From Shapeshifters by Adrian Mitchell, illustated by Alan Lee
Julia Eccleshare's picks in The Guardian:
Who Wants to Be a Poodle I Don't, by Lauren Child (Puffin, £10.99). Age: 4+
A pampered poodle's determination to escape the confines of her sheltered life to become a real dog is brilliantly captured in Lauren Child's clever words and finely matched pictures. Shaped by her anxious owner, Trixie Twinkle Toes's life is devoid of risk or danger or even untidiness. But she longs to catch sticks, roll in the mud and, above all, to step in puddles! Influenced by the Performing Poodle Sisters, who show her how daring, dazzling and dangerous a poodle can be, Trixie Twinkle Toes gets a grip, jumps in a puddle, rescues a dog and finds liberation as a new life of wind and rain unfolds before her. A hymn to freedom: for dogs read children.
The Chicken Thief, by Béatrice Rodriguez (Gecko Press, £9.99). Age: 4+
An unusual love story unfolds across visually captivating spreads, with the pictures perfectly capturing every detail of the high drama at the heart of this stunning, wordless story. On an instant, a fox snatches the chicken from under the noses of her friends. The kidnap is shocking and the chicken's friends immediately give chase but the mood and tempo change as the chicken falls in love with the fox and the two establish a peaceful and benign rapport. The chase over, all ends happily, despite the disbelief of the others, when the chicken and the fox declare their love for one another.
TS Eliot's scheming, savvy, thoughtful, worldly and clever cats will entrance a new generation of readers as re-imagined by Axel (The Gruffalo) Scheffler. Although his cuddly cats make the brave Growltiger, the curious Rum Tum Tugger, the mysterious Macavity and the fun-loving Jellicle seem superficially softer and less knowing than Eliot's text implies, careful reading of their eyes reveal that none of the humour has really been lost.
A Necklace of Raindrops, by Joan Aiken and Jan Pienkowski (Cape, £12.99). Age: 4+
Magic has never been more elegantly shaped than in these effervescent short stories which weave a speck of the unexpected with the everyday to make worlds that are both familiar and excitingly different. A necklace of raindrops gives a little girl magical powers against the worst excesses of weather; a sip of yeast swells a baker's cat to such a size that it saves the village by damming flood water; and a bit of sky, caught in the pastry being rolled for an apple pie, makes the pie so light that it floats up and away with a little old woman and man on it. The flight of imagination is delicately captured in Jan Pienkowski's accompanying silhouettes.
The Magician's Elephant, by Kate DiCamillo, illustrated by Yoko Tanaka (Walker, £8.99). Age: 9+
"Follow the elephant," a little boy is told when he asks a fortune-teller whether his missing baby sister is still alive. But where will he find an elephant in the cold and grey city of Baltese? By believing, of course, but he is also helped out by the magician who conjures up far more than he'd bargained for when trying to produce a bunch of lilies. Touching and tinged with enough comedy to keep it light-hearted, this fable is a glorious corkscrew of a story which spirals to a perfect conclusion.
Shapeshifters: Tales from Ovid's Metamorphoses, retold by Adrian Mitchell, illustrated by Alan Lee (Frances Lincoln, £14.99). Age: 9+
Powerfully illustrated, this is a handsome introduction to some of the best-known stories about the Greek gods and goddesses and their legendary powers of transformation. Adrian Mitchell's vivid verse and prose retellings reflect the humour, pathos and often downright tragedy of each story by capturing the reasons for the shape-shifting and the usually devastating consequences of it.
The Way We Work, by David Macaulay (Dorling Kindersley, £25). Age: 11+
Cutting deep into the body and exposing its inner workings in a way that is both attractive and accurate is a remarkable achievement. Here David Macaulay, master of the cross-section, plies his familiar combination of knowledge and draftsmanship to outstanding effect. The major systems of the body are explained as simply as possible while the workings of bones, cells, blood and vital organs are explored in depth. This is a book with an immediate impact which will take a long, long time to absorb fully.
The Lark and the Laurel, by Barbara Willard (Jane Nissen, £7.99). Age: 10+
Propelled by all the joys of a burgeoning love affair, albeit shot through with a remarkable twist, this cleverly constructed historical novel weaves in timeless themes of loyalty and self-discovery. Against the background of the end of the war of the roses and the beginning of the reign of the Tudors, Barbara Willard's impeccable detail of farm life deep in the Sussex weald captures the great differences of the time, while her feisty characters – and especially her forthright women – make this as fresh and of-the-moment as any contemporary vampire romance.
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