posted on 11 May 2020

More Alien’s Guides from Maverick Early Reader series

I have already enthused about this attractively presented new series of non- fiction titles elsewhere on this site. These two new books are from the orange band which is in the middle of the scale of colours that ‘reflects the various levels of reading difficulty:

  "All the books in the reading scheme are carefully graded in terms of content, phonics, sentence construction and language style and         ‘ edited by a leading educational consultant".

As with other books in the series, we join the two alien tour guides, Finn and Zeek  as they try to explain the weird and wonderful ways of life on planet earth. I guess that their remit is to drum up enough interest from folk in the wider solar system to do a bit of exploring, pre armed with the guide to ensure that they get a full experience from a well- planned holiday.

Wings and Wheels

As ever, the two tour guides respond to an incoming query, this time from Torro and Rush who are residents of Planet Vaycay. They are curious to know about the different forms of transport that they might encounter on a visit. The following pages indicate that Vaycay probably has more sophisticated forms of transport but the enthusiastic guides make trains, planes cars and everything else sound very exciting, not to be missed  experiences. I like the way that by using lots of photographs and other illustrations throughout to complement the simple text , they are able to convey lots of interesting facts and figures. Who knew that some cargo ships can carry the equivalent weight of 3.8 million apples? The usual multiple choice quiz at the end of the book provides the chance for children to show off the knowledge they have gained whilst reading and a useful index/ glossary reinforces understanding of perhaps unfamiliar terms used in the text.

Minibeasts

Beet and Lil from Planet Juice have evidently already visited Earth but are curious to know why they came across such a wide variety of minibeasts. What follows is a very clear overview of creatures like dragonflies and worms using photos and diagrams to explain exoskeletons and other features. Although this band is probably designed to appeal to five and six year olds – I think that the format is also  very appealing to much younger children who are often fascinated by minibeasts. The final recommendation is for Beet and Lil to find out more about the extraordinary Rhinoceros beetle that features on the cover on their next visit. In all my sixty four years living on planet Earth, I had never heard of that one and so will be keeping my eyes open!  

Both are informative and engaging little books that are already a big hit with my five year old grand- daughter. I always recommend Maverick Early Readers when I visit nurseries and schools because I believe that they are well designed, colourful and very accessible for children who are beginning to gain confidence with reading independently.  

Karen Argent

May 2020