BooksforTopics Reading for Pleasure Recommendations
Former Blue Peter presenter Konnie Huq (Photo credit: Ed Miller)
Book Title: Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World (available here)
Author: Konnie Huq
Publisher: Piccadilly Press
Publication Date: August 2019
Most Suitable For: Years 4-6
Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World is the beginning of a highly marketable new series from former Blue Peter presenter Konnie Huq. With a light-hearted storyline, an authentically childish narrative voice and doodle-style line drawings and charts, the book will hold an instant appeal to fans of ‘Diary of Wimpy Kid’. The science-loving main character will also likely appeal to those looking for stories representing girls interested in STEM subjects.
Cookie is a 9-year old girl who invites the reader to access her innermost thoughts in a recount of a typical few months of her life in a London Bangladeshi family. During this time, Cookie details the quotidian ups and downs of her life as she navigates friendships, school, science competitions and the overwhelming urge to continue asking her parents for a pet.
The plot sees various strands of Cookie’s life tie up as she competes for a place on her favourite TV quiz show Brainbusters, continues her search for the perfect pet, works single-handedly on a science project to make a solar system out of fruit and learns to tolerate her new annoying classmate Jake. Overshadowing everything is her concern about what will happen when her best friend Keziah moves away to Solihull.
Cookie’s stream-of-consciousness narrative is as raw as any nine-year-old’s unfiltered thoughts might be and the humour at times tips into the anarchic, respecting the reader’s intelligence to not have to categorise any of the characters as wholly good or bad. I enjoyed the insights into the inherited attitudes and lifestyle of Cookie’s Bangladeshi family, without this ever being forced or over-stated for the sake of inclusivity. There is enough interest in the set-up to make it easy to imagine the natural flow of subsequent books to expect in the series. With plenty to laugh about, the easy, relatable humour combined with integrated line-doodles makes this a likely book to draw in reluctant readers.
Relatable and humorous, this is an easy-to-read story that is likely to be passed around from pupil to pupil in KS2 classrooms.
You can order Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World online or from your local bookshop or library.
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***Book Giveaway!***
Thanks to the publishers at Piccadilly Press, we have five copies of Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World to give away to our followers.
To enter, simply follow @booksfortopics on Twitter and retweet the giveaway tweet before 11.59pm Wednesday 14th August 2019 (T&Cs here).
You can order Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World online or from your local bookshop or library.
Many thanks to the publisher for sending me an advanced review copy of this book and providing the giveaway prizes.
