The lovely people at Simon and Schuster have really been spoiling MissB by sending us some gorgeous picture books. We love books in this house and can never have too many. I’m going to share a few more of their lovely books with you here and if you make it through to the end of this post there is a lovely competition for you to win a bundle of all the books mentioned – how lovely is that?

The Worst Princess – Anna Kemp & Sara Ogilvie

“Once upon a time, in a tower near you,
Lived a sad princess; the Princess Sue.
“Some day,” she sighed, “my prince will come,
But I wish he’d move his royal bum.”

“But when Princess Sue’s prince finally does arrive, he’s not quite what she had in mind. He’s surprised to discover that Sue wants to ride horses and battle dragons; he just wants her to wear pretty dresses and stay indoors. Find out how the feisty princess escapes the clutches of her twit of a prince in this funny twist on the traditional princess tale.”

I love this book, let’s face it, in this day and age the traditional role of “princess” is pretty much dead and I’m all for MissB reading the more traditional story books but this one is much more my style. A bit of feminism and a sense of humour. MissB loves the lovely illustrations and the “scary dragon” (she has an obsession with monsters, dragons and dinosaurs at the moment). In fact when I read this book I actually find myself chuckling as this is SOOO what MissB would be like if she were the princess herself :)

Jump On Board The Animal Train – Naomi Kefford & Lynne Moore

“The giraffes hooves click as he moves,
The elephant’s feet plod down the street,
The tiger’s tail swishes the rail,
The bear’s paws pad on the floor . . .
And they follow us as we go!”

Join one little boy on a fantastic journey to meet the train. He’s joined by bears, elephants, tigers and a whole menagerie of other animals but, when he finally meets the train, there’s an even more exciting surprise in store.

MissB is a huge fan of aminals (as she calls them) of all kinds and so any book which contains them is sure to be a hit. A lovely element of this book is the split pages which reveal the hidden animals as you go along. We had lots of fun trying to search for the animals and guess what they were before turning the flaps. MissB has named the little boy MasterB as he does look a little like her brother so it’s now been renamed MasterB’s animal train bless her.

Norman The Slug With The Silly Shell – Sue Hendra

“Norman is a slug who longs to be a snail – if only he could find a shell!”

Kids will laugh out loud at Norman’s crazy antics as he goes to hilarious lengths to find a shell of his own. But will he be satisfied once he finds one, or will his dreams get bigger and bigger and bigger?

What you can’t tell from the picture above is that the cover of this book is sparkly. I tell you nothing makes a book more appealing than a sparkly cover :) As soon as MissB saw this book she was bouncing up and down. I absolutely love the illustrations in this book, they are bright, beautiful and fun. The story can’t help but make you laugh and MissB loves us reading it to her before bed. The author obviously knows exactly the silly kind of story that appeals to young children :)

Barry The Fish With Fingers And The Hairy Scary Monster – Sue Hendra

This is another book by Sue Hendra, the author of Normal The Snail With The Silly Shell. She also has another book called Barry The Fish With Fingers which I haven’t read but I think based on the two books I have read of hers I’ll be adding it to my list of must buys :)

Yet again the cover is nice and sparkly and the illustrations in the book are beautiful. The number element of them playing hide and seek is always nice to see, we are currently learning numbers and any chance to count with MissB is a boost and of course my little monster obsessed daughter loves the hairy scary monster that they find in the old wreck. You can’t beat books that have silly but simple story lines, lovely illustrations and sparkly covers – they have got it SO right with these :)

Competition

The lovely people from Simon & Schuster Children’s Books have offered a bundle of ALL of the above books for THREE (yes THREE) my readers to win. Here’s what you need to do to enter:

You can do all of the actions below or just 1 of them but please make sure you leave a separate comment for each action you take or your entries will not be valid & please make sure you leave a way of contacting you either email or twitter, Thank you x

* Leave me a comment telling me you’d like to be entered

* Like Me on Facebook http://facebook.com/kneesupmotherbrown (there is a link on the right sidebar!)

* Follow me on Networked Blogs – see link on the right sidebar!

* Tweet the following “I’d like to win a bundle of picture books from @simonkids_uk and @dawnie_brown in this lovely giveaway at http://wp.me/p2dS23-1f8 “

* Subscribe to the blog via email (form is over on the right sidebar!) – please note if you were previously subscribed to the blog you will need to subscribe again as I lost you all when I transferred to self hosting :(

Good luck! UK entries only please. The winner will be drawn by random.org on Sunday 13th May at 8pm x