The beautiful and nostalgic picture book ‘Queenie-One Elephant’s Storyby Corinne Fenton and illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe was shortlisted for the Eve Pownall Award for Information Books. It was also a notable for the picture book category.
It tells the story of an elephant that lived at the Melbourne Zoo, delighting audiences for almost 40 years. Teachers notes provide many links to the curriculum. It’s a delightful story and a beautiful book.
Older Readers Shortlist – Read
The Sweet, Terrible, Glorious Year I Truly, Completely Lost It
Performing
There are many parts of this book I truly appreciated. The author describes the feeling of the final night of performance beautifully:
“After the curtain fell on the final scene, I had that same feeling I get on Christmas night; fierce joy, stabbing regret and an intense longing to do it all again, folded together like nuts, raisins and glace cherries in a fruitcake.”(p281)
I have seen young performers experience this many times and I think Lisa Shanahan captures the experience of being in a school musical or play very well in this novel. Like “Don’t Call Me Ishmael” she makes lots of great references to classical literature of Shakespeare’s ‘Tempest”.
Humane
My Big Birkett is a multi faceted story that has heart wrenching moments. It illustrates the family of notorious troublemakers, that are the part of most communities, in a compassionate way. I love this paragraph also that is how I feel so many times:
“One of the things that scares me most is the feeling I’m going to drown in the flow of other lives. You can be celebrating because your sister’s given birth to a healthy baby or you’ve won lotto or the lump in your knee isn’t cancer after all, and yet, across town someone is devastated because their grandma died, or they failed an important test or they have no food. Sometimes when I think about these competing lives, even in my own town, let alone the whole world, I feel too tired to move.”(p290)
My Choice
I found this book a lot like “One Whole and Perfect Day”, an excellent read. My choice from this section would be one of the red books.
I’m glad my son had to work today. We bought the latest Harry Potter from his place of part time employment when I dropped him off and I had most of the day to read it. When I picked him up, it was his turn. We are fairly dignified about sharing the book now, but it hasn’t always been like that.
I remember around book 4, we had one copy to share between 3 of us and the kids would take a plastic chair up on to the garage roof and sit up there and read it, mocking me. I am fairly afraid of heights. I knew if I went to the gym, or the shops, the book and the kids would end up on the garage roof and I would have no way of retrieving it until they were hungry or it got dark. Funny memories!
Our Harry Potter books have been read and reread. We’ve been to all the movies, yet only the first one all together on opening night. The movies were ok, but not nearly as gripping and fun as the books.
I’ve enjoyed what I’ve read so far, I’m almost reluctantly reading it because once it’s done, it’s done. My next shift will come in an hour or so when he goes out for dinner.