Read Me a Story, Please

You will need a strong arm for this hefty anthology! It contains fifty bite-sized stories catering for all tastes from twenty-nine authors. Many of its delicious fillings are new, and each one has a distinctive taste and special spark whether it be from Anne Fine's glowing worm, Hetty, the stars on the blue curtains in AdŽle Gera's 'Playing Princesses' or Vivian French's 'Before Goldilocks' (which I just loved). Dann's illustrations always make me smile though somehow I can only associate 'The Little Girl and the Tiny Doll' with Edward Ardizzone or Michael Foreman's 'Two Giants' with his original artwork. My only quibble, albeit a very tiny one, is with some of the timings given for the stories which are supposed to take either two, five or ten minutes to read: perhaps the compiler's clock came from wonderland too -- best use your own!