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Who is Maisy?
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For those of you who haven't come across Maisy, this is a brief description of her.
Maisy is a loveable, ever so cute little white mouse, with a pink tail, nose, ears and paws.

She isn't a regular sort of mouse..........she wears clothes, sleeps in a bed, brushes her teeth and much, much more. In short she does everything that young children can relate to and that is her appeal. All that's different is that she's a mouse!

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Maisy goes to the library
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No surprises about the storyline........... Maisy loves going to the library but on this particular day she wants to find a book about fish.

She finds a book about tigers, one about turtles and another about birds, but none about fish.

Maisy isn't too bothered about this as there are lots of other things to do in a library, e.g. use the computer, listen to music and even look at the fish in the aquarium.

And that was what gave Maisy her clue to finding the book about fish..........it was indeed next to the aquarium, where else!

Maisy goes to sit down quietly to look at her book but her friends come along and start laughing and pulling funny faces.

Then it's story time in the quiet corner and they all sit and listen to it.

Maisy and her friends get their books 'zapped' before leaving the library and going outside to re-enact the story book they had earlier. Finally, Maisy sits down to read her book in a nice.....quiet ....place.....

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Illustrations
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I really like Lucy Cousins illustrations in the series of books about Maisy.

They are bright, large, simple and bold. The outlines of each character or object is in thick black pen and the rest is coloured in, in rich vibrant colours.

The backgrounds are also very bright, not just the bog standard white that is in so many other children's books.

There's always lots to talk about in her drawings and this along with the use of colours makes this book a big hit with young children.

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Style, Format & Educational Value
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There is more text in this book than many of the other Maisy books. The font of the text is great for young readers as there aren't any loops or cursive writing which is harder for emergent readers to cope with.

The pages are a good mix of text and illustrations.

This is a good starting point prior to a trip to the library as it explains to young children what a library offers etc.

The only reason why I have given this 4 stars instead of 5 is that I think that the author could have offered some lift-the-flap opportunities which she does so well in her other books as a means of developing fine motor skills.

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Price
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My hardcover ISBN: 1-84428-679-7 was £7.99 but Amazon have some new copies for sale from just 96p so a big saving even with P&P charges.
This book is also available in paperback for £1.52.

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Maisy Products
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Maisy is hugely popular and a range of movies / films on VHS are available:
* Play with Maisy
* Count with Maisy
* Maisy's Bedtime
* Maisy's colours and shapes

There are also educational resources:
* Counting game
* Colour game
* Memory game
* Domino game

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Other Maisy Books
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* Maisy's colour collection
* Maisy's rainbow dream
* Maisy takes a bath
* Maisy at the farm
* Where is Maisy going?
* Maisy goes to bed