Fly Me To The Moon (Roaring Rockets - Tony Mitton)

Name: belfin

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Product:	Roaring Rockets - Tony Mitton
Date:	18/07/08 (110 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Wonderful rhymes and pictures make this a great asset for any budding spaceman

Disadvantages: None

***Background***

Tony Mitton is best known to me for being the author of the fantastic, Spookyrumpus, but this book is part of a series about Amazing Machines and there are quite a few others in it to choose from.

Ant Parker illustrates the series.

***The Story***

"Wow!
Rockets have power. They rise and roar.
This rocket's waiting, ready to soar.

Rockets carry astronauts with cool, white suits,
oxygen helmets and gravity boots."

We then see a rabbit, a mouse and an owl go into the rocket and we see a countdown before they blast off into space. We learn about the fuel tanks and how they drop off and find out about gravity and how you float about in space if you aren't strapped in.

The friends soon find themselves near the moon and launch the lunar lander before they take a walk on the moon. When the mission is over we see the explorers going back in the rocket for the long ride home.

"Rockets re-enter in a fiery flash
to land at sea with a sizzling splas!
The helicopter carries the brave crew away.
Let's give them a cheer. Hip, hip, hooray."

Although that's where the story ends, there is a small section at the back about Rocket Bits and various things that we have seen in the story are explained in more detail, such as the oxygen helmet and the command module.

***The Illustrations***

The pictures in this book are very bright and exciting to look at. There are lots of descriptive sounds throughout and the words are written in big letters on the picture. The animals look cute and funny and my son's favourite is when the rabbit unstraps himself and is shown floating on his back in the rocket.

***My Thoughts***

This book came home from school with a pack of fun activities included and focuses on sounds as well as learning about space rockets, so we've had a fun-filled weekend but the book on it's own is wonderful too.

My son has read both Spookyrumpus and has Bumpus Jumpus Dinosaurumpus, so we are pretty familiar with this author's work. He loves both the funny rhymes and amusing pictures in these books and although the illustrator is different here, the pictures are excellent.

There are a few things in the book that maybe aren't quite as factual about moon boots and landers as they could be but this book is aimed at young children and the entertainment value alone works for my son. Children seem to be fascinated with rockets and travelling in space so this book is sure to spark a child's interest.

The clever rhymes also help a child to get involved in reading and memorizing the last words in a sentence is a good start to this. At five, my son manages to read this book on his own without any real difficulties despite there being a few words here and there that don't really sound out easily. The black and bold text is written on the colourful backgrounds of the pages but that doesn't seem to be a problem as the colours are enough of a contrast for the lettering to stand out.

The book is obviously a hit with my son, as he has been reading it all weekend and seems to thoroughly enjoy it.

***Other Books In The Series***

Amazing Aeroplanes
Brilliant Boats
Cool Cars
Dazzling Diggers
Flashing Fire Engines
Super Submarines
Terrific Trains
Tough Trucks
Tremendous Tractors

***Price & Availability***

We had an older hardback version of the book but it is available in paperback form for the publishing price of £4.99. You can find it slightly cheaper at £3.49 from Amazon.

If you think your child will enjoy this series though, it might be worthwhile getting the box set of the ten books as Amazon also have them available in hardback form for a total price of £9.09.

Paperback ISBN No. 075340351X
Box set ISBN No. 0753461544

Summary: My son loved this book