Ayo Recommends

In P6A, my reading group has been enjoying, The Crowfield Curse by Pat Walsh.  We all wrote reviews of this book as one of our tasks.  I really loved this book and hope when you read my review, you will rush to your library for a copy and read it too!

The Crowfield Curse – A review

Set in 1347, the story follows monks’ apprentice, William, as he finds himself caught up in a battle between light and dark forces that seem to surround the abbey where he lives.  After discovering a creature called a hob tangled in a trap, Will’s eyes are opened to the magical creatures around him.  There are many ‘fay’ creatures, old pagan gods, ghosts and healers and a secret buried deep in the woods.

William is a peculiar character.  He is kind, fair and tender-hearted, able to move past conventional beliefs in order to see the bigger picture.  Although frightened a great deal of the time, he continually strives to do what he believes is best for others.  Which, in my opinion, all adds up to a tenacious hero.

The mystery that Will is drawn into is genuinely intriguing.  It’s so hard to tell how the story is going to turn out.  Even when you are 100% positive you think you know what’s going to happen it goes all twisted and the author (Pat Walsh) adds a new development.  I would love to see The Crowfield Curse as a movie so I could see how the characters are brought to life.

Another really great thing is that the author doesn’t skimp on historical detail.  Even if it is a book mostly targeted for children aged 9-13, this is a very detailed look at medieval life and it really shows how difficult life was then.  I was also interested to see how matter of fact the hardships were.  It’s difficult to imagine anyone today being so philosophical about hard work, hunger or cold.  You can always come up with theories for this book.

As mentioned in the paragraph before, I recommend this book to children aged 9-13 years, especially those interested in that time period or in magical creatures.  This does not have the charm of the ‘Harry Potter’ series, but it’s a wonderful book nonetheless.

Overall, The Crowfield Curse is a fantastic, spellbinding novel.  The greatest piece of literature I’ve ever read and I can’t wait to read the sequel, The Crowfield Demon.

Review by Ayoyinka P6A

Thanks for reading my work.

Book Week Scotland

Hello again!

Today we have been reading our favourite Bookbug books to pupils in Mrs Rusbridge's class P2/3.

We had a great time and they were very good listeners. After reading, we all drew a picture from our favourite book and then we cast our vote for the Scottish Children's Book Awards. We're not going to tell you which book got most votes as there is still one class to vote!

In our last blog we mentioned we had been writing book reviews with Miss Scott's class P2B. We have been busy typing up their reviews so here are a few samples of the fantastic work they produced.

Scarlett wrote about Robot Rumpus by Sean Taylor and Ross Collins:-

"I liked Robot Rumpus because it was funny, colourful and the dog was scared of the robots.  My favourite robot was Cook-Bot.  My funniest robot was Clean-Bot because he washed the dishes and he got a bit crazy with the squirting!

I think this book deserves to be a 10 out of 10.  My most exciting part of the book was when the robots were going all over the place!  The funniest part was when Mum and Dad come home and found the place a mess!

If I was the author I would change the bit at the start to the girl saying “I’m scared Mummy and Daddy.”  I thought Dress-Bot wasn’t that funny because he wasn’t really in the book that much.  If I recommended this book to other people I would say its ages are 6-7 years old. The words I would use to describe this book are funny and exciting."

By Scarlett Lenad P2B

We hope you enjoyed reading Scarlett’s review.  Look out for more reviews in our next blog.

Love from your friendly P6 readers

 

 

 

 

Readathon

Calling all readers!  Readathon has been launched! 

Calling all sponsors!  Support your child, grandchild, niece, nephew by sponsoring them to read throughout the month of December and raise money to modernise our school library.

Our favourite local author and poet, Diana Hendry, spoke to us at assembly on Monday this week and talked about the importance of her local library as she was growing up with a great hunger for books.  She showed us a special book she has had for a very long time and also shared a secret with us – sorry we can’t tell!

Our library is important to us – we have a fantastic and wide-ranging choice of new novels.  The only problem is that the library is not a particularly inspiring place to read.  We want to paint it brightly and fill it with lovely colourful shelving and comfy seats.  So why not help us raise some funds to change this environment and encourage even more readers.

Ps.  We really would love some new books for Christmas!

Shared reading with the P2

In  October, P6A pupils read three books  to the P2 pupils.  After we read to the children, we took a vote. The most popular book was Princess Penelope and the Runaway Kitten.  It was the book most enjoyed  out of the three.

The two other books were Lost for Words and Robot Rumpus. We had to calculate the scores. The P6A pupils still have to read to two other classes:-  P2/3 and P2A. We are looking forward to reading with the other two classes.

Tomorrow, we will be working with pupils from Miss Scott's class to write reviews of these books.

Look out for our next blog, when we will share some of the reviews with you.

By Fraser Dempster and Ciaran Barr P6A/Book Club.

New Books

We bought some new books for the library and I have not read all of them yet, but I have read Winter Bringers and it is amazing.  I would recomend it to anybody.

So why not try it. Visit the library and see what an amazing selection we have got.  

From Ruairidh

Ruairidh's Recommendations

I started reading Flora and Ulysses a couple of weeks ago and have written a book review on it …

                                                               Flora and Ulysses

                                                              by Kate Dicamillo

This book is amazing.   If I could give it a subtitle, it would be “The Amazing Adventures of Ulysses the Superhero Squirrel and his Human Sidekick Flora.”

This brilliant novel makes you feel like are Ulysses the squirrel and getting sucked up the vacuum cleaner with him.  Flora starts off as a cynic but by the end she has changed and that is all thanks to Ulysses.  I think that the inclusion of comic strips makes the book much better, I have never seen an author do this before.  Another good thing about this book is that we learn not to be somebody you don’t truly want to be.

Flora and Ulysses is a gripping novel which you can’t put down until it is finished.

I would recommend this book to 9-11 year olds so it can be enjoyed at its fullest.  But if you are not these ages you are more than welcome to read this book.

I am currently reading the Indian in the Cupboard series.  I would recommend this series to 9-11 year olds.

Tom's Recommendations

Hello!  My name is Tom and I am in P6A.  On Tuesdays at lunchtime, we have Book Club where we can relax and read some great books.  I would like to share with you today some of my favourites.

I started reading ‘The Lost Gods’ by Francesca Simon which is shortlisted for the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize.  I wrote a review of this book and it has been entered for a competition – I hope I win!

Here is my review:-

The Lost Gods by Francesca Simon

This hilarious, awesome and addictive novel is the best book in the universe. The Lost Gods will hold you in a magnificent world from the first page to the last!

The main character Freya takes you on an epic adventure about Woden, Frejya and Thor. It all starts when Woden, Frejya and Thor have had their youth restored but they have lost all their magical powers. The gods need worshipers/fans quick, before the frost giants come!

I would recommend this outstanding novel to 9-13 year olds. If you are not any of these ages you are more than welcome to read this novel. But for the book to be fully enjoyed these I think are the ages.

This book is always exciting there are no boring bits.  My favourite character is Thor because he is funny and awesome.  I highly recommend that you should read this extraordinary book because Francesca has moved up a step from her Horrid Henry series.

The Lost Gods is a perfect book for reading for fun.  Francesca is an outstanding author and she really made me understand what was happening.

I hope you enjoyed reading my review and that more of you will go and read the book.

Right now I am reading ‘Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief’ by Rick Riordan. I am really enjoying this book and I would recommend this book to 10-12 year olds!