Warambi by Aleesah Darlison and Andrew Plant

Warambi is the story of a little bent-wing bat. The story follows Warambi growing up and learning to fly and hunt. When the bat colony's cabe is demolished by excavators, Warambi finds herself separated from the other bats and the story follows her adventure to find a new home.

We stumbled across this book at The Library Shop, the State Library of Queensland's bookshop - a wonderful place to find excellent children's books, particularly Brisbane, Queensland or Australian books (actually it is a wonderful place to find all kinds of fabulous books!!)

As soon as we saw Warambi, we had to buy a copy - the illustrations are excellent and the realistic artwork really brings little Warambi to life. (It is amazing to learn that the bent-wing bat is only 45mm long - hard to believe from looking at the incredibly detailed drawings of the bats in this book).

The other really lovely thing about this hardcover book is the endpapers, which contain additional information about bent-wing bats, including where they live, what they eat, etc. We don't read this information to Maximilian yet, but these are a great way to  learn more about the facts behind the story - something which will really appeal to the wonderful curiosity of older children.

This isn't a short story so it is not one for young babies or toddlers. Although the text on each page is quite short, there are a lot of pages so younger children just wouldn't have the attention span to enjoy the story. The illustrations are remarkably realistic and mostly dark coloured, so also wouldn't really appeal to young children in the way that bright primary colours do. At eighteen months age, Maximilian will now sit still and listen to the entire story and he enjoys it but he doesn't really understand what's going on in the story, and it will probably be more suitable from around age 3 and up.

Warambi would be a terrific addition to a storytime program based on Australian animals and could also be used for environmental awareness or a conservation theme. It would also be a great book for primary school teachers or librarians to use an education aid. I really think this is a wonderful and unique book and I'm glad we found it - it will be enjoyed in our home library for many years to come.

Squish Rabbit by Katherine Battersby

This is the simple and sweet tale of Squish Rabbit. Squish is just a little rabbit and being little can lead to big problems.

Squish often feels ignored and overlooked. He is lonely and makes a friend, but knows it isn't as good as the real thing. One day, when having a tantrum, Squish meets Squirrel and they become friends.

Although the story is very simple, young children would probably relate to Squish, particularly if they are feeling ignored or misunderstood by the grown ups in their world. Parents could also use Squish's tantrum as a starting point for a great discussion about dealing with big feelings - something that toddlers often struggle with.

The book itself is very well produced - the puffy cover and satin finish give the cover a wonderfully tactile feeling. The illustrations are simple, colourful and effective. The combination of collage and ink drawing is really attractive and the stylised Squish and Squirrel characters are very sweet.

We got Squish Rabbit when Maximilian was around 15 months old and he was just the right age to begin enjoying it straight away. I'd recommend this story for 12 months plus as there isn't enough to engage younger babies effectively, and it isn't available as a board book so younger babies can't engage with the physical book really either.

Katherine Battersby is a local Brisbane author and Squish Rabbit is her first book. Maximilian received Squish Rabbit as a gift from a dear friend and our copy is signed and inscribed by the author. I hope this will just be the first of many autographed books in Maximilian's book collection!