Trouble in Toadpool by Anne Fine (Children's, 9 years +, 9/10)

July 2013, Corgi, 224 pages, Paperback, Review copy

Themes: families, jokes, fairs, getting roped in to helping out, gruesome pumpkin, bunny slippers, trapeze artist, predictable fortune teller, wobbly tents, Chinese whispers, roast beef sandwich, crochet, saying sorry and meaning it,

Content: lots of laughs

Summary from Random House Children's Publishers

Bliss! A lovely, quiet, nothing-to-do and nothing-on-the-calendar Sunday . . .

Well, that's until bossy Aunt Susan - an unstoppable force - is on the phone insisting that Harry and his family come down to help her a local event she's promised to organise: the Great Toadpool Show.

It means swinging from a trapeze. Or walking on stilts. Or riding a unicycle . . . And that's not counting the fortune-telling tent, the tombola, or the choir singalong.

Aunt Susan has no idea of the mayhem she's about to unleash.

Nayuleska's thoughts 

The characters within Harry's family are ones every reader can probably relate too, although hopefully they don't have as many as Harry does! His Aunt Susan is a woman to be reckoned with, as is his Great Granny who likes poking things with her cane. I adored Harry's bunny slippers, and was fairly impressed at his fashion choice when he and Tatiana were sorting out his costume. I thought it was a shame that Harry encountered issues with his planned act, but he did manage to have fun all the same. There's nothing in particular that makes this a 9/10 read, it's just not quite my favourite kind of book.

Find out more on Anne's website.

Suggested read

Check out Anne Fine's other books which include Eating Things On Sticks (Children's, 9 years +, 10/10)