We’re very excited to have recently been chosen as a Boolino Friend, (a book reviewer) for children’s online book and reading platform, Boolino. Boolino are a company on a mission to turn children into book lovers by helping their parents find the books they like in an easy, intuitive way.
Oscar and I love reading books together. I’ve been reading to him since he was born and he joined our local library when he was just three months old. Stories have been part of our bedtime routine for the longest time and today we love it. However, it hasn’t always been this way. There was a time when bedtime stories were just too much stimulation for him and so despite the ‘advice’ that all parents should be reading to their children at bedtime, we had to stop, take a step back and hope he’d come back to it.
Thankfully, after about a year, he did and he now loves stories more than ever. Most nights we have at least one, if not two (if not three if he’s feeling lucky!) stories. He loves all sorts of books, in all sorts of different styles. Rhyming, funny, factual, he loves them all. But one thing they all have to have in common is good strong pictures; clear, with lots of interest. He’s currently learning his letters and although he doesn’t yet read, he likes to be able to gauge what’s happening in the story from the illustrations.
Our first story from Boolino; George and the New Craze by Alice Hammond was exactly the kind of bedtime book we love. Clear and fun, with plenty of engaging illustrations (by Kimberly Scott).
George and the New Craze is a story about a giraffe and his friends at the Heavenly Hippos Wildlife Park who want to collect as many “People Cards” as the Penguins have!
Oscar liked
Oscar loved that there were plenty of illustrations of animals for him to name and count. He also loved that it was set in a wildlife park, something he could relate to, having recently had a very successful day out at Marwell Zoo.
Mummy liked
There are two things I love about this story. One is the underlying message that sharing lots of things is more fun than keeping one or two things to yourself. As sharing is a concept we are constantly having to reinforce with Oscar I loved this element of the story.
The other thing I loved was the idea of the People Cards. There are several illustrations of the cards. Each one has a name and a brief description of the person. I love the illustrations and Oscar loves me to go through them, naming all the faces. I feel sure it’s something he will start to memorise soon.
I loved this element of the book, however I was a little disappointed to see that of all the People Cards, no one was described as a Stay at Home Mum (or similar). That’s obviously a personal thing, but worth noting I felt.
Overall we really liked this book. It was just the right length for bedtime and had many elements Oscar loved. He loved it so much that he wanted to ‘show the people’ what he was reading. The concept of sharing rubbing off already!
Thank you to Boolino for sending us this book to review. I was not paid to write this post and as always all opinions are my own.