A pair of siblings start bickering on a road trip in Oliver Jeffers’ extraordinary new picture book, Meanwhile Back on Earth (HarperCollins, £16.99, all ages). Their clever father tries to distract them by drawing them out of their own conflict. Suddenly their car is a time machine launched off into space.
In the “year-view mirror” they see the world as it was 78/150/500 years ago, with people fighting over small pieces of land and access to power. Concluding their journey to the edge of the galaxy at Pluto, the family find themselves seeing the world 11,000 years ago, where “there are fewer people on Earth than currently live in Ireland … and they are much too busy surviving to bother fighting each other”.
The book features all of the hallmarks of Jeffers’ usual artistry – bright colours and distinctive bobble-headed characters – but the metaphorical resonance of his spare text is superbly achieved here. Indeed, in a house of young readers of all ages, the 10-year-old was particularly engaged by the way in which the illustrations and allusive context invited independent research. Meanwhile Back on Earth is a stunning achievement that puts human impulses into perspective.
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The Humbug family also go on an unexpected adventure in Humbug: The Elf Who Saved Christmas (Scholastic. £7.99, 8+) a comic Christmas novel from Steven Butler. Despite their unfortunately unChristmassy name, this family of elves are the unsung heroes of the season, shovelling reindeer poo all year round to ensure that Santa’s cervine sleigh-pullers are clean and healthy for their annual journey around the world. In the hierarchy of Santa’s Workshop, however, their industry doesn’t count for much, and when a mince pie goes missing from the workshop kitchen, Gristle and his sister Scratcher are framed for the crime and exiled from the North Pole. Butler revels in wordplay, offering a “gut-swilly, tongue-bleurghy” lexicon for young readers to chew upon, as well as a surprising and very funny seasonal adventure.
Blended families are the focus of Katya Balen’s emotionally stirring The Light in Everything (Bloomsbury, £12.99, 10+). Eleven year-olds Zofia and Tom are absolute opposites. She is rowdy and raucous and shouty and turbulent, loves sea swimming in freezing cold water and sports. He is anxious and fretful and afraid of the dark, and finds comfort in crafting tiny animals from paper. When their parents decide to marry and a tragedy befalls their sibling-to-be, Zofia and Tom are forced to find a shared language, and they do, bonding while making a boat. This is a compelling story suggestive with adult issues of domestic violence, terminal infant illness and miscarriage, but Balen is attuned to the emotional register of childhood throughout. The prose is beautiful, the tension blistering: The Light in Everything is a highly recommended read for mature children aged 10+, as well as their adults.
Wren by Lucy Hope (Nosy Crow, £6.99, 8+) also has a coastal setting. The 10-year-old eponymous heroine loves taking out her coracle to watch, and occasionally rescue, seabirds. However, Wren’s father disapproves of his daughter’s escapades – her mother’s fate, he reminds her, is a good example of how badly adventuring can go – and he decides to send her off to the Anglesey Institution for the Re-education of Young Women. Wren has other ideas, however, and with the surprising assistance of her inventive Aunt Efa and her steampowered wheelchair, Wren sets about making an aeroplane that will take her far away from trouble. Hope writes brilliantly about her young heroine’s ambition and Wren’s creative approach to the challenge she sets herself is particularly well-drawn, as we watch her try to take flight like her avian namesake.
Odd aunties anchor the narrative of Bramble Fox, a thrilling fantasy adventure by Kathrin Tordasi, translated by Cathrin Wirtz (Pushkin, £7.99, 10+). Set in Wales, the book infuses a modern-day setting with British history and mythology. Sent to live with her aunts Bramble and Rose for the summer, 10-year-old Portia is led into a dangerous adventure by Robin Goodfellow, who appears to her in fox form and tricks her into opening a portal to the Otherworld. Local bookworm Ben follows, as do her aunts, and a clash between kingdoms ensues. This is an exciting, substantial book with a brilliant setting that will appeal to fans of JRR Tolkien and Philip Pullman.
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Cloudbabies by Eoin Colfer and Chris Judge (Walker, £12.99, 3+) takes a sensitive approach to a difficult subject matter: childhood illness. When Erin becomes a long-term patient at the children’s hospital, she finds a unique way of making friends and the days pass: cloud-spotting. When she returns to school, however, she has a hard time fitting back in, until her Cloudbabies come to the rescue again. Judge’s bright and playful illustrations provide a visual joy to counteract the difficult subject matter, in a book that will provide emotional confirmation for sick kids and promote empathy for all readers.
