Rosie's Magic Horse

This slight story written by Russell Hoban just before his death in 2011 is brought gloriously into life by Quentin Blake’s full-colour, all-action illustrations. Rosie, its young heroine, goes riding at night on a splendid horse made up from the discarded ice-lolly sticks she had previously collected. Her journey takes her to cities and jungles, deserts and oceans until she returns home next morning with a casket of gold looted from pirates encountered along the way. Even these by now hackneyed characters in picture books still manage to spring into life as Blake goes to town on their ragged clothes and even more ragged whiskers. Over almost before it has begun, this is still a book to return to many times for its general sense of fun, with no spoiler clouds anywhere to be seen on the horizon.