Monthly Book Roundup - What We Have Been Reading in June

Its time for my monthly book round up again. Each month I write about new books that I have introduced to Lily at bedtime and what we think of them. We always read around 3 books a night and most nights we end up reading the same ones with a few odd ones read in between. I find reading the same books helps Lily relax and she does grow fond of the stories each month and gets excited when I get them out to read each night. 

You can read all our other monthly roundups here.

We didn't have a theme for this month, but I did want them to be quite adventurous or involve the outdoors this month seen as its now summertime. This month I really did enjoy all the books we read and I think its a really good selection of books to consider buying. 

Here is this months choice - 

1. Peter's Pebbles by Cherie Zamazing
I chose this story from the shop because collecting pebbles is one of Lily's favourite things to do. So I thought that she would really love this story. I didn't get much chance to have a look what the story was about and thought from the cover it would be about collecting pebbles but when I got it home it had a compleatly different storyline. I can't complain at the storyline though. It was great. Peter not only collects pebbles but he then paints them into animals. One day he accidently drops his fish pebble into the fishbowl and it comes to life. He is so amazed that he makes all his other pebbles come to life by doing things that relate to them. EG - throwing the parrot out the window so it flies. Soon he doesn't have room to keep them so has to paint an island on a pebble for them all to live on. Lily loved this story because of the pebbles involved and because of all the animals involved. She would point out all the animals in the story. We loved this story so much that we decided to do an activity based on it and paint our own pebbles. You can see this here. I bought this book from the works for £1!! What a bargain. 

2. A Gold Star for George by Alice Hemming 
I do love stories that involve giraffes and this isn't the first we have read. The front cover really caught my eye and it looked like it would be a good story. The story involves George the giraffe and he is entering into a zoo contest. He would love a gold star on his fence in the zoo. But he ends up being such a kind giraffe that he helps all his friends win all the awards and doesn't win one himself. His friends all get toggether at the end and reward him with some stars they think he deserves though, so its a happy ending. Its a really nice story about friendship and also showing that winning is not always the most important thing. Lily enjoyed this story and I would definetly recommend it. I won this book in a competition but you can pick it up online. 

3. Wild Goose by Laura Wall 
This story really does show adventure. It shows goose and his friends all out in wild, walking through the woodlands and getting up to all sorts. They have a picnic, collect things and then make a picture out of what they find. I think its a great story to read to children who are very outdoorsy. Lily asked for this book quite a bit and I think she really liked the main character of the goose. The book was also really colourful which I think added a lot of interest to Lily. The story also isn't too long and so it was great to read on the nights she was really tired. I also won this book but you can pick it up online. There are also other books about goose in the series which we may consider getting now. 

4. Cave Baby by Julia Donaldson 
This was my favourite book this month. But it is always very hard to beat a Julia Donaldson book. This was one I hadden't heard of before and its not one of her well known stories but believe me when I say that this story is so good that it does need to get known. The story is about a cave baby living in his cave. He is bored and wants to paint. He paints all the walls which does not make his cave mummy and daddy happy. His daddy threatens that a mammoth will come and take him and feed him to the big brown bear if he does it again. That night a mammoth does come. He is scared, but soon realises that they aren't going to feed him to the big brown bear but instead are going to get him to paint their walls. The big brown bear gets mentioned through out the story which Lily enjoyed. It also like most of Julia Donaldson books has a really nice rhyme to it which makes it so much nicer to read. If this is a Julia Donaldson book you haven't read yet then I urge you to give it a try. My friend bought me this book and Im glad she did. You can pick it up from most book stores such as Waterstones. 

Which story do you like the sound of the most?