Clara Dackenberg Books

This is a unique and thought-provoking picture book about a girl’s playdate at another house. While the text describes a simple afternoon of games with her friend Henry, the illustrations quietly reveal a different story – the families live in completely different worlds, that Henry has access to (and even discards) toys that she can only dream of having, and the girl’s mum is evidently there to clean.

This is a book to truly ponder over, offering no easy answers or neat resolutions. Children can be prompted to consider the unspoken divide between words and pictures, which mirrors the unspoken class divide between the girl and her playdate companion. A brilliant pick for KS2 to explore subtext, social inequality and throwaway culture, especially as the words and pictures tell two very different versions of the narrative.