Child's Play

Review of What I Like!

A book of poems that are not deemed by my reviewer to match the title. ‘I don’t think they’re for very young children. I think it’s good. The poems are quite exciting.’

The Lucky Four-Leaf Clover made my reviewer giggle. When bending down to pick clover, father is butted by a goat and ends up falling flat on his face.

Little Miss Mabel drew the response, ‘The picture of the snake who swallowed her plate is funny, and I like it because the boy is watching at the door.’ I hadn’t particularly noticed the boy, but now saw him clasping his hand over his mouth as he beholds the strangest of sights. I observed my reviewer taking a few seconds to study the picture for the inappropriately-named poem One to Ten. ‘The person who did the pictures actually counted the number of foxes – there are 34 of them – look, 34 foxes in a den.’

Nursery World. 30th April 2005

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