Jump on Board the Animal Train

By Naomi Kefford & Lynne Moore

Age: 3+

A clip-clopping, trip-trapping, click-clacking journey to meet the train – Jump on board and off we go!

One little boy is going on a fantastic journey to meet a train. On the way he is joined by bears, elephants, tigers and more – but just wait until the birthday boy gets to the train and the biggest surprise in store!

You can follow the animal clues on the split pages to guess which animal is coming up next and join in with all the sounds the animals make – the tiger’s tail swishes, the bear’s paws pad, the elephant’s feet plod.

And look out for the cheeky monkeys, the happy hippo and the singing penguins in the final surprise!

Published by Simon & Schuster

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For older children
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The Get Rich Quick Club Kerching!

By Rose Impey

Age: 7+

Ever planned to make your millions while you’re still at school? So does the Get Rich Quick Club – but their ideas for doing so are daft, dangerous and doomed to failure!

They’re also quite a laugh and this book is extra value for money as it has two fabulous stories.

The Sneaky Peeky Crew sees the gang providing a security service for neighbours. Look out for lots of dog poo, missing eggs and a nighttime adventure that goes horribly wrong.

In the Bogie of Doom, the gang starts to sell drinks in hot weather. Harmless you think, but throw pancake-tossing into the mixture and you can bet the gang will end up with egg on their faces…

Look out for greedy foxes, circus-performing dogs, lots of cupcakes and a massive pancake bonfire….! You may even, occasionally, find an excellent business tip hidden among their exploits.

Published by Orchard

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Our Books of the Week is in association with the ReadingZone

• The children’s books website www.ReadingZone.com aims to help families to support their children’s reading by suggesting the best books available.
• The website provides news about books and authors, competitions, author interviews and recommendations, and there are distinct areas for children themselves to explore new releases.

And to find out more about our favourite characters, Alex will be joined in The Junior Club by TV dog trainer, Robert Alleyne.

He’ll have some top tips for dog owners out there for you, have a chat about why dogs can be so good for you, and even whether you think it’s better to go for a pedigree like Lady or a mix like Tramp!

Listen to this interview on Monday in The Junior Club from 2pm

Lady and the Tramp is out on Blu-ray and DVD on 30th January – click here to get your copy!

To remind you how good that film is, here’s the iconic spaghetti scene:

My Granny is a Pirate

By Val McDermid, Arthur Robins

3+

‘My family has a secret

I’m not allowed to tell.

They’d chase me if I told you

And then chase you as well….’

And the secret is – granny is a pirate! She has sailed the seven seas, captured pirate ships, climbed the rigging and kept a pirate parrot. She even had a pirate dog called Jolly Roger! After every adventure, though, granny made sure she was home in time for tea. Now granny has promised that if her secret is kept, she’ll make us all pirates!

Look out for lots of pirate treasure, secret passages, scaredy cat pirates (granny made them walk the plank), skeleton robbers, and pirate grog!

Published by Orchard

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For older children
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Undead Ed and the Devil’s Finger

By David Grimstone

9+

Ed is undead and is keen to move on but he’s got a problem in the form of an evil clown who made a pact with the devil… and now four of Ed’s fingers belong to Satan!

Ed’s rogue hand is proving to be a real liability, especially when it drags him into a graveyard on the hunt for a lump of Edam cheese. Before he knows it, Ed is facing a pitched battle to the death to rid himself of the devil to reclaim his four digits. Yup, being undead sucks!

During Undead Ed’s crazy adventures, you’ll get to meet an incensed werewolf (‘like a big carpet with teeth’), see the devil in the flesh (‘massive’) and find out what it’s like to lose most of your body parts…. Not for the faint hearted! But if you like horror, laughs and the undead, it’s perfect!

Published by Hodder

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Our Books of the Week is in association with the ReadingZone

• The children’s books website www.ReadingZone.com aims to help families to support their children’s reading by suggesting the best books available.
• The website provides news about books and authors, competitions, author interviews and recommendations, and there are distinct areas for children themselves to explore new releases.

Ella  – By Alex T Smith

Ella is a ladybird with a strangely familiar problem – two very horrible and spoilt wasp sisters who don’t want her to go to the ball. Yes, this is a fabulous retelling of the Cinderella story, by bugs.

Little Ella slaves away for her sisters (who NEVER say ‘thank you’) and she is always very tired. But all that is about to change as Pierre, a famous artist spider in Paris, is throwing a Grand Bug Ball at the Candelabra. Naturally, Ella and Pierre get to bump into each other and fall in love – but how can this romance blossom if Pierre doesn’t know who Ella is?

Look out for a special fairy godmother called Mrs Buzzbottom, some stylish sunglasses, stunning spotty bugs and a trés chic spider.

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For older children
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The World of Norm: May Cause Irritation – By Jonathan Meres

If you think you’re having a bad week, check out what’s up with Norm.

Norm knew it was going to be one of those days when he wore up and found himself standing at a supermarket checkout, totally naked…. That was just a dream though. The real nightmare is about to arrive at his front door – his perfect cousins are coming to visit!

His week doesn’t get much better – annoying younger brothers, a mobile phone from the Dark Ages, a dog called John and more time spent with his perfect cousins add to his gloom.

But when Norm dreams up a plan to get a new mobile phone involving an attempted dog-napping, blackmail and a very bad disguise, things get a whole lot worse…

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Our Books of the Week is in association with the ReadingZone

• The children’s books website www.ReadingZone.com aims to help families to support their children’s reading by suggesting the best books available.
• The website provides news about books and authors, competitions, author interviews and recommendations, and there are distinct areas for children themselves to explore new releases.

Not on a School Night  – By Rebecca Patterson

The holidays may be over, but there is still plenty of time for fun for these two small boys – especially at night time.

These boys LOVE bedtime! On Monday nights, they play Super Boy and Little Flash, on Tuesday night they are Triceratops, Wednesday night is when they do the Big Jump from the top of their beds, and on Thursday, they dress up. And every night, Mum shouts, ‘Not on a school night!’

Friday nights, though, are special. It’s Not a School Night, and that means plenty more time for lots of fun…. and just wait till Saturday morning!

Look out for lots of jumping, loads of naughtiness, oodles of soft toys – and some sleeping!

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For older children

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Claude at the Circus – By Alex T Smith

Roll up! Roll up! Come and enjoy all the fun and thrills of the circus with a very small dog, and a sock, in Claude at the Circus!

Claude is a small dog with a big appetite for adventure. One day he and his friend Sir Bobblysock (who is a sock) decide to visit the park.

Now, when you and I decide to visit a park, we might want to play on the swings a bit and then have an icecream. When Claude and Sir Bobblysock visit the park, however, they end up having a lot more fun than that.

First, there’s jogging with some funny-looking people, then sleeping in a flowerbed, saving a runaway baby and finally being the star act in the local circus.

Claude discovers he is the only dog in the world who can climb a trapeze, sit on the high wire and dunk a biscuit in his tea, and be fired from a cannon to arrive home just in time for tea….

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Our Books of the Week is in association with the ReadingZone

• The children’s books website www.ReadingZone.com aims to help families to support their children’s reading by suggesting the best books available.
• The website provides news about books and authors, competitions, author interviews and recommendations, and there are distinct areas for children themselves to explore new releases.

Two thirds of our planet is covered in water but still over 90% of the ocean is unexplored – so we thought we’d better get cracking!

Join our new Fun Kids star Marina Ventura as she goes exploring the seas and the type of creatures that live there.

Marina and her very clever Mappy App will be travelling to the polar ice caps, diving into the deepest areas of the oceans, meeting a lot of interesting animals along the way!

Find out about the power the oceans have over our weather and environent as well as the problems we face today from from climate change and humankind’s destructive influences.

Listen to Marina Ventura’s Ocean Adventure every day in The Club with Luke from 4pm!

Meet Marina Ventura

Our new Fun Kids star is pretty amazing! Marina absolutely loves exploring and is ready to try everything, whether it’s dealing with the icy cold winds of the Arctic or swimming with a pod of whales in the ocean.

What’s more, she does it all with a smile!

Of course, she couldn’t do it without Mappy App. He’s a super clever device Marina takes with her everywhere.

Although he might not be quite as up for coming face to face with a polar bear, he is full of fascinating information to help Marina learn about the places she visits and also stops Marina running headfirst into trouble!

The only problem is he sometimes gets lost in Marina’s backpack. Being an explorer means she needs to carry a lot of stuff with her, but it does sure make things hard to find!

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Marina Ventura’s Ocean Adventure is supported by the Natural Environment Research Council. To find out more visit nerc.ac.uk

You Choose

by Nick Sharratt, Pippa Goodhart

If you could go anywhere, where would you go? A city, the desert or outer space? What kind of home would you choose – a palace, an igloo or a mushroom? And when you got hungry, what would you eat? Cake? Ketchup? Crab?

This book puts children at the centre of their own story and could see them flying by hot air balloon into the jungle, wearing rabbit slippers – or becoming an elephant tamer who lives in a windmill. Will they ask a unicorn or a vampire to go with them on their adventures? They can choose!

Lively illustrations – and loads of reusable stickers to make up their own stories – will make this a firm favourite.

Published by Corgi

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For older children
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Cartoon Kid

By Jeremy Strong

Love comics? Superheroes? Laughing your socks off? Then you’ll love this book! Cartoon Kid Casper has a best mate, Big Feet Pete, and together these superheroes are more than a match for the Vampire Twins! (Or so they’d like to think…)

With their special superpowers, they get one up on the bullies, are arrested by the elephant police (yup), make up the biggest excuses ever for not doing their homework, and help their mates win the cup for being the best class in the school.

Cartoon Kid tells the story so there are loads of illustrations and comic strips throughout, as well as some handy facts – so in case you have to work out if you’ve been bitten by a Black Widow spider or a Cardinal Beetle, spiders have eight legs and beetles have only six.

Published by Puffin

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Our Books of the Week is in association with the ReadingZone

• The children’s books website www.ReadingZone.com aims to help families to support their children’s reading by suggesting the best books available.
• The website provides news about books and authors, competitions, author interviews and recommendations, and there are distinct areas for children themselves to explore new releases.

We wanted you to write a poem on any wildlife subject you wanted – this could be about birds, mammals, icky insects, absolutely anything that comes up when you think about the wildlife.

The winning entries would not only appear in Bird Life, but also be read out on Fun Kids!

.The amount of entries and general standard of the poems was unbelievable and we want to say thank you and well done to all those who entered!

However, we have finally picked our winners! And just in case you missed them on air, you can hear them all right here.

Listen to them below!

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