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Topic: Geography

Chapter book

The ladybirdz arrive in Woodside Terrace, and Aubrey’s Easter holidays get complicated. Ariadne the spider asks Aubrey to help. Something Must Be Done, but first Aubrey sucks the swallow stone which makes him small enough for daring flights on the back of Hirundo the Swallow and amazing adventures in the Web of Time and Space. Add in Bernardo the bee, Eric the earthworm and a whole conference of ravens, and you have the start of an epic tale in which a small boy and a house spider try to save the world!

Picturebook

Pandora lives alone in a world of broken things. She makes herself a handsome home from all that people had left behind, but no one ever comes to visit. Then one day something falls from the sky… a bird with a broken wing.

As Pandora nurses the bird back to health it begins to fly away each day, bringing a seed or small plant back with him. Then one day, the bird doesn’t come back. Pandora is heartbroken.

However, day by day, things begin to grow. This is a stunning fable of hope and regeneration from critically acclaimed artist Victoria Turnbull.

Poetry

A timeless, beautifully designed book for children and adults alike, The Lost Words is a gift that will be pored over and cherished for years to come.

All over the country, there are words disappearing from children’s lives. These are the words of the natural world; Dandelion, Otter, Bramble and Acorn, all gone. A wild landscape of imagination and play is rapidly fading from our children’s minds.

The Lost Words stands against the disappearance of wild childhood. It is a joyful celebration – in art and word – of nearby nature and its wonders. With acrostic spell-poems by award-winning writer Robert Macfarlane and illustrations by Jackie Morris , this enchanting book evokes the irreplaceable magic of language and nature for all ages.

Picturebook

In this visually compelling look at our changing environment by Jeannie Baker, illustrator of the critically-acclaimed Mirror and Where the Forest Meets the Sea, a mother and baby look through a window at a view of wilderness and sky as far as the eye can see. With each page, the boy grows and the scene changes. At first, in a clear patch of forest, a single house appears. A few years pass and there is a village in the distance… When the boy is twenty, will he recognize the view from his window? Illustrated with elaborate and gorgeous collage constructions, Window is a wordless picture book that speaks volumes.

Non-fiction

Set your spirit of adventure free with this journey to the world’s great oceans, discovering the diversity of life that exists in the deep blue sea.

Whether you’re travelling long haul with leatherback turtles across the Pacific, snoozing with sea otters or ice bathing with a walrus, this book celebrates the very prescient topic of the world’s oceans with Lucy Letherland ‘s animal characters.

Each section begins with an infographic map of the ocean it explores – Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Southern and Arctic – followed by richly detailed two-page spreads exploring its depths and the denizens within , as well as seabirds , coral reefs and shoreline critters . Discover saltwater crocodiles lurking in the Andaman Islands, hammerheads gathering in the Atlantic, and the awe-inspiring colossal squid that calls the Ross Sea home.

Lucy Letherland’s illuminating artwork shows how these oceans teem with life, forming part of complex and fascinating ecosystems, all in a quirky, characterful style.

Graphic Novel

With the humorous and heartfelt tones of Finding Nemo, The Aquanaut follows a group of determined characters on their entangled journey to save their family.

First there’s a band of sea creatures struggling to find their way to a fabled paradise and safe haven for marine life. Then there’s a girl who lost her father at sea and is at risk of losing her uncle to his obsession with the legacy of a theme park. The unlikely group find their way to each other at AQUALAND, and stumble across what they are looking for in unexpected ways.

Non-fiction

This is our Blue Planet: a beautiful blue marble suspended in a sea of stars. Dive into these incredible stories from BBC Blue Planet II.

Unlike billions of other worlds in the Milky Way, 71 per cent of our Blue Planet is covered by ocean. It’s home to the greatest diversity of life on Earth but is our least explored habitat; we’ve better maps of Mars than of the ocean floor.

With so much more to discover, take a deep breath . . . and dive into a wondrous world beneath the waves .

Explore coral reefs that shimmer in a kaleidoscope of colours. Venture to the bottom of the ocean where creatures beyond your wildest imagination live in the dark. Chase sea otters through kelp forest seas, and glide the open ocean with humpback whales.

Chapter book

Nobody visits Eerie-on-Sea in the winter. Especially not when darkness falls and the wind howls around Maw Rocks and the wreck of the battleship Leviathan, where even now some swear they have seen the unctuous Malamander creep…

Herbert Lemon, Lost-and-Founder at the Grand Nautilus Hotel, knows that returning lost things to their rightful owners is not easy – especially when the lost thing is not a thing at all, but a girl. No one knows what happened to Violet Parma’s parents twelve years ago, and when she engages Herbie to help her find them, the pair discover that their disappearance might have something to do with the legendary sea-monster, the Malamander. Eerie-on-Sea has always been a mysteriously chilling place, where strange stories seem to wash up. And it just got stranger…

Non-fictionPicturebook

A nonfiction picture book, The Blue Whale draws children into the life and world of this enormous whale by situating facts within a familiar context that is fun and engaging. Here, readers are given the actual size of an eye right on the page, and we are informed how understand this whale’s body size in relation to trucks, cars, milk bottles, and hippos! With an accurate and engaging text, fully vetted by a blue whale expert, and lyrically lovely illustrations, The Blue Whale is a book that invites children in and holds their attention. Its tempo is like a pleasing melody, which means that the information never becomes too weighty or exhausting–a key thing when it comes to young readers and their enjoyment of a book!

Chapter book

A funny, touching and original mystery-adventure about a young girl living on a tropical island – the first in a new series.

From multi award-winning author Nicola Davies comes a new adventure series, starring a young girl living on a tropical island in a sea full of islands. Washed up on Turtle Island as a toddler, Ariki has always felt different from the other children. But there’s somewhere she belongs heart and soul: the sea, where she plays with dolphins, sharks, whales and turtles. One day Ariki catches sight of a strange creature in the water, bigger than any she’s seen before – soon after, an enormous shark tooth is found on the sand. When a group of giant sharks start circling the shore, the island’s fishermen are too afraid to go out to sea. Without fish the people will starve… Can Ariki save the day? The first in an exciting new series, this book is strikingly original but has the feel of a classic: Ariki’s world is a timeless paradise, and children are sure to fall under the spell of this cheeky, charming little girl.

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