Read The Children’s Bookshow 2024 Autumn Tour

People often ask us how we decide which authors and books to feature in The Children’s Bookshow programme each year. The answer is quite simple: we do lots and lots of research and reading to find the best books for children! We work not only with beloved household names who are champions of The Children’s Bookshow but also with new and relatively unknown authors and illustrators, and we work hard to bring excellent books from international authors and artists to the attention of teachers and children in the U.K too.

In this blog, Kate Arafa, co-Director of The Children’s Bookshow shares what she loves about the books that made up our 2024 Autumn Tour Reading list.

Our 2024 national tour began with a fantastic performance at The Stables theatre in Wavendon with Al Rodin the author and illustrator of An Adventure for Lia and Lion. It’s the first time Al has worked with the Children’s Bookshow and we were as mesmerised as the children as he painted live on stage! An Adventure for Lia and Lion is a beautiful picture book, a story about a friendship between a girl and a lion and how much better life is when you learn how to share it. This is a great thing for children to understand in their own games but as with all the best picture books the message is not didactic and doesn’t overwhelm the story. A lovely book to read alongside very young children.

Then we were off to The Grand in Wolverhampton to celebrate a brilliant book, Drew, Moo and Bunny Too, written by poet Owen Sheers and illustrated by Helen Stephens. This is an adventure story full of pirates, magic carpets, the wonders of the world and most importantly friendship. Owen’s poetry is spot on; the rhythm, the placement of each word, his craft in telling this fun and beautiful story makes it a wonderful read. Helen’s illustrations are gorgeous. They are vibrant and colourful and despite her insisting she hates drawing pirates, she is really very good at it! Owen’s poetry makes this book a delight to read aloud to little ones, but there’s lots in the story for independent readers of 7+ too.

This performance was followed by another poet and illustrator combination at The Northcott in Exeter. There is something magical about listening to a poem and watching an illustration unfold live at the same time and this is what poet Kate Wakeling and illustrator Elina Braslina, who came all the way from Latvia, offered to the audience in Exeter. Every child got a copy of Cloud Soup to take home and keep, a collection of poetry that is funny, moving and expertly conceived. Paean (or Eleven Uses for a Garden Pea) for instance offers such a fun new perspective and way of seeing a simple garden pea! Elina’s playful illustrations are the perfect match for Kate’s poems. Cloud Soup is aimed at children 9+.

At Newcastle Theatre Royal, Valerie Bloom mesmerised children with her live performance. Valerie’s book Stars with Flaming Tails is full of playful and joyful poems. Some are funny, some are sad and some make you think about everyday things in new ways. There are poems that play with form, there are fiendish riddles, and poems that I love about our world. Her poems sing from the page! This is a joyous book that children will want to read again and again, from 6 - 11 up.

Kwame Alexander’s book The Crossover is a firm favourite in my household. In fact all three of my daughters say that it is one of the best books they have ever read. A novel in poetry about two brothers who play basketball. Kwame told us in his live show at the London Old Vic that the publishers who rejected this book said that boys don’t read poetry and girls don’t read about basketball! Not so in our house. This book is brilliant - it’s moving, it’s funny and totally compelling. Perfect for independent readers, 9+.

Ele Fountain’s novel Wild is such a gripping page turner you can almost forget to slow down and enjoy her prose. Ele talked to children at the New Wolsey theatre in Ipswich about this book, and about the rainforest and conservation. Her characters are vivid and real and the circumstances and the dilemmas that they face make us readers consider deeply moral questions about how we live on this planet and how we treat other humans. Her books tell really important stories. This powerful story has lots for 10+ readers to think about.

My Baba’s Garden is a rich story about a boy’s relationship with his grandma exquisitely illustrated by Hans Christian Andersen award winner Sydney Smith. Sydney’s performances involved painting live to evocative soundscapes for hundreds of children at Hull New Theatre and the Southbank Centre in London. The words and the illustrations in My Baba’s Garden are perfectly married to tell the story. There is much to look at with many details that recur throughout the story that children love to find. Sydney’s paintings are full of light and beauty - even the page full of large wriggling worms! A beautiful picture book for sharing with young children.

After half-term, we set off to Warwick Arts Centre for a performance with the novelist SF Said. SF Said tells an important story in his latest novel Tyger. He takes us on a journey through a version of London that is a divided and segregated society, a form of apartheid where the ‘foreigners’ live in a separate zone and are treated as second class citizens with little or no opportunity to follow their dreams and change their future. There are elements in this story that deeply sadden me as although this is set in a dystopian world, these things are happening right now in our world as I write this. The key characters in this story, two brave and bright children, find hope through their relationship with the mythical Tyger and their acquisition of three skills: perception, imagination and creativity. This is such a thought-provoking and rich story. It’s a book for confident readers to return to again and again!

Author and illustrator Sam Usher was also new to The Children’s Bookshow this year. We love his series of books about boy and Grandad. Zoom tells a new adventure on a swelteringly hot day when boy and Grandad go out onto the roof to cool down with their telescope. When they spot astronauts in trouble on a planet they work together to build a rocket and zoom off to the rescue! I love the relationship between the boy and his grandad, how they work together to overcome problems, and the subtle slip that launches them from reality into a realm of imaginary play. Perfect for 6 - 8 year-olds.

Children lost and abandoned on an uninhabited island brings to mind William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies. But things play out rather differently in Frank Cottrell-Boyce’s brilliant novel Noah’s Gold as lucky children in Peterborough found out at his performance at The New Theatre in November. Noah’s Gold is a funny adventure story that combines mystery, friendship, treasure maps and what happens when a geography field trip goes wrong and you no longer have a teacher or the internet to rely on. Readers will devour the story, desperate to find out how and if the group of children stranded on an island will ever be rescued. And will Noah manage to find the gold? Readers aged 9 - 11 will definitely identify with Noah’s brilliant character.

Michael Rosen’s Big Book of Bad Things is one of Michael’s many classic collections of poetry. Every child who attended his show at The Grand Theatre in Blackpool got their own copy of this book to take home and keep. I love Michael’s live performances for The Children’s Bookshow and he never fails to make me laugh. When reading some of the poems in this collection like the “The Rhythm of Life” and “The Noise,” I can hear, in my mind, the way he performs these poems and it makes me smile! Read Michael’s poems out loud to young children, let readers age 7+ read them independently, recite them to yourself or your granny - these are poems for everyone!

Catherine Johnson’s Race to the Frozen North is such a gripping story that completely hooked me in right from the very beginning. Catherine loves black history and is interested in writing about people who have been airbrushed out of the past. Race to The Frozen North tells the story of Matt Henson, a Polar explorer who was the first man to reach the North Pole but has been completely forgotten because of the colour of his skin. This is a brilliant and vital story for young readers from 10 years old.

Our final event at Institut Français was with French author and illustrator Beatrice Rodriguez who is also new to The Children’s Bookshow this year. Her illustrations in Barnaby is not Afraid of Anything by Gilles Bizouerne are charming and funny. Three friends are out on a moonlit stroll in the woods when they see a creature with a long nose and long skinny fingers and they are frightened that it might be a witch. Summoning all their courage to approach it they find out that the creature is nothing like what they expected. I love the expressions on the animals faces and the way they overcome fear and their own preconceptions. This is a sweet, playful story to share with children from 3 years old and onwards.

If you missed our Autumn tour, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter mailing list for news of all future events - see box below.