Tim - the tiny horse with a big heart and a deep soul (Tim the Tiny Horse at Large - Harry Hill)

Member Name: tinkabubble

Product:	Tim the Tiny Horse at Large - Harry Hill
Date:	04/09/09 (31 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: An inspiring book full of humour, love and good old moral fibre

Disadvantages: None

Tim The Tiny Horse is a little (well, tiny) blue horse who I hesitate to call a figment of Harry Hill's imagination as he is such a complete little character! As we find out in Harry Hill's first book about the lovable Tim, he has his likes ("Sweets, Fly [his best friend], Hula Hoops and Anna Ford [News reader]") and his dislikes ("Dogs" and "Fly's girlfriend"). His "stable is a match box with a tic tac box for a conservatory", "a sugar lump would last him a month" and he is "so small that the blacksmith had to make his shoes from paperclips."
Let's just say then that it is Harry Hill who documents Tim's adventures over two books so far, this latest offering being 'Tim The Tiny Horse At Large'. In this book, we find out that some things never change; yes, "Tim is still a very small horse." So small in fact, that Harry Hill uses a tic tac to show Tim's "relative size", and suggests that Tim could "use an ipod as his main T.V., with the headphones as speakers (his ears are too small to need a sub-woofer), but he doesn't."
Tim's best friend is also still the enigmatic Fly, however, in this book, their friendship suffers a knock due to Fly's marriage and new found fatherhood. Yet, although Tim sometimes feels lonely, he has many adventures in life and always shares the morals of his stories with the reader, which makes this a fantastic book for everyone, young and old.
The book is humorous (well, it is Harry Hill!) and at the same time heart warming, and although it isn't very long and can easily be read in less than an hour (which seems to make it ideal bed time reading) it is such a complete work, incorporating humour, melancholy, love, war (usually over food!), romance and the ups and downs of life in general, that it seems to me it could span all ages, and in particular is a great book for parents to read with their children.
The illustrations in the book (also by Harry Hill) really help to bring Tim and his world to life with their colour and character, and add a great deal to the humour of the book as we follow Tim through his experiences of unrequited love, being a best man for Fly, babysitting for Fly and his wife's maggot and adopting a pet.
Tim The Tiny Horse really does capture both heart and imagination (I fully intend to make my own life-size version of Tim out of blue-tac - it shouldn't take much!) and just hope that Harry Hill writes more about him!

Summary: It might not be for everyone, but then again, it just might be : )