Tag Archive | Austin Macauley Publishers

The Adventures Of Rose by Mary Bessenich

Sep26

Absolutely Charming

The Adventures Of Rose by Mary Bessenich is an absolutely charming story for anyone aged eight years and over. I absolutely loved it.

The Adventures Of Rose is such a beautiful, heart-warming tale that will make your heart swell with love and also your eye shed a tear. The book is about Rose, a hand-crafted doll, and her life of thirty years and counting.

The reader sees the love that goes into making Rose and the loss felt when she is sold.

Rose is a special doll with a red velvet heart who leaves a trail of love wherever she goes.

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The Arrival Of Jessica BunnyDuck by Harry Bird

Sep20

It’s Ok To Be Different

The Arrival Of Jessica BunnyDuck by Harry Bird is a beautiful book and just perfect for the under fives.

The book teaches our children that it is okay to be different on the outside. Inside we are all the same with our basic needs for food, warmth and love.

The message of the book teaches our children to love and care as we see an abandoned baby welcomed into a family unit. We learn the concept of sharing what we have with those around us who have nothing.

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D.A.N’s Little Book Of War Poetry by D.A. Nicholson

Sep5

Very Sad, Very Powerful

D.A.Ns Little Book Of War Poetry by D.A. Nicholson is absolutely heart breaking and very powerful.

The poems cover the major conflicts since World War I but with a heavy loading set during the war to end all wars.

We hear about the mud, the terror, the gunfire. Under the masterful pen of D.A. Nicholson, the terrible images spring to life as we ‘see’ the desolation of war.

There are a few poems set in Iraq and Vietnam. We hear of the terrible cruelty of the Holocaust. We ‘see’ men being given white feathers and shot for cowardice. We hear of the total futility of war, the terrible loss of lives as men are used for cannon fodder.

All the poems are powerful. The one that really affected me was Bright, Shining Light about the atomic bomb being dropped from Enola Gay. It was accompanied by a drawing of what is now the peace museum. It really shows the futility of war:

“Men, women, and children, getting on with their lives, on this warm summer’s day,

The world changed forever when they dropped the atomic bomb from the Enola Gay.”

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The Life Of Riley by Sharon Plant

Sep3

Small In Stature, Big In Heart

The Life Of Riley by Sharon Plant is a marvellous historical novel that is both educating and eye opening.

The novel is set during the first quarter on the twentieth century as we follow Ray Riley from a six year old to a married man. The story is fictional but the locations in London are accurate of conditions at the time.

Poverty in the early twentieth century was rife. Sharon Plant has perfectly captured the squalor and the desperation, as the reader hears of rodent infested rooms with water running down the walls.

We see the effect of poverty and the feeling of hopelessness on lives as wages are often spent in the pub rather than putting food on the table. Ill tempers often see wives sporting black eyes.

Living in poverty means families cannot always afford to look after their own children and they send them away to live with richer relatives. This really resonated with me as after my Nanny’s mother died in 1894. She was given to an uncle and aunt to be looked after and her baby brother given to the neighbours. The other six children stayed in the family home.

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