Sand-Play Time on the Sun-Baked Beach Juliette MacIver   

 

Sand-Play Time on 
the Sun-Baked Beach          

Juliette MacIver   (2026)
Scholastic, 24 pages, Paperback 
ISBN   978 1 77543 933 2 

 

‘What a solid seawall, strong, tall and wide.

With 15 shells, it’ll stand against the tide!’

The very rhythm of the title Sand-Play Time on the Sun-Baked Beach reveals that the author is Juliette MacIver. She has a great ear for rhymes and rhythm, making her books a joy to read aloud. Who can read ‘Sunshine! Sunblock, a sunhat each, skipping down the track to the sun-baked beach’ without hearing echoes of John Masefield’s Cargoes?

The two girls doing the skipping have come to the beach, with their father, in order to build what is now known as a seawall (because it is easier to rhyme than sandcastle). What follows is not so much a counting book as an un-counting book.

The mighty wall with its decoration of 15 shells is soon facing a frontal assault by the incoming tide. As each wave removes more shells, the young Canutes keep count and learn subtraction:

‘Auē! 4 shells! Sly sea tricks.

We had 10 shells but now there are … 6.’

The waves continually return, so we have a final countdown.

‘Woosh go 2 shells, and now there’s only … 1.’

Soon, as all beachgoing junior engineers know, the sea prevails in this game. The girls are elated rather than disappointed as their seawall vanishes. ‘The sea won the game but now we can SWIM!’

The co-operation needed in building and decorating a sandwall is beautifully captured in Lily Uivel’s illustrations. As the sisters work together, building and rebuilding, they have two companions, a crab and an oystercatcher, who appear in almost every picture. The golden sand of the beach and the turquoise sea are skilfully intertwined to create a charming memory of days spent on summer beaches. And we’ve learned to count to 15.

 

 

Trevor Agnew 

2 Jan 2026 [Review 3820]