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The Blue Balloon - Mick Inkpen
by jo1976
All three of my children have loved the many stories and characters created by Mick Inkpen and we have a much loved collection of classic Inkpen tales. Amongst my sons' favourites is the 'Blue Balloon' - a story which is currently being read and re-read on a nightly basis by my two year old son.
This fun tale is narrated by an ... unnamed little boy who discovers a soggy blue balloon in his garden. He soon discovers that this is no ordinary balloon. In fact, it is 'indestructible'! One of the things that I do like about Inkpen is that he doesn't try to dumb down a children's story and he includes quite sophisticated vocabulary. My youngest son has been enjoying this story even before his second birthday and, whilst he may not understand every specific word, he does follow the gist of the story.
Where this particular story excels is with the simple but really eye-catching images of the blue balloon. This is very cleverly done with the use of fold-out pages, where the balloon keeps getting bigger and bigger. So big that the pages fold out to four times the usual size to show the balloon! This is really appealing to youngsters, although the folds of that page have become worn and slightly damaged through repeated folding and unfolding - always a sign of a well-loved children's story.
There are a number of folding pages, to indicate where the boy's dog tries to s-t-r-e-e-e-t-c-h the balloon and where the boy is even taken all of the way up to the moon and back (just in time for tea.) All of these features just leave my two year old son wide-eyed with excitement and enjoyment!
Kipper the dog is one of Mick Inkpen's most popular children's book characters and this particular tale sees Kipper's first appearance although this is not a typical Kipper story. Here, Kipper is more of a run of the mill pet dog and can't talk but does have the distinct colouring and is clearly named. My son has a number of Kipper stories so I'm sure the familiar character helps to reinforce his love for this particular tale.
Despite some of the more challenging vocabulary, I would recommend this particular story as a reading aid for new readers as well as a story book for pre-schoolers, especially for children who are already familiar with the story. My five year old son is gradually becoming more confident with his reading skills and is now able to read this story (with minimal assistance) to his younger brother, partly through his concentration on the words and partly through his familiarity with the story and using the pictures as prompts. Both boys are happy to sit together, opening out the folding pages and giggling at the boy's attempts to pop the balloon.
I would highly recommend this book to children from two up to the age of six, where its simplicity and the unusual addition of folding pages just seem to have a special age to young readers. I will be sad when all of my children are too old to enjoy Mick Inpen, especially his magical blue balloon!
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Wibbly Pig: In Wibbly's Garden - Mick Inkpen
by Economum
We love Mick Inkpen's books and we especially love Wibbly Pig (but Kipper the Dog is great too). We also have the excellent flap book "Everybody Hide from Wibbly Pig" which is along similar lines to this one.
"In Wibbly's Garden" is a beautiful lift-the-flap picture. The gently humour and colourful ... pictures combine fantastically with the imaginative flaps to make bedtime stories enjoyable rather than being a chore.
The flaps and cut-outs reveal the story bit by bit with many different variations on the basic flap - the flaps go up, sideways and some pages have flaps within flaps to reveal special secrets.
I hope I'm not spoiling the story by revealing that the plot is (very loosely) based on Jack and the Beanstalk except that the giant in this case turns out to be very friendly.
The book uses a friendly but still easy to read font that makes it easy for children to read themselves.
Ages
The book is suitable for a wide range of ages as it can be read to babies; toddlers will enjoy the interaction of revealing the flaps to join in with the story and slightly older children can learn to read it for themselves (and then enjoy reading to younger brothers or sisters). The plot is fast moving and there are not a lot of words on each page - which helps to stop impatient toddlers from getting bored (and saves parents from having to do impromptu precis of the page!)
Price
The RRP on the back of this hardback book is £10.99 and as a special present for a small child it would be worth this amount (the work that goes into sticking, folding and cutting each flap must add substantially to the cost of producing each copy) although I have to admit that I bought it from the Book People online for considerably less than this. (They are my favourite source of picture books.)
It can now be bought second-hand extremely cheaply from Amazon, although with this likely to have been a much-loved toddler book with vulnerable flaps, you would need to be careful about the condition of the book. (Having said that, ours has lasted well - perhaps because it was particularly treasured.)
I would really recommend this book to any parent with a small child looking for a fun book to read with/to their child that will interest you both.
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Hissss! - Mick Inkpen
by emmad5689
My youngest daughter Emily really loves books and my eldest daughter Sophie loves a trip to the library, on one of our more recent trips we picked up this book about Little Kipper.
The book is written by Mick Inkpen who has written many childrens books and whose books we have always enjoyed. There are a large number of books ... in the Kipper range and my daughters have read a number of them now and always enjoy them.
The front cover of the book shows Kipper the Dog sat with a rubber duck in a paddling pool full of water, the name of the book is written in large black letters above the picture and the name of the author is written underneath. The background is white so the picture stands out really well and is nice and colourful.
The story follows Kipper the dog on a very hot day, to begin with Kipper uses the sun to make shadows on the wall then he lays on his blanket and has a nice cool drink before deciding he should get the paddling pool out. Kipper gets the paddling pool from the top shelf in the cupboard and the contents of the cupboard fall on top of him, both my girls think this is rather amusing.
Kipper blows up the paddling pool and leaves the hose to fill it up whilst he goes for an ice cream but when he returns there is water on the floor and he finds the pool has deflated. On bending down Kipper can hear a hiss coming from the paddling pool and so he takes the plasters off his head which he put on when the toys fell on his head and he places it on the paddling pool to fix it meaning he can enjoy the paddling pool after all.
The pictures in the book are nice and colourful but they are also on a white background so there is not too much detailing and my Emily loves to point out Kipper and his rubber duck on the pages, all the way through the book we keep getting "woof woof" and "quack quack" from her.
Both girls like this story although Emily likes to listen to it more than Sophie which is probably as it is a bit too short and simple a story for my eldest now as she is heading for 6 years old now. Both girls find it funny when the toys fall on Kippers head and I keep telling Sophie this is what is going to happen to her if she doesn't tidy her room.
The book is simple with only a few words on each page, it is quick to read Sophie started reading it to Emily before we took it back so it was helping with her reading too which is great. I would rate this book 5 stars as I cannot find a fault with it.
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