Weekend Cooking/Cook the Books: Alice in Wonderland

This month's choice for Cook the Books is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. It is such an interesting choice for Cook the Books as it isn't necessarily a book that you would consider foodie, but it is absolutely full of food references. It was also a fun read to revisit as an adult, especially when you consider that the book itself is over 150 years old, and yet it is timeless.

Reading this again reminded me of the White Night event that was held in Melbourne back in 2015. In honour of the 150th anniversary of the book being published, one of the themes for the event was Alice in Wonderland, with many of Melbourne's building being transformed into giant canvasses for projections. Here are a few of the Alice related pictures I took that night.

The adventures that Alice has after she follows the white rabbit down the rabbit hole are zany, and yet apart from the fact that the game of croquet is something that kids today might not be familiar with, pretty much everything else is still easy for us to understand. Although, I did tend to skip through the poetry but I do that in books like The Lord of the Rings too.

The most well known food reference is probably the mad hatter's tea party, but there were so many others, and I had several ideas of what to make.  I  ended going with something that wasn't directly related to the story. If you google for ideas there are so many elaborately decorated items - topsy turvy cakes, giant tea pots etc. Unfortunately my decorative skills do not extend to such skilled designs. I do taste good, not necessarily looks amazing!

Some of the ideas I considered were a big cake surrounded by small cakes to represent the food that Alice ate that had the effect of either making her grow big or small. I also thought about making a treacle tart or an onion tart. There were so many options.

So what did I make? We were having our first guests here for dinner at the new house, so I wanted to make something dessert worthy. I also love making chiffon cakes, so once I found my tin in one of the still packed boxes, I decided to make an Earl Grey Chiffon Cake, inspired by all the tea references in the book.

I ended up adapting a recipe which was made with French Earl Grey tea. I only had a couple of bags of French Earl Grey, and I really wanted to use just normal Earl Grey (British I guess) tea instead. The original recipe also called for orange to be included but I didn't have any. I also took some inspiration from a couple of other recipes that I found online by including some of the tea leaves in the cake mixture.

I do love making chiffon cakes (also known as angel food cake). I have made a lemon flavoured one before and a coffee cream cake that isn't called chiffon cake but uses exactly the same techniques. I might try to make a chai flavoured one next. (editted to say....the next one will be a vanilla one as per my husband's request)

The flavour might have been stronger had I used more teabags, but you could definitely taste it, particularly on the second day. There wasn't a lot left for the second day as all the family loved it, especially my nephews who both came back for seconds!

A couple of important things to note when making these kinds of cakes. Firstly, you do not butter the cake tin. You want the cake mixture to stick. It is important that the cake is left to completely cool whilst still upside down. This prevents the cake from collapsing in on itself and ensures that the texture is extremely light.

Earl Grey Tea Chiffon Cake

4 Earl Grey teabags
160ml ( ⅔ cup) boiling water
185g (1¼ cups) self-raising flour
30g (¼ cup) cornflour
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
½ teaspoon salt
6 eggs, separated
200g caster sugar, plus 110g (½ cup) extra
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
100ml vegetable oil
Icing sugar, to dust


Preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced). Place an ungreased 21cm angel food cake tin on an oven tray. You can also use a bundt tin.

Place the tea bags in a small jug, pour the boiling water over and set aside to infuse until the water is warm.

Sift the flour, cornflour, cream of tartar and salt.

Whisk the egg yolks and 200g caster sugar on high speed until thick and pale then whisk in the vanilla.

Squeeze the tea bags so that you get as much flavour as possible into the water. 

Cut one of the teabags and add the leaves to the egg and sugar mixture.

Add 125ml ( ½ cup) of the tea to the oil. The tea should still be warm but not hot. Add the oil mixture to the egg mixture and whisk on low speed until well combined. 

With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture and whisk until just combined. Set aside. 

In a clean bowl, whisk the egg whites on medium-high speed until soft peaks form. Add the remaining caster sugar and whisk until thick and glossy and the sugar has dissolved. Add about a third of the egg whites to the yolk mixture and use a large metal spoon or spatula to fold through until well combined. Add the remaining egg white mixture and fold until just combined.

Spoon the mixture into the ungreased tin and gently smooth the surface with the back of a metal spoon. Bake in the preheated oven for 45-50 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Immediately turn the cake upside down still in the tin so it is suspended, for a minimum of 2 hours. If you are using a bundt tin for this, you can invert the cake over the top of a bottle to have the same effect.

When the cake is completely cool, run a small knife around the side of the tin to release. 

Dust with icing sugar and serve with whipped cream and strawberries. 

I have also linked this post up with Foodies Read hosted at 

 Weekly meals

Saturday - Out for dinner

Sunday -  Roast Pork

Monday - Beef Chilli with sweet potato wedges

Tuesday - Hainanese Chicken with bok choy and rice

Wednesday - Chicken enchiladas with rice and beans

Thursday - Out for dinner

Friday - Prawn Paella

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page

Weekend Cooking: Sandwich anyone? (or food in kids books)

A couple of weekends ago I was visiting family and it came to bed time for my nephews. I was asked to listen to the older nephew's reader for school and then if I could read a chapter of the book that my sister and brother in law are currently reading aloud to him which I was happy to do. At the moment, they are reading through Roald Dahl's books and they are up to Matilda.

The chapter I was asked to read was when Bruce Bogtrotter was accused by Miss Trunchbull and is forced to eat a whole cake before the school assembly as punishment. Since reading this chapter I have been thinking about the role of food in the books that we read as kids. First though, here is the chapter that I read as it was portrayed in the movie adaptation of Matilda.

Roald Dahl was not averse to using food in his books. The most famous example of this would probably be Charlie and the Chocolate Factory but there was also James and the Giant Peach. I am sure if I was to read all of the Roald Dahl books I would find lots of other examples of food in them.

For now though, I thought I would look at some other examples.

For very young children, the book that came instantly to mind was Eric Carle's Very Hungry Caterpillar, a book that is definitely standing up well even more than 40 years after it was originally published. I am sure it is a story that you will know, but just in case, here is a video of Eric Carle reading the book.

I have just noticed that this video was created to encourage people to celebrate Hungry Caterpillar Day on the first day of spring. Given that was just a couple of days ago in the Northern Hemisphere, the timing seems very fortuitous!

When I think back to my own childhood favourites, one author comes to mind and that is British author Enid Blyton. I know that she isn't that well known in places like America and Canada, but she was certainly a mainstay of British and Australian childhoods. I even bought new editions of some of my favourite books for my son who is now 15 so those books are still available even now. Blyton wrote a number of different series. There were the Famous Five Books which were a mystery series featuring a group of children who try to solve each mystery. My favourites though were the more magical books, in particular the books set in the Enchanted Wood where there was a magical Faraway Tree where there was new world at the top of the tree every few days.

From a food perspective, the world that Blyton portray was a world of picnics, of cakes, of toffee and lemonade. The first book of the Enchanted Woods series was published in 1939 and Magic Faraway Tree published in 1943. Just flicking through the books to see some of the land names such as Do-As-You-Please land you have to wonder how much of what Blyton was writing was directly influenced by wartime life and providing kids with a make believe world that was far away from the austerity that was reality.

When I was thinking about the food, there were a couple of things that I remembered so I went and grabbed a couple of the books off of my son's bookshelf (not that he has read them or will do so now) and thought I would share a couple of examples with you. Firstly, here are the children's first taste of Pop Cakes.

Silky was pleased. She sat there brushing her beautiful golden hair and ate sandwiches with them. She brought out a tin of Pop cakes, which were lovely. As soon as you bit into them they went pop! an you suddenly found your mouth filled with new honey from the middle of the little cakes. Frannie took seven, one after another, for she was rather greedy.

Beth stopped her. "You'll go pop if you eat any more!"

And the very interesting sounding Toffee Shock

Moon-Face was pleased. He poured lemonade for everyone, then handed round a little box full of what looked like all sorts of toffee.

"I don't feel as if I ever want to see what land is at the top of the Faraway Tree again," said Joe, as he munched a peculiar piece of toffee which seemed to get bigger in his mouth instead of smaller.

"Neither do I," said Beth.

"I certainly never will!" said Frannie. "It seems as if there are never any lands there worth visiting. They are all most uncomfortable.

"Except my little land," said the Saucepan Man, rather mournfully." I was always very comfortable there."

Joe's toffee was now so big that he couldn't say a word. Then it suddenly exploded in his mouth, went to nothing, and left him feeling most astonished.

"Oh dear - did you take a Toffee Shock?" said Moon-Face, noticing Joe's surprised face. "I'm so sorry. Take a different one."

"No, thank you," said Joe, feeling that one Toffee Shock was quite enough.

Then again maybe you don't have to be going without, or even really young, to appreciate the Land of Birthdays or the Land of Tea Parties (which we read about in The Folk of the Faraway Tree) even though some options in the latter land seem a bit odd. Would anyone like dewdrop and honey sandwiches, tunafish and strawberry sandwiches or oranges and lemon sandwiches. Or perhaps pineapple and cucumber sandwiches are more your style? Anyone?

In terms of Australian children stories with foodie aspects go, it is hard to go past The Magic Pudding by Norman Lindsay. Who wouldn't want a pudding that can be whatever flavour you like (sweet or savoury) and never runs out. Sounds like heaven to me. Of course, this is an anthropomorphic pudding and so you have to put up with a pudding with an attitude. He is very, very cantankerous and that is before he is stolen by the puddin' thieves.

This book was published in 1918, and I think that it is possibly showing it's age in some ways with some racist attitudes and other non PC aspects, which is a shame in some ways. Even though I haven't read it since I was a kid I do have fond memories of it. Some of Enid Blyton's books have been republished over the years taking out the non politically correct parts which I am torn about. Should they be edited to reflect changing attitudes or should they be left as a historical reflection of the time when they were written and published.

Do you have some favourite food related children's stories, or even just particular items that you would love to be able to eat just once, no matter how wild and wacky it may be?

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. For more information, see the welcome post.

Sunday Salon: A childhood favourite....kind of

The other week I was googling for an image of a book that I had picked up from the library. I have no idea why, but when I googled A Breath of French Air by H E Bates it came up with an image of a book called The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse by Susanna Davidson.  It is even stranger given that today when I searched again, there was no sign of the mouse book! As soon as I saw the title it instantly bought back childhood memories of reading that book! A quick visit to the library catalogue and it was on it's way to me.

Except, when I got the book, it was clear that this wasn't the book that I remembered. The story was very similar but the pictures were definitely not the ones I remembered at all. Then, I looked at the copyright date. 1987. I have always been a pretty eclectic reader but I am pretty sure that I wasn't reading picture books at 16 years of age.

So how is it that the story was the same as I remembered but nothing else? It turns out that The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse is one of Aesop's tales and there are lots and lots of versions of the story (and I only really looked for the ones that are known by that title). There are likely many more that take the story as its basis. On my library catalogue alone there are five different versions, including two that have copyright dated of 2011 and 2012.  Here are just some of the covers for this one story that I found.

The Helen Ward book that is in the bottom row stands out in that it is the only one of the covers that I found that featured real mice and that is one that has been released in the last couple of years

There are lots of Aesop's tales that have made their way into our childhood stories and into cultural references, for example, the hare and the tortoise. I was surprised to learn though that we can quite easily access hundreds of them.

And the copy that I remember from my childhood....

Currently Reading:

Lord and Lady Spy by Shana Galen and Putting Alice Back Together by Carol Marinelli

Up Next:

All Mortal Flesh by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Look! exhibition at State Library Victoria

I had a very bookish start to the week this week, and as far as I am concerned a bookish week is a good week!

Last Sunday I talked my sister and her husband into going out into the city. It was a gorgeous day weather wise when we caught the train into the city. Our destination was the State Library of Victoria, and in particular the Look:! The Art of Australian Picture Books today exhibition which is on display until 29 May 2011.

My main reason for wanting to go was to be able to go and see a couple of examples of Shaun Tan's art from both The Arrival (have I mentioned lately how much I love that book?) and The Rabbits which was written by John Marsden who also wrote the Tomorrow, When the War Began series. I certainly wasn't disappointed by those pieces of art. The fact that The Arrival has so many images in the book, and yet is completely drawn in pencil astonishes me still three or four years after I first read the book.

Really though the target audience for the exhibition is slightly younger than me so luckily we had my 3 year old nephew and 12 year old son with us! It's always interesting to see what it is that catches the attention of a toddler. My nephew and his dad had put their tent up in the backyard on Saturday night and slept in there. There was one illustration (and this is where I wish I had of kept the list of titles of all the books featured in the display) which featured a family going camping, and he was interested, but the main thing he said was that the tent should be blue, which is the colour that their tent is.

After looking at a lot of the different illustrations, it was storytime and my nephew listened to two stories, one that was something about a pig, and the other was Mr Chicken goes to Paris by Leigh Hobbs. I thought that this was such a fun picture book. Mr Chicken is a 4 metre tall bright yellow chicken who goes on a plane to Paris and takes in all the sights! Such fun, especially if you take the time to notice all the background details!

One thing that I thoroughly enjoyed was seeing all the different mediums that illustrators were using. There were waterpaint drawings, collage, paper sculptures, native inspired art and so much more.

Photo credit

After visiting the display, we took the opportunity to visit the reading room and the fantastic dome that forms such an impressive part of the architecture at the State Library of Victoria. There are other exhibitions in the galleries which surround the dome. I had seen them before but it is always nice to go and look at books that are hundreds of years old. I was talking to one of the staff about how much a couple of the books are worth. One book alone is worth $12 million (cue jokes about reading that book on the trains!).

Follow that up with a chocolate frappe fix and it was a good afternoon all round.

I was planning on talking about my other State Library related event in this post, but I think this is probably long enough so I will do a separate post for that one.

Bravo Mr William Shakespeare presented by Marcia Williams

The Globe Theatre is delighted to announce a new season of Mr. William Shakespeare's plays. Prithee take your places once more for a performance of seven of the Bard's finest plays. See As You Like It, Antony and Cleopatra, Richard III, Twelfth Night, King Lear, The Merchant of Venice and Much Ado About Nothing - each brilliantly presented in dramatic comic-strip form, including Mr. Shakespeare's own dialogue and the riotous remarks of the audience. Bravo!

On Sunday I was looking at my library account when I realised that I have a bit of a problem. I can check out four more books on my library card, I have six books waiting to be picked up with two more on the way, and I only had one item ready to take back. Uh-oh. A quick look at my shelves to see if I had anything I could read quickly reminded me that I had this book.

I can't remember whose blog I saw it on originally (normally I write these things down, but didn't this time), but Marcia Williams originally came to my attention when someone posted about her book Archie's War, which is a scrapbook style diary from the perspective of 10 year old Archie Albright. A quick look at the library catalogue did reveal that they didn't have that book on the shelves, but they did have some of the author's other books so I thought I would give one a go!

This book is a collection of 7 of Shakespeare's plays retold in cartoon format. The way that the author has done this is quite clever. The cartoons characters speak actual lines from the plays, whilst the text boxes under the cartoons explain the story, and then along the sides and bottom of each page, you have the unruly crowd commenting. They might be commenting on the story of the play, or it could be a societal comment, or it could be good old fashioned play on words. The commentary from the crowd is quite interesting as well, as the people along the bottom of the page are the lower classes of society with the class of the crowd gradually getting higher up the side of the pages. There are comments about the kind of food that would have been at the theatre, and the Puritans who discouraged attendance and about the Plague. There are cameo appearances by Elizabeth I, and Shakespeare himself, along with a couple of Marlowe and Bacon jokes thrown in for good measure.

As an adult, I really enjoyed this book. The book is aimed at Grade 3 to Grade 6 (so about 9-12), and I am not sure how well it would work. The pages are very busy, and whether they will understand the abbreviated versions of plays like Richard II and King Lear is debatable, but the illustrations are fun and there is plenty of humour which should help as well. I think that my favourite was probably Much Ado About Nothing, but that may well be because that is the play that I am most familiar with.

If you would like to get some idea of the types of illustrations that the author uses, then check out Marcia William's website.

When I picked this book up on Sunday afternoon, I was expecting that this was a book that I would be able to whiz through in a few minutes, but I found myself spending a lot of time on each page reading all the little comments, and looking at all the very detailed illustrations. It was a fun way to spend an hour or so.

Rating 4/5

Monsters Are Afraid of the Moon by Marjane Satrapi

Even though my favourite book of last year was a picture book, I don't often read them. My reason for reading this one was simple. I loved the two Persepolis books by Marjane Satrapi and I was hoping to read some of her other books as well, but the only one my library had was this one!

This is very much a book aimed at say a 6 or 7 years old. There are quite a lot of words in it for a picture book. The drawings are boldly coloured, and simple - very easy on the eyes. The message is a good one too. Marie is scared of the monsters that come out at night, but the monsters are scared at the light, so Marie decides to cut the moon from the sky, but there are consequences of her actions, for everyone, but especially for the cats and rats, so there needs to be another solution.

A fun read. My 10 year old read it in the car to me as I drove along, so it didn't take very long at all to read.

I don't read enough picture books to give a true rating, but I liked this one!

Weekly Geeks #3 - Childhood books

This week’s theme comes from Samantha, who suggested that one week we all write about our fond memories of childhood books.

You could approach this several ways. I’ll probably list my favorite childhood books with maybe a paragraph about each book: why I loved it, how old I was when I read it, where I got the book, etc. You could also just pick one childhood favorite and review it as you would any other book. Or, if you’re fast, you could make up a meme other weekly geeks might like to use. It’ll be interesting to see how everyone personalizes this theme. Don’t forget to come back and leave a link to the post in your comment once you’ve written your post. No wrap-up post this week; just the one childhood books post.

When trying to decide how to approach this week's post, I debated about a few different things, but in the end have decided to focus on four different examples!

The first is my first chunkster....or at least I thought so at the time. I remember being in grade 1 or 2 and being so proud of myself because I had read this huge thick book (yes, I loved them even back then!). Having listened to the book with my son not all that long ago, I think it is probably fair to say that there was very big writing in the book, but still...size matters! The book was Wind in the Willows. Funnily enough, the videos for Wind in the Willows have long been my grandmother's favourites, so perhaps a love for Toad, Mole, Ratty and Badger has been passed down through the blood.

I think I have mentioned the second and third books here before, and they are Enid Blyton and the Trixie Belden books. I cannot tell you how much I used to love some of Enid Blyton's books. Not for me the tales of the Famous Five (although I did still like them), but I was captivated by the books like The Magic Faraway Tree books where the land at the top of the tree changed every few days, and you had to ride a big cushion down the big slide in the middle of the tree. The other books I loved by this author was The Wishing Chair books. Can you tell that I used to read to escape reality. Actually I have not so long ago been accused of still reading to escape reality, but that's a whole other post!

As I got older, I then became interested in the Trixie Belden mysteries. I had basically the whole set and I used to love reading their stories, and taking part in the adventures that Trixie and Marty, Brian and Honey, Jim and their other friends and family used to get involved in. My favourite was Jim....what a guy! I guess I still have a soft spot for him.

I also had this thing that I used to do with these books where I tried to give the words in these books a value by assigning a value to each letter and then adding it all up. Good job this is already a post about weekly geeks, otherwise you would all be going...how geeky is she...making up maths games out of words in a book! I am sure if you were to find one of these books there would be pencil marks on it from where I was playing my game!

The fourth example is The Hobbit. When it came to schoolwork, give me Maths or English, or Social Studies and I did quite well, but the subject where I REALLY struggled was Art...couldn't stand it! So the fact that I loved the title page that I did for my book report on The Hobbit really stands out in my mind!

Top 50 Children's Books

A UK charity called Booktrust recently surveyed 4000 people to ascertain what the top 50 kids books were. Here are the results (with kudos to Daily Mail)

1. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis
2. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle
3. Famous Five, Enid Blyton
4. Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne
5. The BFG, Roald Dahl
6. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling
7. The Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
8. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
9. Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
10. The Gruffalo, Julia Donaldson
11. The Tales of Peter Rabbit, Beatrix Potter
12. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
13. Matilda, Roald Dahl
14. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
15. The Cat in the Hat, Dr Seuss
16. The Twits, Roald Dahl
17. Mr Men, Roger Hargreaves
18. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
19. The Malory Towers series, Enid Blyton
20. Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie
21. The Railway Children, E. Nesbit
22. Hans Christian Fairy Tales, H.C. Andersen
23, The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum
24. The Witches, Roald Dahl
25. Stig of the Dump, Clive King
26. The Wishing Chair, Enid Blyton
27. Dear Zoo, Rod Campbell
28. The Tiger Who Came to Tea, Judith Kerr
29. Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Jan Brett
30. James and the Giant Peach, Roald Dahl
31. A Bear Called Paddington, Michael Bond
32. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
33. Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak
34. Aesop's Fables, Jerry Pinkney
35. The Borrowers, Mary Norton
36. Just So Stories, Rudyard Kipling
37. Meg and Mog, Jan Pienkowski
38. Mrs Pepperpot, Alf Proysen
39. We're Going on a Bear Hunt, Michael Rosen
40. The Gruffalo's Child, Julia Donaldson
41. Room on a Broom, Julia Donaldson
42. The Worst Witch, Jill Murphy
43. Miffy, Dick Bruna
44. The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery
45. Flat Stanley, Jeff Brown
46. The Snail and the Whale, Julia Donaldson
47. Ten Little Ladybirds, Melanie Gerth
48. Six Dinners Sid, Inga Moore
49. The St. Clare's series, Enid Blyton
50. Captain Underpants, Dav Pilkey

My favourite kids books were the Magic Faraway Tree books and the Wishing Chair books by Enid Blyton. When I was young reading was all about escape for me, and what better way to escape than to be able to go to different lands on adventures.

When I was a little older it was Trixie Belden books - but that is because I had a thing for Jim!

Are your favourite kids books on the list?

BTW, I have already posted this video once this month, but seeing as it is number 45 on the list...how could I resist??


ETA - The Flat Stanley video has been removed from Youtube, so instead I bring you I'm Not Going Out There!

I Love You More by Laura Duksta

I love you longer than the longest lollipop ever lasted.
I love you louder than the loudest rocket ship ever blasted.
I love you taller than the tallest giraffe ever grown.
I love you more, so much more than you've ever known.

Are you one of the hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of people who use the phrase "I Love You More" every day? Are you part of that magical giving and receiving of love? If so, then reach out and embrace I LoveYou More, a story about a mother and son, and really, if we are lucky, all of us, who every day can say I Love You More!

Once opened, it is a gorgeous and touching combination of heartfelt message, rhyme and rhythm, and child-like illustrations. Its cleverly conceived flip story, which ends in the middle and starts from either side, will show you what love looks like from both a parent and a child's perspective.

What a lovely book! When I was offered this by Sourcebooks, I wasn't sure about accepting it, because it really isn't something that I normally read. In the end I acquiesced because I thought that if nothing else, once I have read it I can give it to my nephew - now, I'm not sure I want to give it away!

The flip design is in itself a really clever idea - when you read from the front of the book you get the child's thoughts on how much he loves his mother and vice versa from the back, and the slipcover also illustrates the two sides of the story quite well.

The illustrations (by Karen Keesler) are bright and engaging and the story simple and fun. This is definitely a book that little kids will enjoy reading.

I am glad that I did get this book sent to me!

The Red Tree by Shaun Tan

Sometimes the day begins with nothing to look forward to...

Another great book from Shaun Tan, although it didn't blow me away as much as The Arrival did!

This book is about a young girl who feels as though there is no one who understands her, and she is not sure what direction to take but then she finds what she is looking for, so that the book basically is a message of hope.

Whereas The Arrival was purely pencil drawn pictures, this book does have words accompanying the once again beautiful, coloured illustrations that Tan draws.

To say much more would be to use more words than are actually in the book, but suffice to say it is another kids book that I very much enjoyed reading and looking at!

Rating 4/5

The Arrival by Shaun Tan

What drives so many to leave everything behind and journey alone to a mysterious country, a place without family or friends, where everything is nameless and the future is unknown? This silent graphic novel is the story of every migrant, every refugee, every displaced person, and a tribute to all those who have made the journey.

I first saw this book mentioned over at Blogging for a Good Book. I hadn't actually heard of Shaun Tan at all before, but I have to tell you that on the basis of this book alone, I am now a fan.

The book itself is beautifully presented , all in shades of black, white and sepia, and all of the drawings are pencil on paper, with some digital colouring. The detailed drawings are amazing and the story is full of imagination and very touching. The story line is relevant and timely here in Australia, and I am sure in lots of other places in the world, especially in light of some recent comments made by Australian politicians about particular groups of immigrants.

The story itself is of a man who is forced by circumstance to leave his troubled homeland, leaving behind his family, and travel to a strange new country where everything is different, and I do mean everything. The food, animals, culture and language are completely strange, and the man is somewhat lost until there is a friendly face who will help him understand where to go and what to do. Many of these helpful people are others who have undergone a similar process, having had to learn the basics of things like how to cook, and having had to work in low paid and manual jobs in order to just survive in this strange new land.

There are literally no words at all in this book, at least not words that we can recognise. Where there are words on buildings and things they are in a strange symbolic language. The images and the storyline represented are so strong that no words are necessary. The use of elements of fantasy to represent the threat in the old homeland and some of the things that are found in the strange new world are a very strong symbolic reminder to us that for many people who migrate to countries like Australia the things that they find here that are every day to us are sometimes completely foreign to the migrants.

For some example images and some very interesting comments by the author, click here and then select The Arrival.

This book is highly recommended. A very poignant and vivid story told in a beautiful way. I already have my next Shaun Tan book on request from the library.

Rating: 5/5

Other blogger's thoughts:

Rebecca Reads

Nancy v Trixie

Colleen Gleason had a fun Thursday Thirteen up this week....advocating the teenage sleuth Trixie Belden over her more famous colleague Nancy Drew.

Now I was a huge Trixie Belden fan for all of the reasons that Colleen mentioned...most especially Jim Frayne....my first red head literary crush, but not my last by a long way. I think I actually have all of my books in a box around here someday! One of these days I will get around to unpacking them all!

As for kids books, I really loved Enid Blyton's books. The Faraway Tree and The Wishing Chair were among my favourites. The way the kids were able to be transported to whole new worlds, and never knowing quite what they would fine was amazing to a little girl who just wanted to escape!

So, two questions. What kids/teenage books do you remember reading and loving? And who was your first literary crush?

The Ersatz Elevator by Lemony Snicket

Dear Reader,

If you have just picked up this particular book, then it is not too late to put it back down. Like the previous books in A Series of Unfortunate Events, there is nothing to be found in these pages but misery, despair, and discomfort, and you still have time to choose something else to read.

Within the chapters of this story, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire encounter a darkened staircase, a red herring, some friends in a dire situation, three mysterious initials, a liar with an evil scheme, a secret passageway, and parsley soda.

I have sworn to write down these tales of the Baudelaire orphans so the general public will know each terrible thing that has happened to them, but if you decide to read something else instead, you will save yourself from a heapful of horror and woe.
With all due respect,

Lemony Snicket

I actually thought I would pick up this book in honour of the fact that the final book in the Lemony Snicket series was released on October 13. I was sent the first 9 books in the series ages ago, and every now and again I pick one up and read it. This is the sixth book in the series. The good thing is that each book is a fast and easy read.

The Baudelaire children are about to introduce their latest guardians - a very fashion conscious couple who live in a huge apartment on either the 46th or the 64th floor. Unfortunately for the children, elevators are out of fashion so every time they have to go back to their new home they have to climb all the way up the stairs. There are several examples throughout the book of the silliness of blindly following trends. Another amusing example was a dinner at the very fashionable Salmonella cafe, where everything, including dessert is made from Salmon! Reminded me of a VERY fishy lunch I had in Venice once!!

As always the wicked Count Olaf is never far away, and the Baudelaires have to find a way to expose him, thereby saving themselves from his clutches. They also need to find a way to save their friends The Quagmires who are also being held by Count Olaf in his nefarious plan to get hold of their fortunes.

I guess, to a certain extent, the pattern is set for this series of books in the first book - it is in the details that the author excels - providing us with incredibly unlikely situations for the children to get themselves out of. The one that that is likely is that each of the books will be a fun read.

Good for everyone...not only for kids!

Rating 3.5/5