FOUR GECKOS

FOUR GECKOS

Monkey on the Run

Leo Timmers

Gecko Press

30 pages

Paperback, NZ$20

ISBN 978 1 776572 51 9

Otto Goes North

Ulrika Kestere (text and ill.)

Gecko Press
30 pages
pb, NZ$20
978 1 776572 42 7

Zanzibar

Catharina Valckx (text and ill)

66 pages

pb, NZ$20

978 1 776572 56 4

The Runaways

Ulf Stark

Ill. Kitty Crowther

132 pages

Pb, NZ$20

978 1 776572 34 2

These four Gecko titles arrived for review in July 2019. I always enjoy the arrival of books from Julia Marshall’s Gecko Press, because each one is a surprise. These four really surprised because they interacted with each other and got me thinking about some big issues. But they also amused me and gave me hope for the young people who read them. Bear with me and you’ll see why I think children’s books are so important.

Monkey on the Run is a joyous story told entirely in pictures. This makes it a skilfully-laid trap for all those who think they don’t like reading. The plot begins when a father monkey with a motorbike collects his son from school and rides off with him in his banana-shaped sidecar. They drive off down a busy street. That’s the start. The story ends when the pair arrive home, with the young monkey clutching a gift for his mother.  What is it? Where did he get it from? Back to the beginning we go and follow the young monkey’s adventures as he leaps from one vehicle to another.  

Leo Timmers delights in creating crazy cars which are entirely logical if you consider the unusual animals who are driving them. Of course the rabbits would have a fast food van, selling carrot burgers on the move. Naturally a bee taxi has a large hive. Why shouldn’t a rhino’s fire engine employ snakes to slurp drinks and then squirt mouthfuls on fires? Add a young monkey to the mix and the rip down the road becomes even more intriguing. What became of Dad’s ice-cream? Who is stealing dolls? And so it goes on, with all the delightful details inviting the readers to make up their own stories.

Readers of Leo Timmers’ car books probably don’t worry about traffic problems. I sometimes wonder when current concerns enter children’s books. The answer, of course,  is that they

have always been there. Three more of the latest Gecko Press books prove my point.

Take Otto Goes North as an example. The setting is ‘far up in the north’ of Sweden, where Lisa the lynx and Nils the little bear are getting their home ready for a visit by their friend Otto the lemur. ‘He’d been cycling for several months to get there. Maybe even years. A very long time in any case.’ They welcome Otto, who is entranced by the Northern Lights and sets out to paint them. Unfortunately the air is cold that Otto’s nose turns red and he can’t move his hands to paint.  ‘It’s hot where I come from,’ said Otto, ‘My fur isn’t like yours.’  Lisa and Nils put Otto into their sauna to recover, and puzzle out a solution to Otto’s problem. It would be a spoiler to say what they do but it is clever and involves sacrifice, the help of others and quite a bit of skill. Then comes the marvellous moment when they reveal their surprise to Otto. He is able to paint the aurora, and has not one but two marvellous souvenirs of his visit.

It’s a warm story with some amusing conversations, whimsical humour and charming colour illustrations by the author.  It’s only on reflection that we feel the full significance in today’s world of three animals, all with different fur, cheerfully playing board games by the fireplace.

Zanzibar is a droll illustrated story about a French crow, whose imagination is triggered by a visit from a reporter (a lizard named Achille Leblab) who wants stories about ‘exceptional characters.’ Zanzibar suggests his singing might be exceptional. ‘CAW! CAW! CAW!’ Achille, however, is scornful about Zanzibar’s singing. Zanzibar would have liked to have been in the newspaper but now he realises, ‘I’m just ordinary. As ordinary as a crow can be.’ Then he has the bright idea of doing something so amazing that Achille will have to put him in the paper. To avoid spoilers, I won’t say what he does but it is very funny and he has to go to North Africa and make new friends in order to do it. (No spoilers here.) Unfortunately, Achille refuses to believe Zanzibar’s story but his friends do and they reassure him that he has always been remarkable. Through a twist of fate (and the help of another friend) Zanzibar finds that is far more important to keep in touch with friends and to make omelettes than to seek fame.

In an age of viral videos, there is a wonderful and warm message here for young readers. The author’s pictures are fun too. (Why omelettes? Because Zanzibar is a French crow, of course.)

Readers in the (roughly) 10 to 12 range will enjoy The Runaways by Ulf Stark, which can be seen simply as a funny account of a young boy helping his grandfather to escape from his hospital for a weekend. It is indeed funny and enjoyable (as all Stark’s books are) but it also has a bittersweet theme (as all Stark’s books do).  

Gottfried likes his Grandpa but admits that he really is not a nice person. A former ship’s engineer, he swears at his nurses and complains. He is, as Dad puts it, ‘sick and angry and stubborn and crazy.’ Gottfried persists in visiting the old man (bringing him beer and herring sandwiches because Grandpa hates hospital food). He learns that his grandfather has unfinished business at his home. Perhaps because he takes after his Grandpa, Gottfried suggests running away. Surprisingly, Grandpa agrees.

Craftily covering his tracks, so that his dentist father suspects nothing, Gottfried succeeds in getting the old man driven and ferried to his former home, a white cliff-top house, which he had built for his late wife. (An older friend, Adam, helps with the complexities of car driving, and plausible phone messages.) During the weekend they spend in the house, there are memories of Grandma everywhere, but Grandpa finds particular comfort in a jar of her lingonberry jam.

After ceremonially burning his suit (which reminds him of funerals) Grandpa allows Gottfried to take him back to the hospital. Grandpa promises that he will try to stop swearing so that he can surprise Grandma in heaven.  Gottfried is a perceptive narrator who can see past Grandpa’s bluster and understands why he puts a drop of jam into his water glass each day. ‘Grandpa got nicer and weaker with every week that passed.’   Gottfried is able to do one last favour for Grandpa before he dies.

‘Grandpa was pleased when we arrived. He put in his false teeth and smiled.’

The Runaways is a richly rewarding and unsentimental story, about three generations and their relationships and love for each other. The various conversations about life, duty, words, death, heaven and lingonberry jam are very amusing.

Best of all, Kitty Crowther’s colour illustrations are totally unsentimental and show Grandpa as an ugly, angry old man. Only a grandson could love him.   

We are reading Ulf Stark in English because fourteen years ago, in 2005, Julia Marshall had the bright idea of publishing English translations of the best overseas books for young people. The book which gave her this idea was Can You Whistle, Johanna? which had been published in twenty languages but never in English. Julia Marshall translated it and that was the beginning of Gecko Press. Needless to say, that wonderful book was written by Ulf Stark.

Gecko Press is flourishing, and Can You Whistle, Johanna is still in print. Unfortunately Ulf Stark died two years ago from cancer but the great thing about authors is that their words live on. Especially if Gecko Press has anything to do with it.

Trevor Agnew

24 July 2019

New Zealand Spring Picture Books 2013

New Zealand Spring Picture Books 2013:

by Trevor Agnew

 

Magical Margaret Mahy  Betty Gilderdale, Puffin, 120pp, pb, NZ$19.99

Henry’s Map  David Elliot, Random House, 32 pp, pb, NZ$19.99 

Queen Alice’s Palaces  Juliette MacIver, ill. Lucia Masciullo, ABC/HarperCollins, 32 pp, hb, NZ$29.99 

Toucan Can!  Juliette MacIver, ill. Sarah Davis, Gecko Press, 32 pp, hb, $34.99; pb, NZ$19.99 

BANG  Leo Timmers, Gecko, 48 pages,  pb, $19.99; hb, NZ$34.99

One Little Fantail Anne Hunter, ill. Dave Gunson, Scholastic, 32pp, pb. NZ$19.50 

The Importance of Green  Leonie Agnew, ill Trevor Pye Puffin, pb, NZ$19.99 

 

 New Zealand Spring Picture Books 2013

 As many of the late Margaret Mahy’s picture books are currently being re-issued, it is valuable to have a freshly revised edition of Betty Gilderdale’s Magical Margaret Mahy.  First published in 1987, it has always been an excellent guide for young readers, answering the questions that Mahy was always asked. (Do writers ever get rich? Are you afraid of running out of ideas?).  Gilderdale has woven Mahy’s answers (and her own deep knowledge of Mahy’s books) into a lively readable account which explains everything from the origin of the lion in the meadow to why the teachers in her stories are often “of the old-fashioned bullying kind.”  Alan Gilderdale’s illustrations of Mahy’s home and toys add to the warmth of the anecdotes. This reader-friendly paperback brings the genius of the author fresh off the page for a new generation of Mahy readers.

 

David Elliott is well-known as an illustrator of Margaret Mahy’s work, and the frisky farm animals who first appeared in their award-winning The Moon and Farmer McPhee (2010) now return in Henry’s Map. Henry is a fastidiously tidy piglet, who is upset at the untidiness of the farm he lives on. ‘How could anybody ever find anything out there?’ His solution is to draw a map “so that everyone knows what will belong where.’ First Henry draws his own sty, and then he draws a picture of himself next to it. (Young readers like the fact that Henry’s drawing and labelling techniques are – ahem – childish. His spelling is pigletish.)  The other animals are delighted by Henry’s efforts and ask to be included in his map.  ‘Now,’ he said proudly, ‘we’ll know where everything is.’

Henry leads all the animals up the hill. They look at Henry’s map and then down at the farm.

‘But we’re not there,’ bleated the sheep. The matter is sorted out with a charming and satisfying ending.  Elliot’s colour illustrations are masterful, and full of little details like Henry picking flowers to put in his sty.  Young readers delight in the moment when they find that they are smarter than the farm animals.  At the same time, they learn all the basic principles of map-making. They also find satisfaction in Henry’s dictum, ‘A place for everything and everything in its place.’

 

By happy coincidence two of Christchurch author Juliette MacIver’s picture books have appeared simultaneously. Both are excellent.  Toucan Can! demonstrates MacIver’s flair for word-play and rhythm.  Toucan can do anything. ‘With the fry pan and a stew pan, he can juggle one-hand, two hand while he cancans on a fruit can.’ Readers are invited to join in Toucan’s frolics ‘Surely, you can?’ In Sarah Davis’s strikingly colourful illustrations, dozens of cute little birds dance along, and are joined, as the rhymes accumulate, by a kangaroo, a panda and an unidentified furry creature named Ewan who has some formidable aunts. The aunts can’t dance but everyone else can, so the result is a splendid jamboree.  This is a wonderful book for reading aloud – for anyone who can cope with splendid tongue-twisters..

 

 Queen Alice’s Palaces is a witty story, told in verse, about sneaky Sir Hugh’s plan to persuade Queen Alice to build a new palace, which he can then steal.

‘Why not build one no one’s thought of before?

Something, striking, original, new!’

Queen Alice builds no less than six strikingly original palaces – all brilliantly and imaginatively realised by artist Lucia Masciullo – but there is a hitch with every one. Delightfully each hitch involves a disaster for the ‘cunning, conniving and callous’ Sir Hugh. For example, when he tests the upper floor of the knitted woollen palace, both the palace and Sir Hugh come undone. The bamboo palace comes unstrung, the cheese palace goes rancid and a fire in the cockatoo feather palace leaves Sir Hugh ‘with a mouthful of plumes and a burn on the bottom.’ Juliette MacIver is already being called a rising star in the world of picture books, and these two bouncy and funny picture books confirm the claim.

 

Another Christchurch writer is Anne Hunter, who has produced an imaginative bird identification book, One Little Fantail, based on the rhyme ‘Two little birdies.’  Thus her rhyming text introduces familiar birds:

‘With their brown feather cloaks and keen golden eyes,

They skim over tussock and soar through the skies.’ 

And which bird is being described? Dave Gunson’s masterful double-page colour illustrations should leave no doubt, but in a clever move, the Maori and Pakeha names of the birds have been carefully camouflaged in their portrait. (Kahu and harrier hawk, as young readers will have deduced.)  The twelve subjects range from pukeko to kea, and a three page fact section includes further information on all the birds.

 

Sometimes it’s the picture books with the fewest words that provide the best incentive for close reading. Leo Timmers’ BANG contains only one word but young readers will be scrutinising every page for the hilarious details of cause and effect. Eight extremely eccentric vehicles, each driven by a different animal, become interlocked in a series of rear-end collisions. Since their loads include ice-cream, paint, fish, tyres, books, dresses, baby rabbits, fruit and vegetables, each collision – with its joyously repeated signal of ‘Bang’ – leads to a new round of mayhem and coincidence.  The results are colourful, imaginative and funny, concluding with a spectacular double-page pull-out that provides a happy ending for everyone except the fish.

 

Finally The Importance of Green by Leonie Agnew, is a charming and imaginative introduction to the concept of colour, in the story of Liam ‘who could not and would not paint without green.’ When Liam runs out of green paint, life becomes difficult inside his paintings. Cars are trapped by red lights and cows have no grass. As mayhem erupts in his pictures, Liam keeps experimenting with colours but nobody wants to drink blue milk and the grasshoppers don’t like being orange. Then he adds blue paint to yellow and makes an amazing discovery that brings happiness to the cows, motorists, grasshoppers and, of course, Liam.  Trevor Pye’s imaginatively-coloured illustrations are an important element of this picture book’s appeal. A colour wheel offers young readers a guide to future art experiments.

 

Trevor Agnew

 

 

 

 

Full Publishing details:

Magical Margaret Mahy  Betty Gilderdale, Puffin, 120pp, pb, $19.99 ISBN 978-0-143-56881-0

Henry’s Map  David Elliot, Random House, 32 pp, pb, $19.99  ISBN 978-1-77553-330-6

 

  Queen Alice’s Palaces  Juliette MacIver, ill. Lucia Masciullo, ABC/HarperCollins, 32 pp, hb, $29.99  ISBN   978-0-7333-3102-2

 

Toucan Can!  Juliette MacIver, ill. Sarah Davis, Gecko Press, 32 pp,
hb, $34.99  ISBN 978-1-877467-53-0

Pb, $19.99  ISBN 978-1-877467-54-7

  

One Little Fantail Anne Hunter, ill. Dave Gunson, Scholastic, 32pp, Pb. NZ$19.50  ISBN 978-1-77543-138-1

 

BANG  Leo Timmers, Gecko, 48 pages,

paperback, $19.99 ISBN 978-1-877579-17-2

hardback, $34.99 ISBN 978-1-877579-18-9

 

The Importance of Green  Leonie Agnew, ill Trevor Pye Puffin, pb, $19.99  ISBN 978-0-143-50571-6

 

 

Who's Driving?, Leo Timmers, All the Dear Little Animals, Ulf Nilsson, My Friend Percy and the Sheik, Ulf Stark, Selma, Jutta Bauer, 2006

Four cool European Geckoes

Who’s Driving? Leo Timmers, Gecko Press, 32 pages, paperback, NZ$17.99. ISBN 0-9582720-2-6
All the dear little animals Ulf Nilsson, ill. Eva Eriksson, Gecko Press, 32 pages, paperback, NZ$16.99. ISBN 0-9582720-8-7 Hardback, NZ$24.99. ISBN 0-9582720-9-5
My Friend Percy & the Sheik Ulf Stark, Gecko Press, 103 pages, paperback, NZ$15.99. ISBN 0-9582720-
Selma Jutta Bauer, Gecko Press, 52 pages, paperback, NZ$14.99. ISBN 0-9582720-8-5
All Gecko Press, Wellington, New Zealand, 2006.

Four cool European Geckoes

Giraffes driving convertibles? Children holding bird funerals? A sheik coming to dinner? A ewe with a philosophy of life? With a motto of “curiously good books from around the world” New Zealand’s Gecko Press introduces Kiwis to the best of modern European literature for the young. Gecko’s output continues to be splendid as their latest quartet proves.

If a green tractor is being approached by street-entertainer Gorilla, railway guard Gecko, green-gumbooted farmer Pig and doctor Mule, the obvious question is Who’s Driving? Young readers will have great fun matching the key-carrying, well-dressed animals to their amazing modes of transport. Leo Trimmer’s colourful double-page spreads of fire-engines and monoplanes are both attractive and funny. The question of which beastly driver will arrive first will not baffle young readers who have spotted Hare in the racing car. This Belgian title was translated by Christchurch’s Bill Nagelkerke.

Ages: 4-up.

In All the dear little animals three bored children find a dead bumblebee, so Esther, the bossy one, makes them bury it in a cigar box. Before long they have a new game – holding funerals for dead wildlife. “Esther’s job was to dig. I would write the poems. And Puttie would cry.” Before the day is over they have erected tiny crosses over a departed mouse, hamster, rooster and three dead fish that Esther found in the fridge. Each of the children learns something about death as they scour the roadside for flattened hedgehogs. When Esther reassures young Puttie that he won’t die until he is an old man, he responds, “But Mummy and Daddy will be so sad.” Sweden’s Ulf Nilsson has created a very funny account of children at play which also introduces serious issues of grief and mourning. Eva Eriksson’s colour illustrations are beautiful and the book is neither morbid nor mawkish. The children know they are playing a game. “The next day we found something else to do. Something completely different.”

7-up.

My Friend Percy & the Sheik is the second volume in Ulf Stark’s very funny trilogy about young Ulf and his unsuitable friend Percy. Plagued by a bully Ulf tries hypnotism with unexpected results. Did he really hypnotise Percy into doing well at maths and Marianne into kissing him? The sleepy Swedish town of Stureby is startled when Prince Talal of Saudi Arabia visits Ulf’s father, his fellow radio enthusiast. The Sheikh copes well with the pork in his potato dumplings and even enjoys beating Ulf at table hockey.
Then Ulf thinks of a way the Sheik might cheer Percy up and achieves a success beyond his dreams. The dry humour of these tales is always appealing, especially when Marianne asks Ulf what he wants most in the world. Ulf replies, “A dog.” Marianne lets go of his arm.

10-up.

“What is happiness?” A German sheep called Selma has the answer. At sunrise she eats a little grass plays with her children until lunchtime, exercises in the afternoon, eats some more grass, has a little chat with Mrs Miller (a vulture!) in the evening and then falls asleep. Asked what she would do with more time, Selma’s reply begins, “Well, I would eat a little grass at sunrise, play with my children until lunchtime…” Jutta Bauer’s charming cartoons show Selma’s satisfaction with her simple lifestyle. What if she won a million dollars? Selma’s reply begins, “Well, I would eat a little grass at sunrise, play with my children until lunchtime…”
Selma is a delightful little parable of motherhood which will have two groups of readers: young children and their mothers. Selma is destined to be to a popular little stocking-stuffer for mothers of all ages. 9-99.

Note: Gecko Press, Wellington, New Zealand, specialises in publishing English-language editions of award-winning European children's books.

Trevor Agnew

First published in The Press, Christchurch, New Zealand in Dec 2006