Book Review - Everyone Wants an Octopus

Everyone Wants an Octopus Book Review

Written by @liz_ledden 🐙 Illustrated by @makotokoji 🦆 Pubilished by @hardiegrantkids

Another gorgeous picture book that I’ve been meaning to post about for months! If you haven’t got your hands on a copy yet – let me tell you why you should 🤗

Inky 🐙 can’t find a single book with a character who looks like him, yet there are loads of books about Inky’s best friend, Quack 🦆Together they decide to do something about this – because everyone deserves to see themselves in books 📚

Everyone Wants an Octopus Book is a fun, bright, engaging picture book for children 3+ that handles this important theme in a clever, inviting and super accessible way –perfectly pitched for young children.

I love the cute characters, gorgeous lolly coloured palette and octopus facts peppered throughout, as well as the creators’ note at the end which delves a little deeper into the why of this book.

Diverse, inclusive books are important for all kids – to be mirrors so they can see themselves in the stories they read, and windows so they can learn about and understand people who are different to them. And hopefully learn along the way that we are all more alike than we are different 💛

🐙 Bravo for this book – a perfect, gentle conversation starter about diversity and inclusion for preschool plus 🦆

Like a Gannet - Meet Francie

Meet Francie!

She can glide like a swan, dabble like a duck and cut through the water like a cormorant. So when she sees her older cousins diving like gannets from the high diving board, she wants to do that too.

Inspired by my memories of being a child with a bigger body shape who wasn’t very sporty but who felt capable and graceful in the water, I really wanted Francie to have a bigger body type. It’s slowly getting better, but I still think there’s a lack of representation of diverse bodies in children’s books.

I hope Francie shows kids that, with courage, they can face their fears and strive for things out of their reach, learning along the way to accept their limitations and do it their own way. Just like gannets whose short legs and webbed feet make them slow, clumsy waddlers on land, but who transform into Queens of the Sea when they dive.

I’m so happy with how @debi_hudson has illustrated Francie and I can’t wait for everyone to meet her in this joyous celebration of one little fledgling who wants to be a gannet.

 Like A Gannet is out October 1st by @windyhollow Publishing.

Book Review - Our Home

📚 I’ve bought so many gorgeous picture books lately - this whole year in fact - and I’ve been meaning to review them and share them and waah! I’ve never got to it!

So I’m starting today, because we are away camping in the van 🚐 and holidays create space in my head to do such lovely things 🤗

OUR HOME @catherinemeatheringham and @mhdesignillustration and @windyhollow

I always loved these kind of concept books when I was a kid. Imagining if I lived there or which one I would choose. I found it fun, inviting and peaceful in ways I didn’t understand and this book has all those feels 🤗

So come along and see all these different Australian homes 🏠 from a rugged coast to an outback station 🚜 to a high-rise apartment 🏙️.

The simple text leaves room for us to hear their sounds 🏕️ and the luminous illustrations help us imagine the different lives they might hold 🏘️ so we can all celebrate the sense of belonging a little house can bring 💛