9th April International Unicorn Day

Unicorns are supposed to look like horses, but with a single horn on their forehead. The first one appeared in early Mesopotamian artworks, in ancient myths in India and China. Later on, the Green historian Ctesias described the mythical creature and the healing properties of drinking from its horn. The unicorn is also mentioned in the Bible, linked to Christ, and people in the Middle Ages believed that unicorn horns could heal sickness! Nowadays, the mysterious animal is a symbol of fantasy and wonder, making appearances on birthday cakes and children's clothing.

The students I teach are besotted with unicorns. The three year old preschoolers yell, 'I need a unicorn book' and they do not mean a Peppa Pig unicorn book and just when I think they have unicorns out of their system because they are reading chapter books they still      to the unicorn chapter book series. I even have books who will read them.

Next term I have given in and put together a 'bin' of unicorn picture books so that the preschoolers make less mess and can find a book easily. The students love Oscar; Sparkle; Uni; Thelma; Grumpycorn and Twinkle (Little Unicorn) and many other 'stand-alone' books.

Now for the series for independent readers:

My Secret Unicorn series is so old and I have been discarding them as they fall apart, but they are still the most borrowed of all the unicorn chapter books.

9th April Unicorn Day

Unicorn Day is the perfect day to talk about the new book The Teeny-Weeny Unicorn  by Shawn Harris which has had so much hype, even here in Australia where it is going to cost you more than forty dollars to buy. Several parents came to the library wanting to borrow it and I told them I hadn't purchased it as it was too expensive and I was waiting till it got cheaper. One very generous parent solved this problem. She bought it, read it, and then donated it to the library. When she handed it over she did say she wasn't sure what all the 'hype' was about so that made me even more curious.

Having now read it, it is fun. The message is a good one for the age group I teach who are constantly told they are too small for things they want to do, the art work done with oil pastels is good for showing movement and emotions when the unicorn is angry. Children will like the comeuppance the teeny-weeny unicorn foists onto his older siblings. The female gnome is quirky and easy to laugh at, but she is an integral part of the theme of perspective and self-acceptance.

So, should you rush out and buy it? I do like it and it is different from the many other 'mauve' unicorn books that make up the library's unicorn cache, but I don't think the need is urgent. You can wait till it is cheaper here and available more widely.

Meanwhile make do with what ever other unicorn picture books and novels you have. There's lots here to choose from.

22nd July Rachel Morrisoe

At the beginning of the year I bought a picture book called The Drama Llama by Rachel Morrisoe and Ella Okstad for the library.  I bought it because it is about llamas which are popular in our library and because it was one of the books shortlisted for the Early Childhood section of the  Spark! School Book Awards, 2023 prize. These awards are voted for by young children, so I know that the books on this shortlist will appeal to my young students. When I read the blurb and saw that it was about a child who worried I knew it would also be read by teachers. Win win!

In fact the book won its category. I knew of Ella Okstad, but I had not heard of Rachel Morrisoe, so I went looking for more books by her. She is an English children's author. She is fairly new at this writing gig so she only has four books so far. I bought How to Grow a Unicorn and How to Grow a Dragon because they were cheap paperbacks, illustrated by Steven Lenton of Shifty McGifty fame, and I thought they fitted the Book Week theme well, Read, Grow, Inspire. They certainly do that.

In these rhyming stories we meet Sarah and Mr Pottifer's Parlour of Plants, a magical shop with the most surprising plants you'll ever see! Sarah goes to the shop to buy the perfect gift for her grandmother who loves gardens. When she gets to the shop, everything grows wildly out -of-hand and the plants grow magical creatures. This hilarious book will inspire young readers to live their own unicorn fantasy.

Sarah ends up working for Mr Pottifer and then in the second book, an unexpected delivery of dragodil seeds provides the perfect chance for Sarah and Mr Pottifer to grow helpful dragon pets for their customers - or does it? It turns out that these fiery dragons are not very well-behaved at all... and everything soon spirals into smoke-filled, out-of-control DRAGON CHAOS!

I'm not sure if there's more to come, but there is certainly room to be inspired by other magical creatures that Sarah and Mr Pottifer could organise. What would you buy at Mr Pottifer's Parlour of Plants? Why is it called a parlour and not a shop?

The fourth Rachel Morrisoe book, The Truth About Yeticorns  which is also illustrated by Ella Okstad has just been released and this time the focus is on telling fibs.

Meet Sarah

9th April Unicorn Day

What mythological creature has been more beloved over the centuries than the unicorn? Symbols of purity and enchantment, unicorns are loved by both children and adults alike and are integral parts of many fairy tales and legends.

Unicorns certainly do appear to be popular in children's books and just as well because I am constantly asked for a 'unicorn book'. Luckily I have quite a few in the library to choose from. The most popular are probably Amy Krouse Rosenthal's two books about Uni the Unicorn and Amy Young's books about Sparkle, but if you look on this Pinterest page you will see there are many others to choose from and to use for a quick display to celebrate this day.

A group of able Year 2 students  have taken to reading the series of graphic novels about Phoebe and her unicorn too, so come tomorrow unicorn books will be walking out the door of the library.