My Busy Being Bella Day

Even the cat has wonderful facial expressions in this funny and quite believable picture book.  Bella must go to nursery school, and she isn’t pleased that baby brother Bob may be doing exciting things with Mum.  The day doesn’t start out very well either.  Colouring in the lines is hard to do, a spotty banana appears at break time, and friend Sasha is playing with someone else.  All this time Bella is thinking about the possible exciting things that Bob and Mum may be doing and wishing she could be with them.  However, when the teacher praises her singing and she’s allowed to do things that Bob can’t do, she is happy at last and greets Mum and Bob with joy at the end of the session.  It turns out that the most exciting thing Bob has done all day has been missing his sister!  It is the expressions on all the faces in this book that will repay looking at again and again.  The story is told through the pictures, and Bella’s jealousy and moodiness is clear – as are the other children’s feelings.  Not only that, but we see Sasha has a rather pretentious mum and the teacher is distressed at Bella’s messy craft work.  Expression is everything in the story, and the characters really come alive.