Allen & Unwin ISBN 9781760524944 £11.99
The author, Tohby Riddle, is widely known for his picture story books. This is a very clever story based around the curiosity of a cat and celebrates the wonders of the moon and the beauty of the earth. The model for this story is the author’s own cat. Riddle describes her as an inside cat who spends time at the window gazing at the world outside. The cat dreams about being with an Astronaut and looks out of the spacecraft’s window on the scenery of the Moon as the Astronaut works on the amazing dusty, rocky surface with the great heat of the day and the freezing cold at night. This worries the cat but she still looks amazing and, in the dream, she goes out of the spacecraft to experience the environment. The cat dreams of the big blue earth rising above the horizon of the moon and dreams that she is on the earth with colour, movement, plants, insects, birds and animals. This is an environment that does not have extreme daily heat and cold and has water. This is a superb book for young children which helps them understand the environmental differences between the moon and the earth. It is delightful and should be in early years’ classrooms and in homes.
Paul Baker