair User|author=Rob Keeley|rating= 5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= Max doesn't believe in happy endingsWill is a keen player of video games, a conscientious student, a slightly annoying brother and a supportive friend. How could But most of all, heis an aspiring writer. English is his favourite lesson at his school, when lovely, braveMarlowe Park, caring Mum got killed climbing a mountain? He doesn't like heights or small dark spaces and one at which he doesnexcels. This hasn't like silly fairy stories. He absolutely hates being dressed in knickerbockersgone unnoticed by his headteacher, Mrs Howarth, silk slippers and a cape for Dad she has suggested to Will and Ilona's wedding, and in fact, the only thing that's worse, in his opinion, is the fact mum that once it's over he'll have to share his home with spends a horrible new brother and sister. I mean, come on, people! Nettle is couple of afternoons a total grouch who's clearly never cracked week at a smile in her whole lifedifferent school, and little Wild is just . . . well, to tell the truth, he's plain daft. He prances about the place like a demented butterflyStation Road, and he never takes where his baseball cap off, even to go to bedability might be better extended. How's Max supposed to get along with that pair?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444015605</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rose Lagercrantz and Eva Eriksson1836282028|title=When I Am HappiestThe Fighting Spirit|author=Rob Keeley|rating=54|genre=Emerging Confident Readers|summary=''Would you like to adopt a ghost?'' ''Young spirit, born 1887, seeks kind home to haunt. Gentleman by birth. Good company. Gets on well with other children. Jokes and shocks a speciality.'' ''If Dani leaves her school for the summer holidays with one souvenirinterested, place outside your home three twigs, it will either be in the memories shape of the fabulous friendship she formed with Ellaan arrow, who struck pointing to your front door...'' Hooray! Bookbag favourite Rob Keeley is celebrating a chord in decade of his wonderfully entertaining [[My Happy Life by Rose Lagercrantz and Eva ErikssonRob Keeley's ''Spirits'' series in Chronological Order|book oneSpirits]] then moved away, or it will be series with a new adventure that is both a book she has written reboot and compiled to remind her of all the happiness she has encountered along the waya continuation. That is not quite finishedJust like Doctor Who, Edward Fitzberranger, for the following day is to be the great end of year partyour incorrigible Victorian ghost boy, and her classroom decorations are complete and her dress has been bought some new speciallycompanions. But not all of life is happiness Ruby and jollity – Jayden respond to this intriguing advertisement and Dani is removed Edward, who has broken the rules as usual and absconded from the classroom to face very bad news. What ending his manor house home, is adopted by them and takes up residence in store, for her book and for ours?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1927271894</amazonuk>.... a wardrobe!

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Noel Streatfeild Rob Keeley|title=Ballet Shoes Childish Spirits: 10th anniversary special edition

|summary=Around here, we're big fans of children'Ballet Shoess author Rob Keeley. He'' tells the story s a ball of three adopted orphans – Paulinehappy positivity, he understands children, Petrova and Posy Fossilhe writes for their pleasure and enjoyment, not to lecture or hector. Brought to 1930s London as babies by an eccentric explorer (Great Uncle Matthew The ''Childish Spirits'' series is one of his greatest achievements. It's a sequence of ghost stories centring on Ellie, otherwise known as Gum)a stalwart young girl who can cope with anything the spirit world throws at her, and Edward, the girls have a comfortable life until spoiled lordling and the family begin to run out first spirit Ellie encounters|isbn= 1783064617}}{{Frontpage|author=Max Boucherat|title=The Last Life of moneyLori Mills|rating=4. Luckily they are all given places 5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=We meet Lori on the first evening she's got the house to herself – no neighbour to pop in, babysitter poorly, mother at work, just an avidly rule-breaking eleven year old, on her lonesome. What could possibly go wrong? Snuggled in a blanket fort, she has one main intention, and that is to log on to Voxminer, the Childrenworld-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's Academy of Dancing world. But first Lori has a tiny inkling that this stormy night doesn't find herself entirely on her own, and then she finds something even more spooky. For the server she and Stage Training her bestie and soon start nobody else should be able to earn their own way as child performers enter shows signs of tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the stage. game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141359803</amazonuk>0008666482

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Gareth P JonesKieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton|title=Clash of the Rival Robots (Adventures of the Steampunk Pirates)Dungeon Runners: Hero Trial

|summary=We learn a lot about Meet Kit. Like most of the people in his world , it seems, he is an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the Steampunk Pirates in this volume sport where a team of their adventures. While having had references warrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, magical mazes, and race to Britain fighting France before nowthe exit, we find perhaps bothering with the location matters more than [[Attack of treasure or the big bad and the Giant Sea Spiders (Adventures of points they grant you along the Steampunk Pirates) by Gareth P Jones|last time]], as we head back to Englandway. The Pirates have been told Unfortunately for Kit, the only thing he's seen of a way to get into the Tower of London to steal latest race on the Crown Jewels. We also learn a lot about their upbringing, if you can call it inn TV equivalent is that – certainly more than last timeone team has been retired, as we see what made them piratical in the first placeeaten, which was and a surprise to their inventor when it happenednew trio of questors is needed. But you never knowPossibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, they may be about he has taken to face the goading from the token bully of his world and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a showdown against said scientist – andteam. What chance does this friendless, worsemuscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, his next generation of robots. If only they perhaps had been programmed and how could he possibly hope to avoid temptation…succeed?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847156061</amazonuk>1839945184

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Karen McCombieJames Sherwood Metts|title= Catching Falling StarsPlanet Storyland|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= It is 1940 and after Things have been a year of the ''phoney war'' London is suffering in bit sticky for the BlitzEarthlings. Glory AI and her younger brother Rich automation have now been evacuated proceeding apace, often replacing jobs they're paid to a country village far from everything they know do and loveother tasks that took time to accomplish. When the arrangements made by their mother fall through the children are sent Just as they were beginning to get used to live with Miss Saunders, a cold all this technological change and unwelcoming woman who is not popular in the village and Glory wonders if they would have been better off remaining in London despite the danger starting to think of falling bombsother, new ways to spend time, along came an awful pandemic. The local children appear unfriendly Life was pretty much shut down and even in , along with it, all the countryside many daily social interactions on which they are not completely safe from the enemy. All Glory wants is to return home to her parents but she will soon discover that her life is to change in unexpected ways and she will learn that her first impressions should not always be trusteddepend so heavily.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1407138898</amazonuk>1736128426

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alexander McCall SmithTom Percival|title=Precious and the Zebra NecklaceThe Wrong Shoes

|summary=There Will's life is difficult, in a new girl at Precious Ramotswe's schoolmultitude of ways. Her name He is Nancybullied because he has 'the wrong shoes', he has the wrong shoes because his dad can't work and Precious is asked to look after her doesn't have enough money for even the most basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the college, was working a cash-in-hand job on a building site and make sure she settles had an accident. Throw into schoolthat mix the fact that his mum and dad are separated, and Will's life seems bleak in every direction. PreciousAnd yet, already he still has a budding detective tiny amount of hope. He is good at such a young ageart, soon sniffs out that there is a little bit of a mystery surrounding Nancy and on discovering that all Nancy has left clings to the moments of her parents joy when he is drawing, that feel like a fading photograph and light at the end of a zebra necklace she decides that she must try to help Nancy discover the truth about what happened to themlong, dark tunnel.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780273274</amazonuk>1398527122

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hilary McKay1805141872|title=Binny in SecretThe Teacher Who Knew Too Much|author=Rob Keeley

|summary=Reading Binny in Secret was rather like that moment when''Seventeen banks and a jeweller’s have been raided. The police are baffled, as a childbut only Ben knows the truth – his Maths teacher, I discovered that Noel Streatfield had written a LOT of other shoe books orMiss Judson, just is really a few years ago, when I suddenly discovered Jeanne Birdsall safecracker! With police and her Penderwick storiesgangster boyfriend Al on their trail, Miss Judson and I gorged Ben go on the run. But Al needs them, utterly delighting in their humour and kindnessfor one last job... I don't quite know how I haven't come across Hilary McKay before Goodness me, but of course now that Miss Judson is a terror! How on earth did a long list of nice teacher like her books have gone onto my manage to get mixed up with a bad 'un like Al? We'll find out. Luckily for Miss Judson, the pupil who discovers her terrible secret is Ben, the son of a famous magician who has ambitions to read' pile because I thoroughly enjoyed this story be as good as his father some day, and I immediately wanted more!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444913409</amazonuk>who thinks Miss Judson is worth saving

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Kate PankhurstChristopher Edge|title= The Disappearing Dinner Lady (Mariella Mystery)Black Hole Cinema Club|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident Readers|summary=Mariella has to admit it: the school dinners have been much better lately. When Big G was Lucas and his friends are all booked in chargefor a movie marathon at their local cinema, vegetable mush was a place that has the order nickname of the day, but since the 'Ladies Who LunchThe Black Hole' agency have been supplying the meals. All big movie fans, they have been serving up heavenly dishes like 'Monday Munchie Madness're looking forward to lots of exciting films, 'Princess Pie' and 'Pirate Pasta Bake'. The mystery girls love many, many snacks! However, as the movie starts, they very quickly realise that something about this new menufilm format is very different, but and they are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even more than thatimagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what on earth is going on? Will they love ever get back to the new dinner lady, Diana Dumpling. When Diana goes missing in mysterious circumstancescinema, Mariella and her friends are on the case to discover what really happened to their favourite dinner lady.real lives?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444012347</amazonuk>1839942738

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tomiko Inui Adam Stower|title=Murray and Ginny Tapley Takemori (translator)Bun|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers |summary=Murray is supposed to be a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is able to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. But he's a bad magician's cat, so his favourite bun has been turned into a hyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and the catflap they both use can chuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. This time round it drops them into a Viking land, where a troll hunter is expected – well, one much bigger than Murray was, to be honest, but he's turned up and he'll have to do…|isbn=0008561249}}{{Frontpage|author=Alex Bell and Tim McDonagh|title=The Secret Glorious Race of the Blue GlassMagical Beasts

|summary=One problem with being four inches or so tall, as any [[The Borrowers: The Borrowers and The Borrowers Afield Eli is a busy lad – by Mary Norton|Borrower]]-type creature I'm sure will tell you, is getting around. There're day an apprentice in the impracticalities of being so small, encounters wondrous library we start by visiting with catshim, and in the evening a whole lot morehelper at the dessert cafe his gran owns and runs. But Eli lives with this modern world things can happen his lovely gran, too – such as an English governess-type taking for there is a married couple of Little People to Japan with hergeneration missing in the family. There they have kidsA few short years ago, and she leaves them with her favourite pupil – alongside Eli's parents were both lost to the most necessary equipmenttitular race, a small blue glass goblet, that helps globe-trotting adventure where all entrants have to navigate the human bond with world in the Little People by using it to donate milk to them on company of a daily basismagical beast. We're now into This has made the race anathema to the second generation of Japanese people looking after them, pair – but something much more threateningwhen a bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, all-enveloping and worrying than a cat Eli knows his only hope is around to dare to enter what he most hates, with the corner sole aim the prize of magic at the end – World War Twothe only thing to possibly save his gran.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782690344</amazonuk>0571382231

{{newreviewplainFrontpage|author=Helen Cooper|title=In Their Shoes: Fairy Tales and FolktalesThe Taming of the Cat|rating=43.5

|summary=Lots of books haveOnce again, in their own way, shown fairy tales to have relied on certain tropesmice are pitched against cat. You certainly don't have to read them allIn this case, or indeed manyprincipally, to see we have Brie the wily child outsmart mouse, up against Gorgonzola the adult again cat – and again, people tricked into changing ownership of magical thingsin case you're seeing a connection, they live in a cheese shop and therefore all the power of being a stepmother, or names used here seem to be the power names of doing things in threescheeses. StillAnyway, Brie is shunned, scorned and, I think this if you must be one of a very rare few collections to look at footwear as a theme, mous-tracised, for the way his habits don't match the other mice he lives with a tidy. They nibble up paper wrapping from the cheese for bedding – he displays it as art and makes stories based on the visuals on it. And that story-telling will come in handy one night, small selection of fairy when he feels all alone and folk-tales cast out. It's almost as if there were another character from fable who had had to tell stories to entertainkeep themselves alive. This makes Brie the top dog in the mouse community, though, as all with the others had the chance to half-inch some cheese while the cat was distracted. But will the story have the successful sequel it needs when that subject.cheese runs out?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782691014</amazonuk>0571376010

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ulrich Hub, Jorg Muhle and Helena Ragg-Kirkby (translator)Lauren St John|title=Meet at the Ark at Eight!Finding Wonder

|genre= Confident Readers|summary=An educated penguinRoo's life has become almost impossibly difficult. Her mum died when she was young, an agnostic penguin and a violent, smaller, young penguin walk into a snowdrift… You might not be able now she finds herself awoken in the middle of the night by the police banging on her door to make a full joke out of tell her that opening line, but this book practically does continue her dad has dropped dead on from therehis way to the corner shop to buy a lottery ticket. Three penguins – each a little different from the When asked what otherfamily she has, even if they generally look and definitely smell the sameshe can only name her aunt, and GodJoni, a subject who she knows her dad didn't think very highly of their conversation when a butterfly comes along. But she has no one else, of all thingsand so off she goes to live with her unreliable aunt. The young, hot-headed one (wellThings continue to get worse for Roo, as when she and Joni leave London in the pictures he wears a woolly hat, heJoni's bound to be hot-headed) leaves old campervan, it breaks down in umbrage, leaving just two – which is perfectly timed if you're a dove, the middle of nowhere and come along telling all the animals to get then bursts into Noah's Ark in pairs, as an almighty flood is about to happen…flames! Poor Roo!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1782690875</amazonuk>0571376169

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Steven ButlerAdam Baron and Benji Davies|title=The Diary of Dennis the Menace: Canine Carnage (book 5)Oscar's Lion|rating=43

|summary= I'm sure Dennis the Menace has a hate-hate relationship We start incredibly bluntly, with schoolOscar hoping to have his mother – or father, but the nature mother is more likely – read him his very favourite book a couple of it is relevant when considering these bookstimes before he has to be ready for school. The fact But when he goes at enters his parents' bedroom, all he sees is the cause for them in the first place – he [[The Diary of Dennis the Menace by Steven Butler|originally]] was tasked with writing a journal as homeworkmahoosive male lion on their bed, looking sheepish, and turned it into a menacing manual admitting that he won't be hungry for us, his readersanother two days. But if he paid attention there he might realise £1,000 is not quite enough are benefits to build his own, self-aggrandising theme park, even if he manages having a lion around – it can be shown as an unspoken threat to employ the bummy, booky, wimpy types behind bully that ruined a birthday party for Oscar the scenesother month. The grand sum is what Dennis intends And it can shapeshift, so he can take it to win when The Fame Factor TV talent show hits townschool and it can get him out of a problem. That, as we can easily foretell, is going to be very menacingly interesting, but thatAnd it's wonderful to have around the house – not limiting his biscuit intake, being much more lax about the site of the titular carnage – for that we have to rely rules, and so on an unusual sleep-over…. OK, it can't work a dimmer switch but it can give Oscar a wonderful time.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141355840</amazonuk>0008596751

{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Cheeky CharlieJudith Eagle|authortitle=Mat WaughThe Stolen Songbird

|summary=Caro''My book is about all the naughty things that my brother Charlie has done. Some of it is funnys mother, some of it is a bit sadworld-famous whistler, has failed to return home from her recent work trip abroad and lots of it is disgustingnow missing. Her other mother, because that's what Charlie can be. It might even make you be sickRonnie, so get readyis having to go up North to take care of her sister who is unwell.'' You know what So who is going to look after Caro? That's about the size of it. After Harry Sent to stay with Gam, someone Caro has introduced herself - she's almost seven years oldheard her mother despises, she doesn't like feels frustrated and confused and worried. All her summer holiday plans of building herself some equipment to practise her freckles, gymnastics are brought to a halt whilst sheis stuck inside this staid old Victorian lady's used to people thinking that someone called Harry ought to be a house, along with an orphan boy, and she has a younger brotherAlbie, who is three and called Charlieliving there too. This is Harry But she soon finds herself caught up in a mystery, as she discovers a painting of a bird hidden away inside her mum's book about Charlie. Charlie is old suitcase, and all across London a cheeky chappiefearsome gang called the Snakes are thieving artworks and terrorising people. He never shuts up. He likes Is the painting somehow linked to push his luck. the gang? And, having pushed his luck once, he likes what has happened to push it again. And again. And again. This is much to HarryCaro's exasperation, as mother? Is she explains by dint of a book full of anecdotes... somehow involved in the mystery too?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1508910510</amazonuk>0571363148

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel Renee RussellTania Unsworth|title=Dork Diaries: Once Upon a Dork (Book 8)Nowhere Island|rating=34.5

|summary=There Meet Gil. Just twelve, he is wishing you had a fairytale relationship, and/or having so determined to escape the care system – the chance to change your life drastically system that constantly puts him in futureless places that are not homes – and then there find a home for himself. He is being able en route to yet another fosterer, when he jumps into an anonymous car, and lets it ride him to see what would actually happen if either wish came truehis future. Nikki wakes up on a typical school day That future seems to be in jeopardy when someone steals his one bag of belongings – but that someone lives with his brother in a hellish start – no alarm clock, due to her younger sister, sandwich all over her jumper, again due to her younger sister, and so camp onan island between the two directions of a motorway, a place inaccessible and so she can only wish definitely ignored enough to provide for something to take her out of it their safety and give her a dollop of fantasyseclusion. That something is dodgeballThem, and a mute girl also finding a home there, which bangs her on the head albeit so much she wakes up in more successfully. Over a sheer fantasy worldfew weeks we see if their oddball destinies can combine, or if this is one place where her BFFs are Goldilocks and Red Riding Hood, the world is peopled by other folk from school, but her hunky friend Brandon is still Prince Charming, and her enemy Mackenzie Hollister is still able to make her life hell…as we would want it just would not work…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>147114383X</amazonuk>1804540080

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lincoln PeirceHelen Peters|title=Big Nate Lives It Up (Big Nate, Book 7)Friends and Traitors|rating=4.53

|summary=Life at school might actually be interesting for Big NateEngland, for onceWW2. Even if Two young girls are new at the building country pile called Stanbrook. One is so old Nancy, destined to be in service all her life it's falling downseems, an ancient student's journal much like his has been discoveredthe female generations before her. The other is Sidney, peppered with a girl's cartoons from a long, long time ago – proving even he can have a connection with something a century oldhoity-toity Sussex boarding school that has been removed there away from bomber flight-paths. (And I donThe girls are chalk and cheese, and if we hadn't mean the connection made when bits of the place actually fall onto his headguessed that then their behaviour with each other over their first encounters would only prove it so.) Unfortunately for NateBut something is amiss, another connection has been forced on him – he has had to buddy up with and first separately and then in combination they realise the new boy in classLord Evesham must be a rum 'un. ''He's newMidnight deliveries are received under cover of secrecy, dorkytalk is made of meetings with Germans, and has a name not only that sounds like , a British boarding school'', we're toldlocal Spitfire factory has been attacked. But what exactly is it about Breckenridge Puffington III that gives Nate a strong sense of déjà vu…surely the girls are wrong, and the upper class could never be so underhand?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007581270</amazonuk>1788004647

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= StrefJamie Littler|title=J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan: The Graphic NovelArkspire

|genre=Graphic NovelsConfident Readers|summary=Here's a quiz question for you – despite the uniform seventy year copyright ruleTwo sisters, Juniper and Elodie, born fifteen minutes apart, are growing to be chalk and cheese. Juniper is an eager hunter and trader in illicit magic, which work has been including relics from prior major wars left out in the sole recipient Badlands. Elodie is intent on getting closer to power in one of an endless extension the religious districts of itArkspire, courtesy perhaps even to become the child in line to inherit the power of an ex-Prime Minister? The answer is obvious now at leastthe Watcher, the closest to a ruler the district has, as this is and one such volumeof the five major victors in said earlier war. It's a very readable and pleasant variant on J M Barrie's original stage version and novel regarding Peter Pan, which Being trained in the magic that only five people can use would definitely change the status of course helps and always will now help the Great Ormond Street Children's Hospitalwhole family. And But in finding something oddly magical, Juniper might just be able to gain some power of her own – for good, or for a boy who never grows upvery, at 111 years old he's in spritely good health.very bad…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780272901</amazonuk>0241586143

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Helen Moss024162343X|title= Secrets of the Tombs 2: The Dragon PathStolen History|author=Sathnam Sanghera|rating= 5|genre= Confident ReadersChildren's Non-Fiction|summary= They donI was the bad company other people got into at school. I was disruptive in religious education classes because I disputed the existence of a 'god'. Where was the proof? In history lessons, it was probably worse still. Not too long after the end of WWII, I didn't actually intend so much want to have an adventure: quite learn about the opposite, in fact. As far as fifteen-year-old Ryan British army's successes (and his friend Cleo are concernedoccasional failures, being chased by bad guys and falling down deep holes is seriously over-rated. But theybut we didn're t dwell on their way those) in what came to China with their parents anyway, so they can hardly refuse when Cleobe called 'the colonies's grandmother asks them as want to put a jade bracelet she's dispute what right the army had for eighty years to be there in the first place. Looking back where it belongs, I still believe I was right - but I regret that I lacked the maturity to approach 'the problem' politely. Where I wish I'd had Sathnam Sanghera's the harm?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444010417</amazonuk>''Stolen History''.

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Kjartan Poskitt and Philip ReeveThiago de Moraes|title=Borgon Old Gods New Tricks|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Meet Trixie. Forever getting into scrapes, larks and adventures involving flooding the school aircon with fart powder, she could almost be thought a young goddess of nuisance. But just when she's being told that by her one-last-chance-giving headteacher, the world changes. Suddenly, practically everything electronic stops working – a power-out, even of electric cars, hits not just the town the Axeboy and school's in but the Whispering Temple entire planet (Borgon apart from mobile phones, and all that powers the Axeboy 3Internet, just for our convenience's sake). Trixie, luckily, realises what has happened – the ancient Gods have taken the power of power from us. And so she begins her epic quest, to gather all the people that can steal it back – namely the characters from myth that have past form in stealing from the Gods, ie the semi-deities, giants, half-gods and so on known as the tricksters.|isbn=178845295X}}{{Frontpage|author=Hannah Gold and Levi Pinfold|title=Finding Bear|rating=34.5

|summary=''[[The middle's nice Last Bear by Hannah Gold|Last time]], April had been on Bear Island, a lot further north than many people would venture, and crunchy finding a ridiculously unexpected but delightful friendship with a polar bear – that she called Bear. Back home, things on the squishy bits domestic and family front are horrible.'' Noa bit advanced, that's but not a predator in prehistoric times discussing the eating of us humans. Insteadperfect for her, it's Borgon and so can easily be ignored when word comes through from the Axeboy's mother, discussing peachesislands Bear was last left on. Yes, even in a world where For a lot of nasty animals are still around to potentially eat the likes of Borgon, there are still bear doing very Bear-y things for people to learnhas been shot and wounded. Borgon for one, in this third adventure in the series, has a lot Desperate to learn about religion – make sure he scoffs at the idea there's a god resident OK, she and her father return to the Arctic and hope that in a temple he world of very white and his friends have discoveredvery dangerous things, even if his friend Hunjah insists otherwise. The lesson is forced she can find one specific white and dangerous thing – and that the truth comes out, however, when some thieves turn up, having pegged the site as a location of many earthly riches…friendship can continue.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>057130737X</amazonuk>0008582017

{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Dead End Kids: Heroes of the Blitz Simon Fox|authortitle=Bernard AshleyDeadlock

|genre=TeensConfident Readers|summary=It's London in 1940. Most of the men have been conscripted and the East End Late one night Graham Blake is populated mainly by women and children. Josie and her friends are carrying late back from his shift on much as usualthe force, though, grouping into little gangs and arguing over turf via mud fights along the Thames. But then comes suddenly rings Archie, demanding he fetch something from a terrible night of bombing. It's the start of the Blitz secret place, and 57 consecutive nights of bombing for join him on the East Endrun. The fire service is stretched way beyond its capacity and They get together, but barely begin to smell the lucky ones make it out whiff of Southern trains when the shelters in father is arrested, leaving Archie on the morninglate express to Brighton, toting a tin his father was determined to keep away from his colleagues, while and the unlucky ones don't see another sunrisebearer of a whole heap of questions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408338955</amazonuk>1839944420

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Emma CarrollCath Howe|title=In Darkling WoodMy Life on Fire

|summary= In the early hours of the morning Alice’s mum receives the phone call they have been waiting forRen's family home is destroyed in a fire. The long awaited heart transplant that may save She, her parents, and her sick little brother, Theo’s, life is now possiblelose everything. Alice finds herself sent to stay with a grandmother she doesn’t know She doesn't have any of her clothes, miles away or any of her special little knick-knacks from her friends cupboard, and the life now she knows. There is no TVliving at her grandmother's house where they can't touch anything, or do anything, no phone signal and no internet but Alice feels drawn to or even eat the mysterious Darkling Wood surrounding the house despite her grandmother’s wish to have it chopped downfoods they normally eat. Meanwhile When she goes back in 1918 to school she discovers that the class are doing a young girl desperately waits for news special art project, creating boxes of her brother’s safe return from the fronttheir lives, to display things that are important to them and show who they are as a person. Her mother doesn’t like her playing But Ren has nothing to put in the nearby wood but it is there that a box, and so she discovers secrets and magic finds herself starting to steal things. Small things, things that give people might not really miss, not when they have so much already. But what will happen to her hope for the future. if someone finds out what she is doing?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>057131757X</amazonuk>1839942835

{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=The Potion DiariesRob Keeley|authortitle=Amy AlwardThe Boy Who Disappeared and Other Stories

|summary=We've been here before. The lovely children whose name Hooray! Bookbag favourite Rob Keeley is in back with a return to the title of all these books – handy when they make time to try and check if they're in this one or not – are woken up in a ridiculous way by a blackbird making his usual cameo. The Army of Great Kerfuffle is asleep – all single cat of it. short story format! The King is wearing a badge that allows him Boy Who Disappeared treats us to pretend eleven new tales, each as fun to not be the King – this time he's thinking of keeping bees, although he has four animals that go 'quack' in a hive instead. Oh yeah, and the evil badgers are in prison having been naughtyread as his previous offerings. But they will never follow the pattern and be evil and naughty and break out in order to be eviller and more naughty, will they?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0192742736</amazonuk>B0BVW69N1G

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Julian SedgwickLaura Noakes|title=Ghosts of ShanghaiCosima Unfortunate Steals a Star

|summary=ShanghaiMeet Number One. Or rather, Cosima Unfortunate. Or rather, 1926just Cos to her friends. The city practice in the home she lives in is heavily divided between for the natural, national areasgirls to just be named by the number they correspond to in the ledger, and the enclaves of the foreigners they're all Unfortunates – Russianyoung people with disabilities, French, American, Britishuncommon mentalities or suchlike that Victorian society frowns greatly upon. Several of But Cosima bears the younger international youths have formed the Ghost Society gangtag as a surname because nothing else seems to be known about where she came from, after as the principal characterfirst ever inmate, Ruby, found another divide cleaving Shanghai and unique in having no known family in two – that between the living and the dead, the 'real outside world' and the Otherworld. Her brother deadDuring a daring escapade to steal some posh cakes from the kitchen one afternoon, she seemed discovers a plan involving said outside world – a devilish Lord Fitzroy seems to want to become adopt all the conduit girls for a poltergeist in her apartment, and recently the gang have even managed to lock a spirit into a bottle and cast it down a wellhis Institute. But the gang is immediately falling apart – the lad she loves, Charliewhy, and his sister are diverting themselves from, or have been warned off, any further such activity. what does that body entail? Rose knows And could it possibly bring Cos closer to the past she has to find the source of the problem – and cross any untold divides in her city to find the truth…so little link with?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1444923900</amazonuk>0008579059

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Guillermo del Toro, Daniel Kraus and Sean MurrayAlice M Ross|title=TrollhuntersThe Nowhere Thief

|genre=TeensConfident Readers|summary=West Coast USA At last there is new stock in the 1960s, impoverished yet over-full antiques shop Elsbeth and the city is wracked and wrecked by her mother run in a slew of missing children reportsseaside town. Elsbeth knows this because she has stolen it. The parents with their new anguishes, and new rules against playing She also knows she should be free from worries about being found out after dark, have no idea of because she has the horrors in their vicinity – literally under their feet lies a city of trollsability to leave this world, guilty and use an unworldly portal of snatching the children. Last kaleidoscope colours to goenter other worlds, Jack Sturgess. Cue where the modern era sea levels are rising dramatically and Jack's younger, now grown-up brother Jim, and Jim Jr live a sheltered life in the most barricaded buildings are generally empty of humans and secure home imaginableripe for plunder. With eviction imminent, and Jim Jr's life is as exciting as you'd expect. can Elsbeth nab anything to actually generate custom at the shop? UnfortunatelyWell yes, howeveris the answer, but the trolls are about to make a return to their nastiest of ways – and their intentions are fact a lot mysterious man knows exactly which items come from these different Somewheres only raises more surprising than Jim Jr could ever predict…questions…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1471405192</amazonuk>1839943769

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Caroline LawrenceNatasha Farrant|title= The Case Rescue of the Bogus Detective|rating= 5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= Howdy folks! Welcome to Virginia City, bustling and busy home to prospectors, dancing girls, lawyers, gamblers and newspapermen. It's 1862, and our twelve-year-old pal Pinky is continuing the quest to become a successful detective and eventually join Uncle Allan in the famous Pinkerton Detective Agency in Chicago. But for the moment there's so much crime right here in Nevada, thanks to the untold wealth being found daily in the nearby silver mines, that Pinky and financial partner Ping are soon busy day and night, chasing desperados, solving crimes and righting all manner of wrongs.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444010336</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Ali Sparkes|title=Car-JackedRavenwood

|genre=Confident Readers |summary=A boy genius who speaks Mandarin and Latin This story is another excellent adventure from the author of ''Voyage of the Sparrowhawk''. Ravenwood is an old house, in the North of England, where Bea and Raffy have been living for most of their lives. They are part of a criminal who’s just robbed a bank complex, extended family arrangement, as Bea is there with her Uncle Leo, and stolen a car: it’s an unusual pairing but, it turns outRaffy is there with his mum, and they are living together as a perfect teamfamily. ‘‘Car-Jacked’’ leads us They have grown up swimming in the cove, roaming through the twists trees, completely at one with all of the nature around the house and turns loving every inch of 12-year old Jack’s adventure when the place. But now the house is under threat, as Leo is under pressure from his parents’ car is hi-jacked with Jack still insideother two brothers to sell the property to a developer as it's becoming more and more expensive to maintain. The children find themselves worrying not only about where they're going to live, but if they'll even be together, and if Ravenwood itself will be torn down.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>019273346X</amazonuk>0571348785

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joan Aiken Robin Birch and Quentin BlakeJobe Anderson|title=Arabel’s RavenSecret Beast Club: The Unicorns of Silver Street|rating=4.5|genre=For SharingConfident Readers|summary=It’s been manyJayden's nose is forever in a book, many years since I first met Arabel which means he knows a lot about mythological creatures – the phoenixes and her pet ravenunicorns of the world, Mortimer, whilst watching Jackanory on children’s televisionfor example. Bernard Cribbins used Aisha is addicted to read the storiesher new tablet, and they became firm favourites where she can see videos of mineanything that might be out there. Here I am returning to the first book in the seriesThe problem, wellas their mothers see it, just a handful of years lateris that they are never 'out there' themselves, and exploring the story has lost none outside world of its charmHackney, London.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847806910</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Philip Caveney|title= One For Sorrow|rating= 5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= You'd think But when a narrowboat turns up carrying a science-minded, wouldn't youeducational purpose, that Tom Afflick would move heaven and earth to avoid leaving Manchester to go to Edinburgh: on his last two visits there he ended up tumbling into the with a pastinvolving Jayden's cousin, where he met all manner they find a magical world they never knew existed. For many of those mythological creatures are real, including the one Aisha thinks she's seen on a bit of scary folklocal footage. But parents tend to be pretty determined to get their own way about such things The crew of the boat, including a living gargoyle, are tasked with saving the rare critters – and no way are they going the kids unknowingly have the magical sight needed to swallow some mad tale about him being chased by plague doctors and other assorted murderersjoin in. So Dare they side with Leila, off he has to gothe woman on board, and yes – he's barely set foot in ''Auld Reekie'' when he's time travelling again, her relative who lives as a figure in a wondrous mix of dramapainting, real live people and deadly peril.become saviours of the unseen?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1905916957</amazonuk>0241573483

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dave CousinsB09XWSXSKY|title=Charlie Merrick's Misfits in I'm a Nobody, Get Me Out of Here!Maestro Orpheus and the World Clock|author=Robert Penee and Joanne Grodzinski

|summary=What is that sayingFrederick (or Fred, but never Freddy, please) couldn't sleep. A tune, about rather like the best laid plans ticking of mice a clock was playing over and misfits gang aft agley? over in his mind. Charlie and It happened every time he came to visit his fondly thought of friends in the soccer squad we met [[Charlie Merrickgrandfather. He hadn't really wanted to come; after all, he's Misfits in Fouls, Friends, ten now and Football by Dave Cousins|last time]] are hoping for a simple trip to a summer camp for a weekall those old clocks don's educative training. But no, their dopey manager has booked them in t appeal to a survival camp by mistakehim anymore.  ''Who needs old clocks anyway? Instead of hitting All they do is tell the back of the net they're building tarpaulin shelterstime. They canAnd time isn't set any watching footie-heads ablaze, good for they have to spark their own fires anything...'' And that was why he was looking at nightthe clock beside the bed. They can still score, however, as thereIt was nearly twelve o's a pointsclock but at midnight the clock chimed only six times. There was nothing for it but to go and find grandad -based competition to hand, but now that Charlie has dropped his team in where was he? And why had all the proverbial, theyclocks stopped at twelve o're once more really up against it…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192738232</amazonuk>clock?