Branching Out: Books for Fans of Isadora Moon

There’s a new superhero in town and her name is Kitty! This series features a girl called Kitty and her crew of felines as they embark upon brave rooftop adventures in the moonlight. Illustrated in cool blacks and oranges, these fun-filled mystery adventures with talking cats are likely to be a purrrfectly popular independent reading choice among ages 6-8.

In this short, illustrated chapter book, Pedro is an endearing main character. His longing to have an adventure, and the obstacles to achieving that, will strike a chord with many KS1 children. They will be cheering him on, through danger and disappointment, to his enrolment as a fully signed-up member of the Adventuremice team.

One for fans of Harriet Muncaster’s Isadora Moon and Sarah MacIntyre’s Grumpycorn, this is the first story in a series of illustrated short chapter books about Princess Pea and her rather un-royal palace pet – Unipiggle! A madcap and muddy adventure with high-energy design in full colour and tips to draw your own Unipiggle too.

The first in a joy-filled series of illustrated chapter books, telling the funny story of Mira’s adventures as she starts unicorn school. Mira wishes to be paired up with the most beautiful, sparkly unicorn of her dreams, but the reality presents a grumpy, untidy, doughnut-eating unicorn named Dave.

This humorous adventure series explores themes of friendship, inclusion and loyalty, with a backdrop of rainbows, glitter and a dose of unicorn toilet humour, too. Children love the idea of the secret unicorn school – a bit like a sparklier version of Hogwarts. Illustrations, age-appropriate humour and a diverse cast of characters make this a super choice of chapter book story for readers aged 6-8.

These stories are perfect very first chapter books for young readers. The text is larger and wider spaced than most chapter books and the pages are fully colour-illustrated with a bright and bold palette.

Princess Minna is an adventurous, modern princess who is full of life and keen to use her resourcefulness to help whoever is in need along the way. From dealing with dragons to saving a prince in distress, Minna always has an adventure to tackle head on.

Not short of funny moments, this early chapter book series makes for a highly entertaining reading book for children ready to move on from picturebooks to something short and illustrated with multiple chapters.

Luna Grace is a girl who lives on a planet called Starbright. Starbright is a very colourful planet where the residents have some special abilities, such as moving things with their minds. Grace’s hair also changes colour to show the emotion she is feeling. Her family are sent to Earth to study the wildlife and report back to their home planet. Their main challenge is to fit in with the people living on Earth so they can continue their studies. Luna has to go to a new school, and that is quite challenging with her hair constantly changing colour and her moon cat, Twizzle, wanting to come along. The story follows Luna as she moves home and starts her new school.

This book is a great story about a child making a significant move from their home and the emotions children can go through when they have to go through such a major life change. The book also highlights how it’s okay to be different from your friends and appreciate those differences. This is a brilliant book for children starting to read chapter books. It has short chapters and engaging illustrations to break up the quantity of words.

Izzy loves science. She loves experiments and wants to be an inventor. When she is summoned to help get some fairy tales back on track, she is sceptical – she doesn’t believe in fairies and magic. But can she use her science knowledge, along with a little imagination, to help everybody out?

This early, illustrated chapter book by Zanna Davidson is great for budding scientists or anyone with a curious mind. Mixing well-known fairy tales with science and experiments shows that you don’t have to believe in just one or the other. Izzy is a strong character who knows her own mind but who also realises that sometimes you have to adjust your beliefs. The book is set out in a way that makes it very accessible for emerging readers. There are no long pages full of text: the story is set out in a way that incorporates the illustrations by Elissa Elwick as part of the story, rather than an addition. Speech bubbles, maps, explanations and experiments are interspersed throughout the book as integral elements of telling the story.

This makes it very user-friendly and an ideal book to those starting out with longer texts. That’s not to say it’s and easy book- the vocabulary is challenging in places and scientific vocabulary is used appropriately throughout.This would be a great addition to any class book shelf or school library.