This post has taken me 6 months to write…

Today’s post has been the hardest post to research since I began this blog. Why? Well, as part of Reading Round Europe I’ve been searching and searching for almost 6 months (yes, half a year – that’s how dedicated I am!) for some fantastic Danish picture books available in English translation to bring to you, [...]

Stories in Tune – The Nutcracker – Part 1

Just in time for Christmas, today I bring you a series of reviews of picture book versions of The Nutcracker as part of my series Stories in Tune. The Nutcracker ballet, with music written by Tchaikovsky and a libretto adapted from E.T.A. Hoffmann’s story “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King”, could barely be more appealing [...]

Butterflies, mud and stick-on velcro

Summer Birds: The Butterflies of Maria Merian by Margarita Engle and Julie Paschkis was a book I made a point of recently tracking down. It is about butterflies, a biography of a talented and independent woman of the sort I hope will inspire my children, and there’s a link to the Netherlands – so all [...]