Blog Tour: Violet and the Smugglers by Harriet Whitehorn & Becka Moor (Review + Guest Blog Post, Children's, 9 years +, 10E/10E, short 'n' sweet review)

10th March 2016, Simon & Schuster Children's, 208 pages, Hardback, Review copy

Content: some peril, lots of humour

Summary from Simon and Schuster

Meet Violet Remy-Robinson, an amateur Sherlock Holmes in the making...
Uncle Johnny has invited Violet and her friends to spend the summer with him on a sailing adventure around Europe and Violet couldn't be more excited! But when she suspects that the captain of a boat nearby might be up to no good, Violet needs to put her detective skills into action… could he be the head of a smuggling ring?

Meet Violet Remy-Robinson, an amateur Sherlock Holmes in the making...
Uncle Johnny has invited Violet and her friends to spend the summer with him on a sailing adventure around Europe and Violet couldn't be more excited! But when she suspects that the captain of a boat nearby might be up to no good, Violet needs to put her detective skills into action… could he be the head of a smuggling ring?

- See more at: http://books.simonandschuster.co.uk/Violet-and-the-Smugglers/Harriet-Whitehorn/9781471119002#sthash.Wz1cuHhw.dpuf

Nayu's thoughts

Before I get onto Violet's latest awesome adventure, I need to chat about what happened when the book arrive. I didn't just get a book.

I got a pack of Hotel Chocolat's Rose and Violet creams! They are delicious, and made sense since Rose is Violet's best friend, despite Violet's impulsive and sometimes reckless actions, which did rub off on Rose in a good way. I have to note that I'm glad I started eating the chocolates before I read the book - that's all I can say without giving a spoiler! I can assure you I was fine after eating them. I also got...

...a sailor hat! The somewhat giant bunny is mine, I thought she makes an excellent model for the sailor hat which fits on my head, but I'm camera shy.

 
Now, I was a smidge disappointed that Violet wasn't the one who had a hat. I mentioned it to the publicist who thought it was because it matches my Nayu's Crochet Dreams (& my general) avatar.

Almost identical hat, with different colour scheme.

That wasn't why I was so excited to have the cap. The reason is that there's an anime series (come on, you know I mention anime wherever I can!) called Aria the Animation/Origination/Natural (all 3 seasons have different titles) which is about a group of girls who are learning to be gondoliers on an idyllic planet which is like Venice, with only women being gondoliers. Here's the cap for Aria company, the smallest gondoler company with 1 senior and 1 trainee. The other companies have different style hats, but all with a white uniform. This is Akari, the trainee for 3 seasons, then the senior for an OVA. I could easily say more about this peaceful and cute slice of life anime, but this is a book review, not an anime review.

That's why I fell in love with the sailor hat. It's like a bit of Aria is with me.

Anyway, I'll always remember Violet's adventure because of the hat, and the chocolates. There's the fact that it's a super girly book with the illustrations in various shades of black, grey, and purple!! How cool! Definitely my favourite volume to date (can't remember off the top of my head what the other colours were, and my shelves aren't organised logically so it would take too long to hunt down the previous books, which could be with a friend). Illustration is a big deal in Violet's adventure, as it adds that extra element. The importance of getting Violet looking just right is examined in the guest blog post, but I want to show you a picture from the book which made me think of anime again.

 Now, I'm not saying what's going on, but Violet and Rose hate their outfits. The way the outfits are described they are supposed to be horrid. However, I find them super cute and think they have a sweet lolita style to them (frilly, lots of ribbons) possibly like Lala from the anime PriPara

Frills galore! I adore this style of anime outfits. Maybe Violet's grandmother would like this?

or one of the Angely Sugar brand's dresses, like the one Ichigo wears in Aikatasu (best anime EVER!) 

Kind of small but you can see all the ribbons and frills.

I promise you'll love Violet's boat adventure (boats were involved, but they did reach dry land too) not only if you like anime and have a similar mind to mine, but because it's just such a funny story. The characters are wonderfully dramatic, especially Violet's grandmother, and there's the hopeless PC Green who goes overboard (not literally, figuratively) in every single book, especially this one. His actions and attitude both helps and hinders Violet in discovery what's being smuggled, and who's doing it. Poor Rose gets a bit more involved in the adventure than she'd like, but she manages to engage her inner Violet, otherwise who knows what would have happened to her. Violet's parents and pets are as memorable as ever, she even does a bit of homework at the start of the book - only a bit mind. There's far more interesting details to write about than that! I want to reread it straight away because I was sad to get to the end as I enjoy being in their company. Go check out this book!

Check out more about Violet from Becka with some what could be exclusive illustrations!!! Unfortunately the text wouldn't centre itself for some reason known only to Blogger, so apologies for the layout.

The Evolution of Violet Remy-Robinson, in pictures! by Becka Moor

Violet went through a number of transformations when we were first figuring out her character. She originally had poker-straight long hair, boxy dungarees that didn't quite fit, and a striped t-shirt underneath. She also wore a bow in her hair which didn't really tie in with her personality (unless Grandmere had anything to do with it.)

After it was decided that Violet would have short hair, I tried making her a little more prim and proper. Her proportions weren't really working though, she needed to be a bit taller and slimmer otherwise she looked too young.

We then moved on to this design, which was starting to match up better with Harriet's descriptions and her text. Shorts, a t-shirt and a pair of trainers were ideal for climbing trees and making a quick getaway!

Here she is in her most recent adventure with one of her best friends, Rose, wearing an outfit that Grandmere picked out for them, and not being best pleased about it. As you can see, Violet has definitely evolved over the past three years!

In terms of how I create the images for the Violet books, I mainly work digitally, but tend to put my ideas down in a sketchbook first that I can then refer back to. I love the ability to put sketches on different layers and shift them around, changing the composition without having to rub it all out and start over, but I do try to maintain a sense of traditional art within my work.

Nayu: You can see more illustrations on Becca's website.

I hope you've enjoyed this review and guest blog post as much as I've enjoyed putting it together with Becka's post and my thoughts on the 3rd Violet adventure!