The reissue of a classic baby board book to celebrate Helen Oxenbury's great contribution to children's books.Babies make all kinds of friends - rabbits, dogs, guinea pigs, birds, cats, hens and ducks. Helen Oxenbury's gorgeous illustrations not only capture the creatures the baby meets, but every bit of the baby's delight in them. No one draws babies like Helen Oxenbury. Her warm, affectionate depictions have been loved and cherished by children and adults around the world for over 30 years. In 1981, this groundbreaking little book was one of the most innovative board books ever published and is now considered a classic of the genre.
Beautiful, popular and with a husband at the very top of the corporate ladder, Eleanor Geddes has it all, but behind closed doors she's a remote and deeply insecure woman with a secret fear which is about to be realised, as her husband is busy making plans which are set to blow her perfect life apart.Eleanor's friend Ruth Palmer doesn't know it yet, but she's got a problem too. Her marriage feels stale and her husband's working long hours at the office ... or is he?But Ruth's got bigger problems. A drunken kiss with her good friend Helen sets Ruth's life on a downward spiral of sexual frustration, denial and guilt. She turns to drink in a desperate attempt to fight her feelings, but a shocking declaration suddenly changes the course of three families' lives forever.
How does a very small girl hide a very large lion? It's not easy, but Iris has to do her best, because mums and dads can be funny about having a lion in the house. Luckily, there are lots of good places to hide a lion - behind the shower curtain, in your bed, and even up a tree. A funny, heart-warming story about a very special friendship.
David and his family are typical -- three messy, noisy teenagers; two tidy, organised parents. It just doesn't work, does it? But when Mum inherits some money, the find a solution -- two houses next door to each other. Now they can split up, teens in number 8 and parents in number 10. At first it seems like paradise, but then things begin to go wrong ...
This is a story of people you might know. Some kindly men, a few hysterical women, sons who cause exasperation... It is a story of halted dreams, of new dreams dreamed, of love and loyalty, and love and disloyalty. Our Kind of Music follows one man’s journey along a highway initially perceived to be clear of obstacles but which, inevitably, presents hurdles he could not anticipate. It is also the story of his son, whose bravado leads him along a different path to the soul-searching that this ultimately entails. Set against shifting backgrounds – some as exotic as the Seychelles and Tahiti, some as safely domestic as New England’s Vermont and old England’s Dorset, and others as vibrant as Sydney and New York, this story is rich in personality, fostering an innate knowledge of who the characters are and how they feel. Not all are liked, but some are so deeply loved that they linger in the senses, and by the end you might almost expect to bump into them, like old friends, on Main Street. This novel is set over four decades, starting in 1937 and culminating in early 1982, less driven by the events of those years than merely touched by them, just as world events are experienced by ordinary lives. But always, always, running through those years, there is music… Our Kind of Music is a book about ordinary people attempting to lead ordinary lives (not always successfully), and though it is not without doses of light trauma, readers will discover a strong sense of place all around the world, and a nostalgic theme of music running throughout.
Sequel to New York Times bestselling author Alison Goodman's acclaimed The Dark Days Club—a smashing combination of Buffy and Jane Austen! Summer, 1812. After the scandalous events at her presentation ball in London, Lady Helen has taken refuge at the fashionable seaside resort of Brighton, banished from her family and training as a Reclaimer with the covert Dark Days Club. She must learn to fight the dangerous energy-wielding Deceivers and prepare to face their master, the elusive Grand Deceiver. As she struggles to put aside her genteel upbringing, Helen realizes that her mentor, Lord Carlston, is fighting his own inner battle. Has the foul Deceiver energy poisoned his soul, or is something else driving him towards violent bouts of madness? Either way, Helen is desperate to help the man with whom she shares a deep but forbidden connection. When Mr. Pike, the hard bureaucratic heart of the Dark Days Club, arrives in Brighton, he has a secret mission for Helen: find the journal left by a mad rogue Reclaimer, before it falls into the hands of the Deceivers. Coerced by Pike, Helen has no choice but to do as ordered, knowing that the search for the journal may bring about Lord Carlston’s annihilation.
