ALERT

Some posts may be about this same book – this is because Kaspar Prince of Cats is the book provided by ARC.

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When Kaspar the cat first arrived at London’s Savoy Hotel, it was Johnny Trott who carried him in. After all, Johnny was a bellboy and was responsible for all of Countess Kandinsky’s things— including Kaspar. But when tragedy befalls the Countess during her stay, Kaspar becomes more than Johnny’s responsibility: Kaspar is Johnny’s new cat, and his new best friend.

And when Kaspar and Johnny meet Lizziebeth, a spirited young heiress, they find themselves journeying across the Atlantic with Lizziebeth’s family on England’s newest and most magnificent ship, the Titanic. After all, he’s Kaspar Kandinsky, Prince of Cats, a Londoner and a New Yorker and, as far as anyone knows, the only cat to survive the sinking of the Titanic…

In this tightly wound tale by the author of The Golden Compass and Count Karlstein, clockmaking and clockmakers serve as metaphors for fiction and its practitioners. The quaint (and aptly named) German village of Glockenheim sets great store in its clockmaking tradition: each time an apprentice becomes master of his craft, he commemorates the occasion by adding a new figure to the town’s great clock. On the eve of one of these celebrations, a delectably spooky train of events is set in motion when the novelist Fritz sets out to entertain the villagers with his most recent work: the tale of Prince Florian, the deceased local ruler’s son, whose fate is linked to a brilliant clockmaker. Fritz’s narrative is interrupted by the arrival of a cloaked man who appears to have sprung straight from the pages of his novel: the aforementioned craftsman, enigmatic Dr. Kalmenius of Schatzberg, who has come–or so it seems–to help the gloomy apprentice clockmaker Karl achieve an unearned triumph in the next day’s ceremonies. Meanwhile, poor Florian–whose time has nearly run out–stumbles into Glockenheim and finds the innkeeper’s sweet daughter Gretl, the one person capable of restoring true life to the mechanical prince. In signature Pullman style, each character gets his or her just deserts with a fairy-tale ending that pays fitting and playful tribute to the story’s twin obsessions: “”So they both lived happily ever after; and that was how they all wound up.””

I recommend this book to an 8 to 13 aged child, some hard language but mostly fine

Front cover

Awful Auntie by David Walliams is a hilarious book. It’s about a girl called Stella Saxby who has an awful aunt called Alberta. Stella’s parents died in a car crash but Stella doesn’t know how because her dad was a steady driver. On Chester’s (Stella’s dad’s) will, he said that when he died Saxby Hall (their HUGE house) would go to Stella and not to his sister Alberta. Alberta will stop at nothing to have Saxby Hall all to herself. The trouble is that Stella has a few tricks up her sleeve…

Wagner

My favourite character is Wagner, Alberta’s owl, because he starts off helping Alberta but then he goes on to Stella’s side to help defeat Alberta. I don’t think he even liked Alberta in the first place!

When Lyra’s friend Roger disappears, she and her dæmon, Pantalaimon, are determined to find him. The ensuing quest leads them to the bleak splendour of the North, where armoured bears rule the ice and witch-queens fly through the frozen skies – and where a team of scientists is conducting experiments too horrible to be spoken about. Lyra overcomes these strange terrors, only to find something yet more perilous waiting for her – something with consequences which may even reach beyond the Northern Lights…