The Zebra's Great Escape

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Then an adventurous trip happens and I was just all in for it. I loved seeing the countryside fly by as our zebra (or as the dog calls him barcode-horse) rushed to get to his family. Things got very exciting (and maybe a bit scary) when we saw the place that the zebra family was brought to and who the owner was. I have no clue about his English name as I read this book in Dutch, but in Dutch he is called Mr. Spuug (Mr. Spit), which is just a perfect name for this awful horrible bad (and yes I could figure out a few more words for him) man. I loved how Mink stood her ground and loved what followed next. Which I won’t spoil, because haha, no. You will just have to find out. But it was magnificent. Doordat de babyzebra gekleurde plaatjes stuurt die Mink achter haar ogen ziet, voor Mink een nieuwe manier van communiceren, komt ze te weten hoe Storm heet en bij haar is terechtgekomen. KATHERINE: A girl, Mink, is playing on the swing near her home when she hears a noise, goes flying and bumps her head. The noise was a baby zebra called Gabriel and the bump has shaken something loose: now she can understand animals, through pictures and colours behind her eyes. A delightful magical book about a girl who meets a zebra (or a zebra meets her) and she gets into a grand adventure. SARA: I'd look after and research collections in a museum. Somewhere endlessly intriguing like the Pitt Rivers Museum. Or perhaps be a florist as your workplace work would always smell lovely.

Het verhaal toont hoe dapper Mink is, hoe samenwerken tot een goed resultaat leidt, hoe belangrijk familie en vrienden zijn. Het is misschien even wennen aan de communicatie via kleuren, maar dit wordt wel duidelijk in beeld gebracht. Origineel bedacht! The Zebra’s Great Escape is a terrific story for a younger reader. It is quite long but written in three parts. Most children will love this child driven story, no adults needed here. As with all excellent literature, this is a story for all ages. Author KATHERINE: Zebras seem to me to be so startling and different in their beauty: I wanted to write a book that would salute their loveliness.Mink houdt niet van regels, ook niet als het bedtijd is. Ze schommelt liever buiten. En daar ontmoet ze op een avond Storm, een babyzebra. Ze ontdekken dat ze met elkaar kunnen praten door een soort van kleurenmagie in hun hoofd. Storm is verdrietig en in paniek, want zijn ouders zijn gevangengenomen door meneer Spuug, een échte slechterik die dieren verzamelt. Known for loving her father but delighting in not playing by society’s rules, Mink decides to stay up past normal bedtime and play in the city park whilst all the other children are abed. Mink soon finds herself face-to-face with an unusual visitor, a baby zebra, and discovers that she has a gift for being able to ‘feel’ animals' emotions and thoughts, beautifully realised by Ogilvie’s artwork in a riotous fanfare of exploding colours. It isn't long before Gabriel the zebra shares his plight with Mink: his parents have been stolen by a man with an ‘unlovely smile’ who intends to kill them and then stuff them in glass boxes for display along with a host of other animals. I think deciding on the A-Z of animals was some of the most fun I've ever had. X was the hardest: in the end I chose two xoloitzcuintli, a hairless dog from Mexico: 'xolo', for short.

The story begins with Mink. She doesn’t believe in rules and loves to run wild and free. She is out one night having a swing when she hears a noise. It is a young zebra who is very distressed. In his distress he is able to communicate with the girl. Dapo Adeola, Tracy Darnton, Joseph Coelho and Chitra Soundar are among the 19 authors and illustrators longlisted for the Inclusive Books for Child... The winners of the Diverse Book Awards 2023 have been announced, with one winner from each of the four categories announced: Picture book, Children... Mink, Storm, de hond Regenboog en eekhoorn Rodentia trommelen al hun vrienden op om de dieren uit hun kooien te bevrijden.

Sara Ogilvie

Coffee house Caffè Nero has announced the 16-strong shortlist for the inaugural Nero Book Awards, recognising the outstanding books of the past 12... KATHERINE: The thing I loved about writing shorter books for younger writers is that you can hold the whole story in your head at once: where novels sprawl outside your imagination, a picture book can be held steady, so you can look at it from every angle, and bend it into shape.

A young chipmunk called Mino is also taking a big step in his life. The cute, Pikachu-like creature must leave his mother and make a new home for himself in Simona Ciraolo’s When Mino Took the Bus (Flying Eye). Ciraolo’s pastel-hued story finds Mino sharing the journey to the last bus stop with an array of fun animal characters and features fabulous woodland drawings. Mink doesn't believe in rules. She loves running wild and free. So, when a zebra appears in the square where she lives and she finds out that his parents have been captured by the evil Mr Spit, she knows that it's up to her to help. So begins a grand adventure to rescue a whole menagerie of animals - an adventure that will take all of Mink's courage and determination.SARA: Initially it was the appeal of drawing the young Zebra character, Gabriel. But I liked the way Kate Rundell had developed a bond in the story between the little girl protagonist Mink, and Zebra Gabriel, making a strong and surprising friendship. Overall the story plays with clever twists on The 101 Dalmatians. I had illustrated Dodie Smith's book a few years earlier for The Folio Society and the idea of now focusing on stripes rather than spots had exciting possibilities. SARA: A mixture of ways and media. The drawn line is very important as I'm a pencil scribbler at heart. I like to keep the energy in the initial sketches so I use a light box to translate my roughs to final drawings. The line work gets built upon with media such as ink, gouache, coloured, pencil, printmaking, collage, rubbings, stencils etc. Anything that gives the right kind of mark (I have used scanned banana peels and dried porridge before!) Drawings get scanned and digitally finished. The approach and media often depend on what the book is about and the atmosphere it needs. Wie meer van Rundell heeft gelezen ziet in dit geweldige verhaal thema’s terug: dieren, vrijheid, natuur en zelfredzaamheid. Mink en de dierenhulpen bedenken een vindingrijk plan tegen de verzamelwoede van meneer Spuug. Regenboog houdt van niemand, maar helpt Mink toch. Uiteindelijk zijn er nog veel meer dieren die Regenboog, Storm, Mink en Rodentia helpen. Samen staan ze sterk!

What do you think of Sara Ogilvie's illustrations and how the final book looks - any favourite spreads?De zebra is ontvoerd door de gemene meneer Spuug en de zebra-ouders zijn gevangengenomen. Gelukkig krijgen Mink en Storm hulp van hond Regenboog en eekhoorn Rodentia om te traceren waar ze zijn. Er ontstaat een plan voor een spannende ontsnappingspoging bij een groot oud huis in niemandsland. Maar is het uitvoerbaar? Feb 10 2023 The zebra's great escape by Katherine Rundell. Illus. by Sara Ogilvie Bloomsbury, 2022. ISBN: 9781408885758. (Age: 5-10) Highly recommended. Mink knows she has to help Gabriel the zebra. But how? He can’t live in her bedroom forever, cosy as it is. She chats to the neighbour’s dog, and soon a chain of animals is passing on the urgent message to look out for two zebras in a cage. Will they find Gabriel’s parents in time? I loved that animals could talk and the way they did it. With pictures and a lot of colours which Sara Ogilvie brilliantly showed. I would love to be able to talk to my hamsters, I tried, believe me, but sadly it seems only to work in books and movies. The YA author Juno Dawson is also taking strides into a younger market with her witty, chatty take on gender and acceptance, You Need to Chill (Farshore). Sporting sparkly sunglasses and a no-nonsense attitude, Bill’s sister finds herself having to fend off constant questions from her classmates about where Bill has got to. Is he hiding? Is he ill? The truth is that Bill now identifies as Lily and, as her sister tells us in this lovely rhyming tale with illustrations by Laura Hughes, everyone needs to calm down about it.