Keep on smiling! (It's Lovely When You Smile - Sam McBratney)

Member Name: kingfisher111

Product:	It's Lovely When You Smile - Sam McBratney
Date:	04/09/09 (142 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: lovely book for small children

Disadvantages: none

One of my daughters' favourite books has always been 'Guess How Much I Love You?' by Sam Bratney because it is such a cute story. That is why, when we spotted another of his books - It's Lovely when you Smile - at the local library we just had to book it out. We were so pleased that we did because it is just as sweet, cute and loveable as the other and is also bound to become a favourite! The only problem is that I think the girls are going to object when we have to return it so I will probably have to go out and buy it!

This story is all about Roo, a small kangaroo and his mum. One day Roo wakes up feeling extremely grumpy without knowing why. His mum wants to know what is wrong and tells him that he will feel much better if he smiles but that is the last thing Roo feels like doing. However, his mum is quite determined so sets about trying to get at least a small smile out of him. She tickles him and she flips him up head over heels but still he is determined not to smile. She jumps out on him and tosses leaves all over him but all with no success.

This continues like this and it looks as though Roo will never smile again. This is until his mum takes him for a ride looking for food but as they are going down a steep slope she slips and they both end up in a slimy muddy hole! They are both absolutely covered and as Roo looks at his mum in her extremely soaking wet and slimy state a smile starts to spread from one ear to the other and then he just cannot stop smiling!

This is such a sweet story and one that is very easy to identify with. I'm sure that every parent has had moments with a moody child where they have tried to cajole them out of their bad temper. I can just hear myself saying some of the things that the mum comes out with - 'Did I see a tiny smile?', and 'I think I can see a smile this time!' The conversations that the two have are superbly illustrated and we love looking at all of the pictures of little Roo trying desperately not to smile!

The language used is very straightforward and accessible to young children but there are also some lovely alliterative words such as 'slippity, slide and slop' when they fall into the hole. Also the words are arranged in interesting ways on the page not always conforming to straight lines. Sometimes the words jump about to convey lots of movement and sometimes they are printed in big bold letters so that we know to emphasise them! Reading the book out loud to my daughters is a lot of fun particularly the funny conversations between the two kangaroos. Even though she sometimes likes me to read to her, the text of this book is easily within my six year old's reading capabilities.

All of the pages are bright and colourful and help to tell the story well. Occasionally the page direction changes and you have to hold the book longways in order to read the words. This all adds to the overall interest and enjoyment of the books.

It's a very heart-warming read about two loveable characters particularly at the end when we do get a smile out of Roo and his mother is able to tell him that 'it's lovely when you smile!' What you can't help noticing though, is not only does Roo have a great big smile on his face but so does his mum and a number of other small creatures who have been following their adventures. Well they would wouldn't they, for as we all know - smiling is infectious!

We borrowed our copy of this wonderful book from our local library but I have just looked on Amazon and I notice that the paperback version is available for £4.49.

Summary: A great book for little children