Cuckoo Summer

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Then again, Sally’s full of stories and schemes and it seems she’s reluctant to share anything about her past life. This experience has been fantastic primarily for the children, the school and also for me (professionally). It's just so evocatively written - and what a triumph to see this landing in young readers hands, not only sharing the beauty of the countryside but also sharing a little bit of our history too. He is a villain in the mould of some of the worst in children’s literature and quite terrifying at times.

It kept me interested from the first page to the last, and even gave a little emotional kick at the end. Sally, despite her carefree attitude to life and her situation, displays a kindness to the injured enemy that is touching. With vicious Scarcross out to track the airman down, backed up by his Home Guard cronies, the decision becomes increasingly dangerous.In the beginning, Tommy, our narrator, explains Sally’s dialect to us, when necessary, offering definitions for Geordie vocabulary which might be unfamiliar. Tommy’s learned some of her Geordie speech patterns, enough to know that the German gadgie she’s discovered in the woods is the airman who’s parachuted out of the plane crashed in Woundale woods. It is so nice, having read a pile of books for the library recently, to find something that has been crafted and cared for. The characters in Cuckoo Summer are living, breathing beings and each of them has a distinctive role in the story, which is told from the perspective of Tommy, a loyal and compassionate friend who instinctively knows that all's not right in Sally's world, when she refuses to tell him anything about her former home life. I was at my last school for 4 years and we had ********* book fairs every term – and every term, I was disappointed by the narrow range of books.

Tulloch's obvious love for the Lake District and its wildlife also breathes through the pages of the story, which are filled with incidental descriptions of nature and its integral part in the characters' lives, and of course the sound of the cuckoo that echoes through its pages. This is a lovely story full of brilliant, believable characters, sparky dialogue between the two children and running through the whole book a love of the landscape in which the children live. Then a German plane is brought down over the village and the navigator is not there and must have bailed out. Ross Welford introduces Time Travelling with a Tortoise, the sequel to Time Travelling with a Hamster, and a whole new time travel adventure!My only concern is that there are some lengthy, graphic descriptions of animal cruelty in the story, which are upsetting even for an adult to read. This starts a chain of events that leads to the uncovering of secrets about Sally's past and a summer of adventure that neither child will ever forget. So when Sally tells Tommy about the wounded Nazi airman in the woods Tommy is persuaded not to report it but to help Sally keep him hidden. Apart from the gripping plot, one of the best things about this book is its sense of time and place - it makes a real effort to capture the language, traditions and rhythms of a lakeside farm during the Second World War.

Sally’s language took me a little while to get used to but would give teachers who like ‘doing the voices’ during a class read aloud a chance to shine! Cuckoo Summer is a perfect book to share alongside WWII topics, and it will be loved by any child looking for an immersive story of adventure and friendship. I have even talked the head into a little revamp of the library so that we can display them properly! It’s a fantastic independent book seller that will actually be responsive and select appropriate books for you. It is the summer of 1940, and Tommy lives with his three Aunts and young niece on a farm in Woundale in the Lake District.

The characterisation is strong: it's not just Tommy and Sally who have back stories that plausibly inform their actions. How is it that she learns so quickly and diligently during Aunt Annie’s Sunday School, determined to pick up everything it seems she’s missed… like reading and writing, and using cutlery? At one point, the children’s unkind teacher, Miss Gently rattles through the timetables, beating her long ruler like ‘an auctioneer watching farmers at a cattle sale.

It seems Mr Scarcross has little time for his evacuee, and nor does Miss Gently or others in the community. Yesterday a parent came over to tell me how impressed she was by the book fair and that you did a fabulous job of selling the books to the children first. The place is almost a character in its own right, with an immersive understanding of farming at that time. The 103 third parties who use cookies on this service do so for their purposes of displaying and measuring personalized ads, generating audience insights, and developing and improving products.Join our community to get personalised book suggestions, extracts straight to your inbox, 10% off RRPs, and to change children’s lives. Part of Sally's appeal as a character is her dialogue - a young Liverpudlian, Tulloch captures her immense energy for life and fierce integrity through her dialogue, rich with her northern accent. In the opening sentences, the two children come across a German airman who has parachuted from his plane, which has been shot down.