‘The Dragonsitter Takes Off’ is the second in the Dragonsitter series. The series is about a boy called Edward who has a pet girl dragon named Ziggy. In this story a boy dragon comes, starts attacking Edwards’s house and won’t leave.

The book is told completely in emails between Edward and his Uncle Morton. This book wasn’t anything like I expected it to be, but I did like it. I would probably have preferred it if the book had been written as a proper novel rather than emails.

There were lots of illustrations in the book, which were drawn by Garry Parsons. I thought these were pretty good, but they weren’t my favourite pictures ever.

My favourite character was the boy dragon because he was cool, but I also liked reading about Edward.

Although this book was quite funny and exciting, I’m not sure if I would read more in the series.

3 and a half stars

‘Arthur and the Invisibles’ is about a boy called Arthur. A nasty landlord wants to take his Grandfather’s land and Arthur has to somehow save the day because his Grandfather disappeared without a trace four years before. Luckily, Arthur’s Grandfather hid a bag of rubies somewhere in the garden so if Arthur can find it he can pay the landlord the money he wants.

In his Grandfather’s book, Arthur reads about a tribe called the Minimoys, the members of this tribe are all less than an inch tall. Arthur also finds clues to the whereabouts of the Minimoys and is shrunk down to the size of a Minimoy himself. Then Arthur meets the Princess Selenia and her brother Betameche, and has lots of amazing adventures as he searches for the rubies and helps his friends defeat the evil
Maltazard.

There are actually two stories in this book called ‘Arthur and the Minimoys’ and ‘Arthur and the Forbidden City’, both were originally written by a French author called Celine Garcia. They were translated by Ellen Sowchek. The books were then made into the film ‘Arthur and the Invisibles’ and another film was made based on the stories called ‘Arthur and the Great Adventure’. I decided to read this book because I really liked the films.

I really like this book because it’s an adventure story and it’s very exciting. My favourite characters are Arthur, Selenia and Betameche, who is really funny. This is one of my favourite books ever and I hope some more Arthur books are written soon!

5 stars

Jack Stalwart is a secret agent. He goes around the globe fighting bad guys and trying to find his older brother, Max, who is also a secret agent, but has disappeared. In this book, Jack has to climb Mount
Everest to retrieve the ancient Yeti skull, the only known evidence of the Abominable Snowman. The skull was being transported to a scientist in India who was going to examine it, but the plane it was travelling on was ambushed by some Russian spies. Now Jack has to come along to save the day along with three other
GPF (Global Protection Force) agents.

Each of the books in this series is set in a different country. At the start of the books they have information about the countries, which is quite interesting, but not as good as the actual story.

I thought this was a very good adventure story. I liked the book because it made me want to be a secret agent like Jack! Jack was definitely my favourite character because he was so cool. I also thought the Russian spies were good, they had some great gadgets. My favourite bit of the book was when
Jack activated the gravity pull on his secret agent watch so the breathing device he needed flew to his hand.

The series is illustrated Brian Williamson, and I thought his
drawings were good and suited the
story.


These books don’t have funny bits and are quite serious and
  extremely exciting. There are quite a few books in this series, and I
  definitely recommend them for children aged about 7
plus.


5 stars

'This takes the form of Tom's battered homework diary - crammed with his  doodles and stories. "Exciting News! Mr Fullerman announces that class  5F are going on an 'Activity Break'! Which should be fun. As long as I  don't ge stuck in a group with anyone who snores or worse still with  ...Marcus Meldrew. Delia is already threatening to paint my room funny  colours while I'm away. Which is
annoying. I just hope the only surprise I have when I get home is the new pet that I hear Mum and Dad talking  about. Because I've always wanted a pet!"'

This book is about a boy called Tom Gates and is part of a series about him and his adventures.

Tom Gates lives with his mum and dad and his older sister, Delia, who works in a restaurant. In this story, Tom’s going to go on his school activity trip, but he keeps forgetting his form.

Other important characters were Tom’s friend Derek, and Tom’s teacher, Mr Fullerman, who has big eyes like an owl. I liked Tom’s drawings of Mr Fullerman.

My favourite character was Tom because he was funny, but I also liked Delia when she was annoying Tom – that really made me laugh.

Tom does doodles in his school book of monsters and aliens, and these pictures are all through the story, which I thought made the book look
really cool.

I think this book was really brilliant, it was so funny, and the drawings were really good. I would definitely like to read the other books in this series!

5 stars

This is the latest in Tony Robinson’s ‘Weird World of Wonders’ series. It was published for this year’s World Book Day and I got it for free with my World Book Day voucher.

Once again the Curiosity Crew are off on their adventures. The Crew are Jojo, Stig, Grace, Peewee and Nits the dog and in this book they are investigating different inventions.

I think Tony Robinson is a very good author; he’s great at explaining things in an amusing way. My favourite part of the book was about an automatic boomerang, this had a picture of a dog with a speech bubble that really made me giggle!

‘Inventions’ is shorter than the others in the series as it only costs £1, but it’s still very funny. I didn’t think this was quite as good as Tony Robinson’s history books from the same series, but it’s still well worth getting! I can’t wait for the next books in this series.

4 stars

This is the 4th book in the Beast Quest: The Darkest hour series. It’s the 70th Beast Quest book; I’m beginning to wonder if they’ll ever end!

In this story, Tom’s tokens from his shield have been taken away from him by the Council of Wizards, and the good wizard Aduro has been put in jail for helping Tom use the Lightning Bridge. The Lightning Bridge makes journeys shorter, but it’s forbidden to use it.

Vigrash the Clawed Eagle is one of the Lightning Beasts that Tom set free by accident when he activated the Lightning Bridge. Tom has been sent by the Council of Wizards to defeat the Beast and capture a witch and a pirate king, who he met on a previous quest. Tom and his friend Elena have the help of Aduro’s apprentice, Daltec.

I haven’t read all the books leading up to this one, so I had to catch up with the story. This wasn’t very hard; I think I managed to work out everything that was going on!

I thought this book was very exciting, and a good adventure. I really enjoyed it and will continue reading the Beast Quest books. It was definitely as good as the others in the
series.

4 stars

In this book Tony Robinson takes you travelling through time with the Curiosity Crew to the most exciting and disgusting bits of Roman history! The Curiosity Crew are a gang of children called Jojo, Grace, Stig and Peewee and their dog Nits who journey through history, in this book they visit ancient
Rome.

I decided to get this book after I saw Tony Robinson at the Hay Festival last year – he was excellent! It is a very funny book and I think Tony Robinson explains history in a really brilliant way. One of my favourite bits is when Tony Robinson tells the story of the founding of Rome and the brothers Romulus and Remus.

I read this very quickly by myself (along with the other Weird World of Wonders books), and it really made me laugh. This is one of the best history books I’ve ever read; it was really entertaining and interesting. I don’t think anyone could be bored by it! I think it’s good for girls and boys aged over 7.

So far there are four books in this series; hopefully there’ll be lots more soon!

5 stars

Andrew Murray is one of my favourite authors at the moment, ever since I discovered his brilliant Ghost Rescue series! Andrew's written lots of books and I can't wait to read them all!

When did you start writing?

I guess I always wrote (and drew) as a child, but after studying film at college I started writing scripts, then tried other avenues until a friend suggested trying children’s books – to which I thought, ‘What a good idea!’

Do you like writing children’s books?

Yes! It’s wonderful to let your imagination roam in any direction you like, and it’s great to be the creator, the absolute starting point, of the whole creative process.

What’s the best thing about being a writer?

The freedom and creativity, the pleasure of seeing something you’ve written as a real book, there in your hand – or preferably in the hands of readers who are lost in your world and having a great time there.

What have you written that you’re most proud of and why?

Hmm – probably Buddy and Elvis and Ghost Rescue. The wonderful illustrations make both a joy to behold. B&E is in television development, so of course that’s very exciting! And Ghost Rescue was a step up for me, a challenge to pack eight exciting adventures into not too many pages. 
 
When you were growing up what was your favourite children’s book?

The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, the Narnia Chronicles, Alice…  Slightly less
known were Cynthia Harnett’s adventures set in a vivid fifteenth century England, and Minnow on the Say, a gripping treasure hunt by the author of Tom’s Midnight Garden. I also devoured Ladybird books on a vast range of subjects – history, science, nature etc.

Are you going to write any more books in the Ghost Rescue series?

No more are planned at the moment. But I think it would make a great TV series …(hint hint!)

If you had a ghost in your house who would you call to help you, the Ghostbusters or the Ghost Rescue team?

I’d have to work out whether the ghost is nasty or nice – if they are nasty, it would be a job for the Ghostbusters, but if they’re good then Ghost Rescue and I would do our best to help them!

For more information about Andrew visit his website at: http://www.andrewmurray.dsl.pipex.com/

‘An Egyptian Escape’ is about a boy called Charlie and his dog Bandit. It’s the second book in the series about these characters. The first story is about Charlie’s adventures in Ancient Rome. In this book Charlie travels to 1906 and then to Ancient Egypt with some new friends.

This is a comic book so it was very quick and easy to read. The illustrations were by Emma Dodd. They weren’t my favourite type of drawings because I usually like pictures with more detail.

Charlie was quite a good character and the story was exciting, but it was sometimes a bit too silly and I didn’t really like some of Charlie’s friends very much.

At the end of the book there were some facts about Ancient Egypt. These were quite interesting, but I knew most of them already.

I don’t think I’d read more in this series, but it was nice to try this and I quite enjoyed reading it.

3 stars