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[[Category:New Reviews|Confident Readers]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Holly Webb and Jason CockcroftMax Boucherat|title=The Moonlight Statue (The Hounds Last Life of Lori Mills|rating=4.5|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 world-building, critter-collecting game that is a hit in Lori's 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 her bestie and nobody else should be able to enter shows signs of Penhallow Hall)tampering. When malevolent eyes spark up on her phone screen, and her safe place in the game has been doctored – well, where is a girl to turn?|isbn=0008666482}}{{Frontpage|author=Kieran Larwood and Joe Todd-Stanton|title=Dungeon Runners: Hero Trial

|summary=When Polly and her mum move to Penhallow Hall Polly hopes that it will be an escape from Meet Kit. Like most of the continual reminders that her dadpeople in his world, who diedit seems, he is no longer with them. With her mum's new job at an avid fan of Dungeon Running – the hall comes sport where a fresh start for both team of them. Pollywarrior, mage and healer enter specially prepared, century-old, howevermagical mazes, is left and race to her own devices a lot of the timeexit, feeling lonely as she's wandering around perhaps bothering with the treasure or the hall big bad and grounds during the summer holidayspoints they grant you along the way. She had previously been sleepwalking in her old houseUnfortunately for Kit, so shethe only thing he's worried when she finds herself wandering seen of the grounds during latest race on the nightinn TV equivalent is that one team has been retired, eaten, and when she sees one a new trio of questors is needed. Possibly very unfortunately indeed for Kit, he has taken to the stone statues goading from the token bully of his world and stumbled into declaring he'll enter as a dog come to life, she is unsure if she is awake or dreaming! team. How What chance does this mysterious dog come friendless, muscle-free-zone have in actually managing that, and how could he possibly hope to life? And why are there canine guardians for the children of Penhallow Hallsucceed?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847156606</amazonuk>1839945184

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nathan HaleJames Sherwood Metts|title=One Trick PonyPlanet Storyland

|genre=Graphic Novels Confident Readers|summary=Forget the moon being made of cheese, here the Earth looks like it's Things have been a huge dollop of bit sticky for the finest Swiss stuffEarthlings. Horrid, giant insectoid alien things AI and automation have taken overbeen proceeding apace, and often replacing jobs they have zapped anything technological they can find – pumping a blob of something over it, 're paid to do and turning whatever turns up in the resulting spheres into sand, or carting it off other tasks that took time to larger shipsaccomplish. Our heroes belong to a travelling caravan of a village, keeping intact as much human knowledge Just as they can (were beginning to get used to all this technological change and starting to think a digital version of those readers in ''Fahrenheit 451'')other, but they've left their compatriots behind new ways to go exploringspend time, along came an awful pandemic. They'll never expect to find a magicalLife was pretty much shut down and, wondrousalong with it, robotic horse, though – all the many daily social interactions on which is where their problems begin…they depend so heavily.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1419721283</amazonuk>1736128426

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Martin Jenkins and Stephen BiestyTom Percival|title=Exploring Space: From Galileo to the Mars Rover and BeyondThe Wrong Shoes

|genre=Children's Non-Fiction Confident Readers|summary=I take it as read that you know some Will's life is difficult, in a multitude of ways. He is bullied because he has 'the history of space explorationwrong shoes', even if he has the young person you buy books for doesnwrong shoes because his dad can't know it all. So I wonwork and doesn't go into have enough money for even the extremes reached by the ''Voyager'' space craftmost basic of things like food, and his dad can't work because he lost his job at the processes we needed to be expert college, was working a cash-in before we could launch anything-hand job on a building site and had an accident. You probably have some inkling of how we learnt Throw into that we're not mix the centre of everything – the gradual discovery of how curved the planet wasfact that his mum and dad are separated, and how other things orbited other things Will's life seems bleak in turn proving we are not that around which everything revolvesevery direction. And yet, he still has a tiny amount of hope. What you might not be so genned up on He is good at art, and clings to the history moments of books conveying all this to a young audience. When I was a nipper they were stately textsjoy when he is drawing, with that feel like a few accurate diagrams – if you were lucky. For light at the end of a long time now, however, theydark tunnel.|isbn=1398527122}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1805141872|title=The Teacher Who Knew Too Much|author=Rob Keeley|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=''ve Seventeen banks and a jeweller’s have been anything raided. The police are baffled, but statelyonly Ben knows the truth – his Maths teacher, Miss Judson, is really a safecracker! With police and often arenher gangster boyfriend Al on their trail, Miss Judson and Ben go on the run. But Al needs them for one last job...''t worried about accuracy as such in their visual design Goodness me, that Miss Judson is a terror! How on earth did a nice teacher like her manage to get mixed up with a bad 'un like Al? We'll find out. They certainly long ago shod Luckily for Miss Judson, the boringpupil who discovers her terrible secret is Ben, plain white page. Until now…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1406360082</amazonuk>the son of a famous magician who has ambitions to be as good as his father some day, and who thinks Miss Judson is worth saving

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Joy Cowley and Gavin BishopChristopher Edge|title=Helper and HelperBlack Hole Cinema Club

|summary=Snake Lucas and Lizardhis friends are all booked in for a movie marathon at their local cinema, after deciding not to eat or be eaten by a place that has the othernickname of 'The Black Hole'. All big movie fans, have set up their business designed they're looking forward to help other animals in need. lots of exciting films, and many, many snacks! But However, as the movie starts, they need a very quickly realise that something about this new sign for their premisesfilm format is very different, and work done to the entrance burrowthey are swept up into an adventure they couldn't even imagine. But as they lurch from one film genre to the next, can they figure out what name goes first on earth is going on? Will they ever get back to the advertcinema, and who is to do the labour for the expansiontheir real lives? Those arguments done – |isbn=1839942738}}{{Frontpage|author=Adam Stower|title=Murray and there will Bun|rating=4.5|genre=Confident Readers |summary=Murray is supposed to be arguments aplenty before this book a humble, tidy and friendly cat, one who is out – they find a rival has stolen all their trafficable to sleep and eat and eat and sleep and, well, whatever takes his fancy next of the two. Can they get any business back to their door? A rabbit thatBut he's a bad magician's too pale for the desert lifecat, critters in need of so his favourite bun has been turned into a bed for the nighthyperactive sticky rabbit called Bun, and even one wondering if the world is flat or round, all prove catflap they both use canchuck them out, not into the regular back garden, but into a world of frightening adventure and whiffs. ItThis 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 a hard life being such unlikely partners…turned up and he'll have to do…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1776571053</amazonuk>0008561249

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tom Palmer Alex Bell and Garry ParsonsTim McDonagh|title=Secret FCThe Glorious Race of Magical Beasts

|genre=Dyslexia FriendlyConfident Readers|summary=Meet Lily, Maddie, Zack, Khal, and James and Batts. They all go to Eli is a school together busy lad – and they do it eagerlyby day an apprentice in the wondrous library we start by visiting with him, as their inner city life is so devoid of nature and in the open space that evening a helper at the playground is the only room large enough for football. But lo and behold the new head teacher has banned all ball games, on health dessert cafe his gran owns and safety groundsruns. How do these friends get over their disappointment? Why, Eli lives with imaginationhis lovely gran, hard work and a firm belief that what they're doing too – for there is right, is how – they convert a rotting tennis court handily hidden generation missing in the schoolfamily. A few short years ago, Eli's woods into parents were both lost to the titular race, a pitch, globe-trotting adventure where after all entrants have to navigate the world in the company of a magical beast. This has made the race anathema to the pair – but when a lot bad incident at the eatery leads to a confession from gran, Eli knows his only hope is to dare to enter what he most hates, with the sole aim the prize of labours they can play magic at the end – the only thing to their heart's contentpossibly save his gran. Or so they think…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781126879</amazonuk>0571382231

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Meg RosoffHelen Cooper|title=Good Dog McTavishThe Taming of the Cat|rating=3.5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Once again, mice are pitched against cat. In this case, principally, we have Brie the mouse, up against Gorgonzola the cat – and in case you're seeing a connection, they live in a cheese shop and therefore all the names used here seem to be the names of cheeses. Anyway, Brie is shunned, scorned and, if you must, mous-tracised, for the way his habits don't match the other mice he lives with. 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, when he feels all alone and cast out. It's almost as if there were another character from fable who had had to tell stories to keep themselves alive. This makes Brie the top dog in the mouse community, though, as all 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 cheese runs out?|isbn=0571376010}}{{Frontpage|author=Lauren St John|title=Finding Wonder|rating=4

|summary=McTavish did wonder whether he was making a mistake in adopting the Peachey family: it was a decision which came from the heart rather than the headRoo's life has become almost impossibly difficult. You see the Peacheys were dysfunctional: Ma Peachey, an accountant by profession, decided that Her mum died when she was fed up with chasing around after an ungrateful familyyoung, so and now she resigned and dedicated finds herself awoken in the middle of the night by the police banging on her door to tell her yoga with half a hint that she might also dedicate herself her dad has dropped dead on his way to the corner shop to her yoga teacherbuy a lottery ticket. She gave up cookingWhen asked what other family she has, cleaningshe can only name her aunt, bakingJoni, washing and all the other things which kept the family goingwho she knows her dad didn't think very highly of. But she has no one else, such as finding lost keys and getting people out of bed so that they got off she goes to wherever they were going on timelive with her unreliable aunt. And Things continue to get worse for Roo, as when she and Joni leave London in Joni's old campervan, it breaks down in the family? Well, they had no idea middle of how to cope, with one exception.nowhere and then bursts into flames! Poor Roo!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781126836</amazonuk>0571376169

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Julia LeeAdam Baron and Benji Davies|title= Nancy ParkerOscar's Spooky SpeculationsLion|rating= 43|genre= Confident Readers|summary= Nancy ParkerWe start incredibly bluntly, likeable maidservantwith Oscar hoping to have his mother – or father, and part-time super sleuth, returns in this enjoyable mystery story set in 1920. Nancy but mother is delighted more likely – read him his very favourite book a couple of times before he has to be rescued from her job ready for school. But when he enters his parents' bedroom, all he sees is a mahoosive male lion on the fruit their bed, looking sheepish, and vegetable market stall when she is offered admitting that he won't be hungry for another two days. But there are benefits to having a lion around – it can be shown as an unspoken threat to the job of housemaid at an old house by bully that ruined a birthday party for Oscar the sea thanks other month. And it can shapeshift, so he can take it to her old friend Ella who lives nearbyschool and it can get him out of a problem. However strange noises and bumps in the night coupled with ghostly appearances soon disturb NancyAnd it's contentment. The two friends team up and decide wonderful to investigate have around the mysterious happenings. However all does house – not go smoothly for our young heroines as they cope with unfriendly neighbourslimiting his biscuit intake, being much more lax about the rules, spooky cellars and Nancyso on. OK, it can's kindly t work a dimmer switch but eccentric bossit can give Oscar a wonderful time. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0192746979</amazonuk>0008596751

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jean UreJudith Eagle|title=Born to Dance (Dance Trilogy 1)The Stolen Songbird|rating=4.5

|summary=Maddy OCaro'Brien s mother, a world-famous whistler, has failed to return home from her recent work trip abroad and is now missing. Her other mother, Ronnie, is just eleven years old and having to go up North to take care of her life revolves around ballet dancingsister who is unwell. It's not surprising really: her father So who is a leading choreographergoing to look after Caro? Sent to stay with Gam, someone Caro has heard her mother was a ballerina but now runs her own ballet schooldespises, she feels frustrated and confused and worried. All her brother, Sean, has just been promoted summer holiday plans of building herself some equipment to soloist and practise her sister Jen might be having gymnastics are brought to a baby but halt whilst she was in the business is stuck inside this staid old Victorian lady's house, along with an orphan boy, Albie, who is living there too. Maddy's enthusiasm for ballet isn't the usual passing interest which many young girls have - But she soon finds herself caught up in a mystery, as shediscovers a painting of a bird hidden away inside her mum's longing to be off to ballet school full time. In the meantime she old suitcase, and all across London a couple of her friends fearsome gang called the Snakes are looking over the new arrivals at their school thieving artworks and Maddy is convinced that one of them is a ballet dancerterrorising people. Only Caitlyn is ''adamant'' that sheIs the painting somehow linked to the gang? And what has happened to Caro's not and quite definite that mother? Is she doesn't go to classes.somehow involved in the mystery too?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0008164525</amazonuk>0571363148

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rachel Renee RussellTania Unsworth|title=The Misadventures of Max Crumbly: Locker HeroNowhere Island

|summary=We start this book introducing us Meet Gil. Just twelve, he is so determined to Max Crumbly in escape the dark. Literally care system – I don't mean as regards knowing very little about the system that constantly puts him in futureless places that are not homes – and itfind a home for himself. It's clearly a diary-styledHe is en route to yet another fosterer, heavily pictorialwhen he jumps into an anonymous car, light read for a young audience, but we're in the dark as regards Max because ''he'' is in the darkand lets it ride him to his future. School bully Thug Thurston has locked him in his locker, and he's scribbling a goodbye That future seems to the world be in jeopardy when someone steals his journal, with the help one bag of a handy pocket torch. Over an extended flashback belongings – a flashback but that would never really work otherwise someone lives with his brother in a diary-styled book – we see more camp on an island between the two directions of who Max isa motorway, a place inaccessible and definitely ignored enough to provide for their safety and seclusion. He's buddy to the boyf of Nikki Maxwell from this author's other seriesThem, and is a friendless yet cool chap at his middle school, which he's riding out – complete with Thug – because the alternative is his gran's version of mute girl also finding a home-schoolingthere, which is albeit so much worsemore successfully. But when the lockerOver a few weeks we see if their oddball destinies can combine, official notes of his attending late, and problems with classroom beauty Erin all conspire to make Max hate school even more, you might or if this is one place where life as we would want it just expect him to change his mind. But events here will more than make up his resolve…would not work…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1471144623</amazonuk>1804540080

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tom Moorhouse and Holly SwainHelen Peters|title=The New Adventures of Mr Toad: A Race for Toad HallFriends and Traitors|rating=3.5

|summary=''Poop-poop!'' England, WW2. Two young girls are new at the country pile called Stanbrook. YesOne is Nancy, that must destined to be in service all her life it seems, like the most inaccurate representation of the noise a toad makesfemale generations before her. But of course The other is Sidney, it's not just ''a toad'', but Mr Toad – Toad of Toad Hallgirl from a hoity-toity Sussex boarding school that has been removed there away from bomber flight-paths. The irrepressible juvenile driver, thrusting himself into the Edwardian era, girls are chalk and scaring the bejaysus out of his friends, Moleycheese, Ratty and Badgerif we hadn't guessed that then their behaviour with each other over their first encounters would only prove it so. But he's long gone. Toad Hall something is a shell – a ruin compared to what it once was. Stumbling into its underground regions (don't ask) are Moamiss, Ratty and TJ – Toad Junior, first separately and then in full – and what combination theyrealise the Lord Evesham must be a rum 're about to discover will shock themun. But that's nothing compared to the shock that what they find will faceMidnight deliveries are received under cover of secrecy, for Mr Toad will be revived after a century talk is made of being frozenmeetings with Germans, and not like what he finds one bitonly that, a local Spitfire factory has been attacked. ApartBut surely the girls are wrong, that is, from and the modern cars…upper class could never be so underhand?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0192746731</amazonuk>1788004647

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lucy WorsleyJamie Littler|title= My Name is VictoriaArkspire|rating= 4|genre= Confident Readers|summary=Miss V Two 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, including relics from prior major wars left out in the daughter of Sir John ConroyBadlands. Sir John Conroy Elodie is intent on getting closer to power in one of the comptroller religious districts of Arkspire, perhaps even to become the household child in line to inherit the power of the widowed Duchess Watcher, the closest to a ruler the district has, and one of Kentthe five major victors in said earlier war. And Being trained in the widowed Duchess magic that only five people can use would definitely change the status of Kent is mother to the young Princess Victoriawhole family. But in finding something oddly magical, who will go on Juniper might just be able to be one gain some power of Britain's most memorable monarchs. Miss V is also called Victoria - wellher own – for good, Victoire actually - but distinctions of rank are importantor for very, especially when one of you will become a queen.very bad…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408882019</amazonuk>0241586143

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Trenton Lee Stewart024162343X|title= The Secret KeepersStolen History|author=Sathnam Sanghera|rating= 5|genre= Confident ReadersChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=Reuben is a small boy growing up with his mum I was the bad company other people got into at school. I was disruptive in religious education classes because I disputed the existence of a big city full of injustice and fear'god'. The family have little money and working two jobs means that Reuben's mum trusts him to be on his own a lot Where was the proof? In history lessons, it was probably worse still. For a young child Reuben develops a lot Not too long after the end of independenceWWII, which really helps him when he finds an unusual I didn't so much want to learn about the British army's successes (and precious object and decides occasional failures, but we didn't dwell on those) in what came to try to uncover its secret. He hopes it might be valuable and dreams of being able to buy his mum her ideal home. Unfortunately there is someone else also looking for called 'the object and Reuben enters into a dangerous game of hide and seek colonies' as he dares want to take on dispute what right the most powerful and ruthless man army had to be there in the city|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1911077287</amazonuk>first place. Looking back, I still believe I was right - but I regret that I lacked the maturity to approach 'the problem' politely. I wish I'd had Sathnam Sanghera's ''Stolen History''.

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lisa ThompsonThiago de Moraes|title=The Goldfish BoyOld Gods New Tricks|rating=4.5

|summary=Matthew has OCDMeet 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. Not that he knows thatBut just when she's what it isbeing told that by her one-last-chance-giving headteacher, the world changes. He just likes things cleanSuddenly, he really hates germspractically everything electronic stops working – a power-out, or going outsideeven of electric cars, and he feels safest upstairs hits not just the town the school's in his room and but the front bedroomentire planet (apart from mobile phones, where he can control and all that powers the dirtInternet, and where he can watch everything thatjust for our convenience's going on outside, making notes on his neighbours' activitiessake). When a little boyTrixie, Teddyluckily, realises what has happened – the ancient Gods have taken the power of power from next door goes missing one dayus. And so she begins her epic quest, to gather all the people that can steal it turns out back – namely the characters from myth that Matthew was have past form in stealing from the Gods, ie the last person to see himsemi-deities, giants, half-gods and with all of his neighbours so on known as suspects Matthew struggles against his crippling anxieties in order to try and uncover the truth of what happened to Teddytricksters.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1407170996</amazonuk>178845295X

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Gwynedd Rae Hannah Gold and Clara VulliamyLevi Pinfold|title=All Mary (Mary Plain 2)Finding Bear|rating=4.5

|summary=Mary is growing up – [[The Last Bear by Hannah Gold|Last time]], April had been on Bear Island, a lot further north than many people would venture, and going out into the world. Which you might expect of finding a young girl in society, ridiculously unexpected but this is delightful friendship with a young girl ''polar bear'' in society– that she called Bear. StillBack home, she's finding things on the Ps domestic and Qs family front are a bit advanced, but not perfect for her, and so can easily be ignored when word comes through from the islands Bear was last left on. For a bear doing very Bear-y things has been shot and her manners are equally as important as our daughters wouldwounded. But when sheDesperate to make sure he's told OK, she and her father return to be on her best behaviour the Arctic and hope that in a world of very white and very dangerous things, she thinks it is something to sit upon, is there any hope?can find one specific white and dangerous thing – and that the friendship can continue.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405281235</amazonuk>0008582017

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Gwynedd Rae and Clara VulliamySimon Fox|title=Mostly Mary (Mary Plain 1)Deadlock|rating=4.5

|summary=Meet Mary Plain. She's a bearLate one night Graham Blake is late back from his shift on the force, and then suddenly rings Archie, living in demanding he fetch something from a pit in the Swiss city of Bernesecret place, and bears have been there as a tradition for centuriesjoin him on the run. She's not been there longThey get together, for she's just an exuberantbut barely begin to smell the whiff of Southern trains when the father is arrested, slightly stroppy and definitely naïve, little cub, trying to catch up leaving Archie on the late express to her two slightly-older cousins, loving life with her aunt and uncleBrighton, and the generations above them. She's got toting a lot tin his father was determined to learn about lifekeep away from his colleagues, however – from how snow and ice change her world to what sitting on sticky paint can mean. Oh the innocence bearer of a whole heap of little tykes – such as these books were written forquestions.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405281227</amazonuk>1839944420

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Katherine WoodfineCath Howe|title= The Painted Dragon (The Sinclair's Mysteries)My Life on Fire|rating= 5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= Ornate hatsRen's family home is destroyed in a fire. She, the best cigarsher parents, fine foods and delicate perfumes – Mr Sinclair offers it all in his wondrous new department storeher little brother lose everything. She doesn't have any of her clothes, a marvel never before seen on the streets or any of London. Comforther special little knick-knacks from her cupboard, refinement and luxury aboundnow she is living at her grandmother's house where they can't touch anything, with smoking roomsor do anything, tea rooms and or even an eat the foods they normally eat. When she goes back to school she discovers that the class are doing a special art gallery project, creating boxes of their lives, to display things that are important to excite them and intrigue the ''haut monde'' show who they are as they examine the merchandise and chatter their days awaya person. But beneath the wealth lies something more sinisterRen has nothing to put in a box, and once again Sophie and Lil find themselves solving a complicated and multi-layered mysteryso she finds herself starting to steal things. Small things, things that people might not really miss, not when they have so much already. But what will happen to her if someone finds out what she is doing?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405282894</amazonuk>1839942835

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Maz EvansRob Keeley|title=The Boy Who Let the Gods Out?Disappeared and Other Stories

|summary=Zeus retired as chief god Hooray! Bookbag favourite Rob Keeley is back with a long time ago, so return to the rulers of things are the Constellations, even when they're a far-too-juvenile nineteen hundred year old like Virgo. Feeling left outshort story format! The Boy Who Disappeared treats us to eleven new tales, she steals the ambrosia that the Earth resident known each as Prisoner Forty-Two needs, with hardly any clue fun to read as to what to do with it or where he is. So it's no surprise that she crashlands on the farm where Elliot lives. He's got enough problems without worrying about a girl who seems doolally arriving – his father is nowhere to be seen, his mother has got dementia and the farm is a week from being repossessed. It's the birth of a most mismatched partnership – the wise-cracking but hard-done-by lad, and his problems, and the godlike girl who thought she could do it all, but stumbles at the first receipt of sarcasmprevious offerings. But not even together can they see the bigger problems around the corner, for both of them – nor the enormity of the help they might end up calling on…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910655414</amazonuk>B0BVW69N1G

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Alex WoolfLaura Noakes|title= The Shakespeare Plot 1: Assassin's CodeCosima Unfortunate Steals a Star|rating= 4.5|genre= Confident Readers|summary= ShakespeareMeet Number One. Or rather, Cosima Unfortunate. Or rather, just Cos to her friends. The practice in the home she lives in is for the girls to just be named by the number they correspond to in the ledger, and they's London re all Unfortunates – a vibrant, colourful city rich young people with promisedisabilities, new discoveries and great artuncommon mentalities or suchlike that Victorian society frowns greatly upon. A place But Cosima bears the tag as a surname because nothing else seems to be known about where she came from, tooas the first ever inmate, rife with conspiracies and schemes for murder and mayhemunique in having no known family in the outside world. Add During a daring escapade to steal some posh cakes from the mix a mysterious codekitchen one afternoon, she discovers a girl disguised as plan involving said outside world – a boy and a young servant asked devilish Lord Fitzroy seems to want to spy on adopt all the girls for his aristocratic masterInstitute. But why, and what does that body entail? And could it possibly bring Cos closer to the stage is set for thrills and adventure. past she has so little link with?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1911242385</amazonuk>0008579059

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sue Hardy-DawsonAlice M Ross|title=Where Zebras GoThe Nowhere Thief|rating=34.5|genre=Children's Rhymes and VerseConfident Readers|summary=I doubt if you could have zebras, foxes, At last there is new stock in the end of the world, penguins, dinosaurs impoverished yet over-full antiques shop Elsbeth and people out of fairy tale all together if it wasn't her mother run in a book of poetryseaside town. Even short stories would struggle to fit the breadth of content into as few pages as Elsbeth knows this volume doesbecause she has stolen it. Add in home lifeShe also knows she should be free from worries about being found out, because she has the ability to leave this world, school life anduse an unworldly portal of kaleidoscope colours to enter other worlds, er, football, where the sea levels are rising dramatically and you really do have a diverse selection the buildings are generally empty of subjectshumans and ripe for plunder. All have caught With eviction imminent, can Elsbeth nab anything to actually generate custom at the eye of our author ever since she started her career – some of these poems date back a decade – and now she shop? Well yes, is going to try her damnedest, with some brilliant designthe answer, to make sure they all catch but the eye of you.fact a mysterious man knows exactly which items come from these different Somewheres only raises more questions…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910959316</amazonuk>1839943769

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Judd WinickNatasha Farrant|title= Hilo: Saving the Whole Wide World (Hilo Book 2)The Rescue of Ravenwood|rating= 5|genre= Confident Readers|summary=Judd Winick certainly knows how to keep his readers in suspense. The first This story is another excellent adventure from the author of ''HiloVoyage of the Sparrowhawk'' book ended on a massive cliffhanger . Ravenwood is an old house, in the North of England, where Bea and I've Raffy have been eagerly awaiting the next instalment to find out what happens nextliving for most of their lives. The first book was pure comic-book joy They are part of a complex, extended family arrangement, as Bea is there with bright and bold artwork her Uncle Leo, and an engaging fish-out-of water story about a boy Raffy is there with superpowers who fell to earth with no memory of his identity. In this sequelmum, Hilo returns and discovers that mysterious portals they are opening living together as a family. They have grown up all over townswimming in the cove, roaming through the trees, releasing completely at one with all sorts of strange creatures from other dimensionsthe nature around the house and loving every inch of the place. As But now the townsfolk run in panic house is under threat, as Leo is under pressure from his other two brothers to sell the invading monsters, its the job of Hilo property to a developer as it's becoming more and his friends more expensive to send them back maintain. The children find themselves worrying not only about where they came from 're going to live, but if they'll even be together, and seal the portals for goodif Ravenwood itself will be torn down.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0141376902</amazonuk>0571348785

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Sam GaytonRobin Birch and Jobe Anderson|title= His Royal WhiskersSecret Beast Club: The Unicorns of Silver Street|rating=3.54

|summary= What would you do if your only son was accidently transformed into Jayden's nose is forever in a cat? book, which means he knows a lot about mythological creatures – the phoenixes and unicorns of the world, for example. Aisha is addicted to her new tablet, where she can see videos of anything that might be out there. The Czar is beside himselfproblem, as a war chieftheir mothers see it, is that they are never 'out there' themselves, exploring the emperor outside world of the landHackney, he needs an heir strong enough to follow his legacyLondon. Instead But when a narrowboat turns up carrying a science-minded, he has educational purpose, and with a past involving Jayden's cousin, they find a fluffy ginger kittenmagical world they never knew existed. He is For many of those mythological creatures are real, including the laughing stock one Aisha thinks she's seen on a bit of local footage. The crew of his enemiesthe boat, including a living gargoyle, are tasked with saving the rare critters – and he really needs the kids unknowingly have the magical sight needed to turn these odds back join in his favour. So he forces those responsible to change Dare they side with Leila, the cat into woman on board, and her relative who lives as a giant cat through figure in a painting, and become saviours of the same magic they used the first time: alchemy. unseen?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1783443820</amazonuk>0241573483

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mary HoffmanB09XWSXSKY|title=TiltMaestro Orpheus and the World Clock|author=Robert Penee and Joanne Grodzinski

|genre=Dyslexia FriendlyConfident Readers|summary=To make an authorFrederick (or Fred, but never Freddy, you first show someone booksplease) couldn't sleep. To make a readerA tune, you first show them rather like the books they want to, ticking of a clock was playing over and/or can, readover in his mind. To make a builder, you first show someone buildingsIt happened every time he came to visit his grandfather. I use those platitudes He hadn't really wanted to introduce Simonetta, or Nettacome; after all, who lives in Pisa late in the thirteenth century. She is surrounded by fabulous buildings – ithe's not for nothing the area will become known as the Field of Miracles, for the Cathedral, Baptistry ten now and bell tower look gorgeousall those old clocks don't appeal to him anymore.  ''Who needs old clocks anyway? But something All they do is wrong with tell the latter one – ittime. And time isn't good for anything...'s definitely leaning, cracks are showing, and over the hundred-plus years it's taken to get this far people have built  And that was why he was looking at the floors at odd angles to correct clock beside the problembed. Netta is intent on being It was nearly twelve o'clock but at midnight the person who can solve it, alongside her father who's employed to finish it offclock chimed only six times. But therein lies the problem – There was nothing for it's all well but to go and good showing someone buildings, and making them want to be an architect, find grandad - but if theywhere was he? And why had all the clocks stopped at twelve o're the wrong gender then all hope is lost… or is itclock?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781125651</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Linda NewberyNigel Baines|title=Until We WinA Tricky Kind of Magic|rating=4.5|genre=Dyslexia Friendly Emerging Readers|summary=The best journeys are made with little stepsCooper loves to perform magic tricks. Lizzy is slowly leaving her boring village behind – by being cheeky yet clever at her lessonsHis father was a magician, and getting a job in an office in named Cooper after the nearest proper town – and by saving to buy, and teaching herself to ride, a bicyclegreat Tommy Cooper. All thatBut sadly Cooper's under the watchful eye of a mother insistent she learns to knuckle down with the housework on behalf of the menfather died suddenly, and an older brother working at the village hunt. At the officenow Cooper doesn't quite know who to be, however, further steps are suggested or how to her – shorthand and typing classes, but she gets divertedbe. A chance encounter in a tea rooms puts more stepping stones in her way – en route to becoming a fully committed Suffragette, concerned only with making demands for votes for women.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781125791</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Barry Hutchison|title= Worst Ever School Trip: Beaky Malone|rating= 5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Dylan 'Beaky' Malone has a reputation as a prolific liar. He lies to And when his teachers, friends and family and has become so good at it, he rarely gets caught out. Everything changed, however, when he stepped into Madame Shirleydad's magical truth-telling machine. Now it's impossible for Beaky prop rabbit starts talking to tell a lie, but worse than thathim, he now has a habit of blurting the truth out without warning. So whether it's telling the headteacher that his breath smells, confessing undying love for the dinner lady, or embarrassing his friends by sharing their deepest secrets, the saying: 'really''the truth hurtsdoesn't know what' has never been more appropriate.s going on anymore!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1847157750</amazonuk>1444960261