A masterpiece of storytelling with evocative and stunning illustrations, destined to be read for years to come.
The wishing stars burn bright tonight,
the air is thick with dreams,
And a deeply sleeping dinosaur is waking up,
it seems . . .
In a town by the seaside, Marianne is often seen foraging on the beach. But she isn’t playing with children her own age. Instead Marianne is alone, and digging for dinosaur bones to build a special sort of companion.
Then, one night, she goes to sleep wishing with all her heart that her dinosaur might come to life . . .
A very rare and special book where the words and pictures take you on a magical journey far beyond the page.
The Girl and the Dinosaur is available in hardback for £10.99.
A magical adventure to delight the imagination. The curl-up-on-the-sofa snuggle of a series from a uniquely talented author.
Tilly Pages is a bookwanderer; she can travel inside books, and even talk to the characters she meets there. But Tilly’s powers are put to the test when fairytales start leaking book magic and causing havoc . . .
On a wintery visit to Paris, Tilly and her best friend Oskar bravely bookwander into the land of fairytales to find that characters are getting lost, stories are all mixed-up, and mysterious plot holes are opening without warning. Can Tilly work out who, or what, is behind the chaos so everyone gets their happily-ever-after? The second enthralling tale in the bestselling Pages & Co. series.
Pages & Co.: Tilly and the Lost Fairy Tales is available in hardback for £12.99.
As expectation mounts on Christmas Eve, a boy hears sleigh bells ringing and looks out of the window in time to see Santa arrive. Santa comes down the chimney (this is a fun picture as the book is tall and thin) and delivers the presents while pretending he does not notice the boy watching. Off he rides with all his favourite reindeer, and it’s time for Christmas to begin! Told in verse that’s perfect to recite aloud with all the family gathered around, this poem has stood the test of time since it was first written almost 200 years ago.
A beautiful edition in a traditional style, for the newest family member to cherish.
The Night Before Christmas is available in hardback for £12.99.
By Alex T. Smith
This is a beautifully written story book which will make a lovely addition to the Christmas countdown. I have been reading this to my 4 year-old and every day she is excited to find out what happens next on Winston’s Christmas adventure. I can see she will be enjoying this for many years, long after she has become a confident independent reader herself and it will become a much-loved family tradition. At the end of each chapter are lovely ideas of festive activities – the Christmas rocky road recipe was delicious!
From Alex T. Smith, bestselling author of the Claude series, comes How Winston Delivered Christmas – the irresistible story of the brave little mouse who sets out on an adventure on Christmas Eve. Featuring beautiful colour artwork and Christmassy activities to make-and-do throughout, this gorgeous book is sure to become a festive family tradition that will be enjoyed year after year.
Winston the mouse is on a Very Important Mission. On Christmas Eve, he finds a letter to Father Christmas that did not make it to the post box – so, with no time to lose, he sets out to deliver it himself in time for Christmas Day! He has a lot of Very Exciting Adventures on his Very Important Mission and makes some wonderful friends along the way.
Each chapter includes its very own festive activity for all the family to enjoy together – including writing a letter to Father Christmas, making mince pies, designing your very own Christmas cards, making presents, creating decorations, and so much more! This flapped paperback features a festively foiled cover and artwork on beautiful paper, making it the perfect Christmas gift.
How Winston Delivered Christmas is available in paperback for £9.99.
Having two small children at home I read a lot of picture books and this one was a real treat! A unique, feel-good and clever Christmas story which I’m sure will help keep the magic alive for some children just a bit longer.
The big red suit was ironed and ready. The elves had stuffed the final teddy, when from the bathroom came a yelp, ‘Ho Ho, oh no! Quick, someone HELP!’. When Santa accidentally shaves off his famous beard, the elves all rally round to help. Can they glue it back on? Maybe the answer is whipped cream or candyfloss.
Or perhaps it’s mashed potato . . .
Will they be able to sort him out before Christmas Eve? Things are not looking too good until the littlest elf has a bright idea! Festive and fun, this is destined to become a seasonal favourite.
Santa’s New Beard is available in paperback for £6.99.
I love a good fairy tale, and an even better retelling. My favourite fairytale, however, is a lesser-known one, often forgotten under its more well-known sisters: ‘East of the Sun, West of the Moon.’
North Child is a retelling of that very story, about a girl called Rose. Rose is an unusual child, a North Child. For Rose was born facing north, and the old stories say she is destined to travel far from home on a dangerous journey. Making a pact with an enormous white bear, Rose travels on his back to a mysterious castle that holds a dark enchantment, a darker temptation, and the key to her true destiny.
North Child is available in paperback for £7.99.
By Mac Barnett
We all know a curious child, that always asks questions. Mainly ‘why?’ Well, this book answers all those questions…. Just not exactly correctly!
Why is the ocean blue? What is rain? What happened to the dinosaurs? It might be time for bed, but one child is too full of questions about the world to go to sleep just yet. Little ones and their parents will be charmed and delighted as a patient father offers up increasingly creative responses to his child’s night-time wonderings.
Just Because is available in hardback for £12.99.
The case is closed. Five years ago, schoolgirl Andie Bell was murdered by Sal Singh. The police know he did it. Everyone in town knows he did it. But having grown up in the same small town that was consumed by the crime, Pippa Fitz-Amobi isn’t so sure. When she chooses the case as the topic for her final project, she starts to uncover secrets that someone in town desperately wants to stay hidden. And if the real killer is still out there, how far will they go to keep Pip from the truth . . . ? This Christmas, take a rollercoaster ride by reading another of Holly Jackson’s YA thrillers, leaving you shaking, blubbering, dizzy, confused but also happy and smiling all at the same time!
Available in paperback for £7.99.
Sucker for dogs on a front cover? “I, Cosmo is a “woof – tastically” heart warming story, full of life, and will be sure to make your heart strike whenever you next see a Golden Retriever. Cosmo’s family is falling apart and it’s up to Cosmo to keep them together. He knows exactly what to do. There’s only one problem – Cosmo is a Golden Retriever. A moving, beautiful, hilarious story of one dog’s attempt to save his family, become a star, and eat a lot of bacon.
Available in paperback for £6.99.
Celebrate the dawning of a new decade with the fully revised Guinness World Records 2020. The electrifying new cover with thousands of new, updated and classic superlatives, hundreds of never-before-seen images, and a selection of eye-opening photo-composites that put a new spin on record-breaking will make sure that you go into the new year knowing some fun and crazy facts about the diverse and dedicated record breakers located all over the world.
Available in hardback for £20.
Soar into space with this glorious love story of alien folk, from the creators of The Gruffalo and Stick Man. Whilst the fun rhyming patterns and colours are a delight for little ones, the simple yet positive message of tolerance and acceptance makes it a joy to read for all the family.
Available in hardback for £12.99.
Rabbit is not tired and doesn’t want to go to bed, so decides to capture the dark in their biscuit tin and stay up late. But Rabbit soon learns why the dark is so important, and has a big decision to make.
This picture book has a beautiful fold-out surprise inside, and has been tried and tested by Lyndsey’s three-year-old niece. The perfect bedtime story!
Available in paperback for £6.99. Get in touch to order your copy.
The Iguana Boy series is great for age seven plus readers. Following the success of the first two books, the final Iguana Boy instalment hit the shelves a few months ago, which sees Dylan once again team up with trusty scaled-sidekick Paul. Can they defeat super villain Mind Bender who has kidnapped all the super heroes? With familiar illustrations by Rikin Parekh, these books are sure to entertain your super-hero fans.
As a local author, together with Mostly Books, James has visited primary schools across Oxfordshire presenting creative workshops, and giving hilarious talks to young children. Exciting alien adventures are due to land in his brand-new material currently being penned.
All Iguana Boy books are available in paperback for £6.99. Get in touch to order your copy.
This stunning book is filled from cover to cover with inky illustrations and life affirmations, as a young boy embarks on a journey, befriending a chatty cake-loving mole, a quiet fox and a wise horse.
Perfect for all ages, this book is a beautiful reminder to be kind and gentle with ourselves and others…and to always make time for some cake!
Available in hardback for £16.99. Get in touch to order your copy.
In the third magical Stella Starflake adventure the explorers meet gargoyles, sea-gremlins, mermaids, red devil squids – even a Gentleman Flamingo!Ice princess Stella Starflake and her father Felix are in trouble: President Fogg has expelled them from the Polar Bear Explorers’ Club, and banned them from going on any further expeditions. Stella’s not going to be put off by rules and regulations though. She knows her friend Shay is in danger of turning into a witch wolf himself, since receiving a deadly bite on their last adventure.
It’s vital that Stella and her friends set out to find the spellbook that could save his life, even if it means travelling over the cursed Black Ice Bridge. It’s a formidable and dangerous task, and their journey takes them on a breathtaking, page-turning adventure!
Explorers on Black Ice Bridge is available in paperback for £6.99. Email us to order your copy.
Believe in the impossible this Christmas – a magical story celebrating the power of imagination, from the bestselling author of Stories for Boys Who Dare To Be Different. Oleg and Emma entered their den to find a cardboard spaceship standing exactly where they usually sat. Slowly, the front door opened and out stepped a boy.
‘My name’s Sebastian Cole,’ he said. ‘But you already know that.’When Oleg and Emma invent a new classmate called Sebastian, they are amazed when he appears – very much real – in their secret den. Sebastian isn’t like the rest of their classmates.
He’s never eaten pizza, he’s not sure what goose bumps are, and he has a satchel that seems to hold an endless supply of hot ice cream. But as the trio begin their adventures, more impossible things keep happening, from a runaway goat appearing at school to a sighting of some snowwomen walking down the road. Things soon take a turn for the dangerous when the three friends are pursued by the mysterious Institute of Unreality, who want to capture and erase Sebastian, restoring order to the world.
With the help of a cowboy gardener, an imprisoned scientist, and the rest of their class, can Emma and Oleg protect their new friend and keep the magic of the impossible alive, just in time for Christmas? After inspiring countless young readers with tales of extraordinary people in the world around them, Ben Brooks’ first children’s novel is a magical adventure that celebrates friendship, the power of imagination, and ice cream.
The Impossible Boy is available in hardback for £9.99. Get in touch to order your copy.
A boxful of brand-new crayons is excited to begin a new adventure when a boy named Lucas brings them home and starts using them to make pictures. Except that Lucas never ever uses the white crayon for any of his drawings. And when he decides he needs a new set of crayons, that crayon is still just as tall and just as clean as the day it was bought. Poor white crayon feels so dejected!
But when a girl named Olivia stumbles upon the unused crayon, she’s delighted. She draws her own kinds of pictures, and that white crayon is exactly what she needs. one boy’s trash is another girls’ treasure…..Here’s a funny, heart-warming story that not only shows how things can be used in different ways, but also reinforces the lesson that everyone feels good when they have a chance to participate.
The Forgotten Crayon is available in hardback for £12.99. Click here to order a copy.
Join Douglas and his friends for some hide-and-seek fun in a new adventure. This bestselling series has sold over 1.6 million copies!Hugless Douglas loves to play hide-and-seek but he’s so big he can never find a good enough hiding place. So he and Little Sheep team up to be the best seekers ever.
But what happens when someone gets a little more lost than they planned?David Melling is one of the UK’s best-loved author-illustrators and his tenth book about Douglas the brown bear is as funny and compelling as the first. It combines brilliantly imaginative illustrations with an endearing sense of what it is like to be a small child learning about the world.
Hugless Douglas Play Hide-and-Seek is available in hardback for £12.99. Click here to order a copy.
Guardians of Magic is the first title in a brilliant new magical adventure series from the creator of Goth Girl, Chris Riddell. With gorgeous two-colour illustrations throughout and a special full-colour guide to the giants in the book, this fantastic hardback is a perfect gift. For as long as anyone can remember, children have made a wish on a cloud horse, never quite believing that their wishes will come true.
But times are changing. The future of magic is in danger. Enemies are working together to destroy it – especially the magic of nature and its most powerful source, The Forever Tree.
Unless three brave children fight back and believe in the impossible, soon magic and the cloud horses will be gone. Zam, Phoebe and Bathsheba don’t yet know how powerful they are… In Guardians of Magic the Costa award-winning, 2015-2017 UK Children’s Laureate Chris Riddell weaves together a magical quest.
This is the first title in The Cloud Horse Chronicles series.
Guardians of Magic is available in hardback for £12.99. Get in touch to order a copy.
Suzy can’t wait to return to the Union of Impossible Places on the Impossible Postal Express. But when she arrives, she overhears a dastardly plan to destroy Trollville from a shadowy and unexpected villain. Suzy and her friends must race from magical cloud-worlds to secret caverns to catch the culprit, before Trollville comes crashing down…
Welcome to the Impossible Places… Where there’s fuzzics not physics, where adventure meets magic and where the journey will never, ever take you where you expect it to.
Available in hardback for £12.99. Get in touch to order your copy.
This story is about a little girl named Property Jones, so-called because she was left in the lost property cupboard of a bookshop when she was five years old.
Property loves living in the bookshop, but she has a whopper of a secret … she can’t actually read! So Property doesn’t see the newspaper article announcing the chance to win the Montgomery Book Emporium, the biggest and most magnificent bookshop in the world! When her family win the competition, Property finds herself moving to the Emporium, a magical place filled with floor upon floor of books and a very bad-tempered cat.
But all is not at it seems at the Emporium and soon Property Jones finds herself in a whole heap of trouble.
Morrigan Crow is cursed, destined to die on her eleventh birthday.
But, as the clock strikes midnight, she’s whisked away by a remarkable man called Jupiter North and taken to the secret city of Nevermoor. There she’s invited to join the Wundrous Society. Mystery, magic and protection are hers – if only she can pass four impossible trials, using an exceptional talent.
Which she doesn’t have…
Every year, the people of the Protectorate leave a baby as an offering to the witch who lives in the forest. They hope this sacrifice will keep her from terrorizing their town. But the witch in the Forest, Xan, is in fact a good witch who shares her home with a wise Swamp Monster and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon.
Xan rescues the children and delivers them to welcoming families on the other side of the forest, nourishing the babies with starlight on the journey. One year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary child with extraordinary magic. Xan decides she must raise this girl, whom she calls Luna, as her own.
As Luna’s thirteenth birthday approaches, her magic begins to emerge – with dangerous consequences. Meanwhile, a young man from the Protectorate is determined to free his people by killing the witch. Deadly birds with uncertain intentions flock nearby.
A volcano, quiet for centuries, rumbles just beneath the earth’s surface. And the woman with the Tiger’s heart is on the prowl…
