Wilberfoss Primary School

Dennis The Menace – A Monster Menace

Written by Rachel Elliot

Review by Ben, Year 5

For any of you that don’t know, Dennis The Menace is a famous comic character from The Beano comic. He wears his famous red and black top and causes trouble and chaos wherever he goes, usually with his menacing dog Gnasher!

The Monster Menace is a book with three Dennis The Menace short stories inside. They were all great, but my favourite was “School Trip“.

Dennis is going on a school trip with his class. The day before the trip Dennis hid his catapult in the hedge so when his mum searched him he won’t have a catapult or anything bad.

The school bus had arrived at Dennis’s house and his mum searched Dennis just to be sure he did not have his catapult. When Dennis got outside he ran to the bush and got his catapult and then got on the school bus. What a Menace!

Dennis had already caused trouble on the bus. Finally the class got to Beanotown museum. The first place the class went to was the dinosaur hall but then the curator took the class to the fossil exhibit but Dennis and his friends were very sneaky and ran back to the dinosaur hall and Dennis and caused more and more trouble.

The curator came running in to see what happened. Everyone went MENTAL! The curator went green so Dennis’s teacher suggested they got something to eat, after which they carried on their trip with the Egyptian exhibition.

As the Curator was speaking about the history of Egypt, Dennis, Pieface and Curly ran away from the group again and went into the model pyramid and CAUSED TROUBLE!

What I liked about the book is it was really really interesting and it had a very good pictures. This book was very funny and exciting, my favourite part was when Dennis got in the mummy costume and scared the class!!

Well, there are many, many reasons for writing about what you read, but one of the best is the possibility that you’ll be talking directly to the author of the book you’ve just read!

Amy in Year 5 reviewed Colin West‘s Marmaduke the Magic Cat in December – her review is here, where she said how much she liked the book.

Well, author Colin West has been in touch through the comments and said this:

“Hello Amy, I am so pleased you liked my story about Marmaduke. it was fun drawing all the magical things he could do. I hope you can find more of my books to enjoy!”

Isn’t that great? Well done Amy.

Marmaduke The Magic Cat

By Colin West

Review by Amy (Year 5)

Marmaduke the Magic Cat is about a cat who can float things in the air because he’s got a magic collar.

Marmaduke gets lost and meets a girl and her grandma. They see from Marmaduke’s collar tag that he belongs to a Witch!!!!!!

Marmaduke is a wonderful cat that who has been a witch cat for years and years.

They take Marmaduke to his witch owner Muriel on Forest Road. But Marmaduke runs away again, back to the girl!

I really like the Book because I love Cats.

Puppy Love – A Litter Of Puppy Stories

By Christophe Loupy & Eve Tharlet

Review by Isabel (Year 5)

Puppy Love has three lovely stories; Hugs & Kisses, Dont Worry Wags, and Wiggles.

They’re all all about little Wags the puppy.

In “Hugs and Kisses” Wags went to the ducks, horses, pigs, rabbits and butterflies and he gets kisses from all of them!

In “Don’t Worry Wags”, Wags the puppy was worried about getting into the truck to go to the farmer’s market. His mum and dad said that it would be fine, but he still worried.

The market had loads of people in it and he got lost in town. He saw some goats and woofed but they couldn’t help him find his family. He was really, really sad and worried. After a long time Wags found them again.

In Wiggles Wags watched the cows being milked and eggs being collected in the chicken coop and also poked his nose in the bee hive on the farm.

I like it because you can choose your book and the first one is sweet and cute. The second one tells you that you can over come your worries. The last one is realy nice and he follows the farmer around the farm. You can choose your book as well.

My favourite character is Wags….. isn’t he lovely?

Super Animal Adventure Squad

By James Turner

DFC Library

Review by Lewis (Year 4)

Super Animal Adventure Squad is a brilliant comic about 5 super animals who stop evil villians like Dr. Nefarious and his giant mutant ant, and Captain Green Beard and his pirate crew.

The Super Animal Adventure Squad is: Agent Rex, Agent K, Agent Irwin, Agent Bearbot, and Agent Beesley.

Rex the chameleon is my favourite character because he said lots of funny things and he was very silly. And Irwin was funny as well when he stamped on the ants.

My favourite part was when the unicorn on the television woke Agent K up. It was my favourite part because agent K screams. Another really funny part is at the start of “The Case Of The Baboon Bandit” where one of Captain Green Beard’s crew the night guard over the head and all he can say is …. “Ouch“!

It was a good book, with a great, funny beginning, hilarious middle and super silly end! I think that if you like humour and funny things you will love Super Animal Adventure Squad!

Dumpling

By Dick King-Smith, illustrated by Jo Davies

Review by Harry (Year 5)

This is all about a lovely little dog called Dumpling. And all she wants is to be longer – because she’s a dachshund! That’s a sausage dog. Her owner describes her best in the book as:

“But dachshunds are supposed to have long bodies, you know. And you haven’t. You’re just a little dumpling.”

That’s Dumpling – the short brown dachshund. She finds a witch’s cat and asks if she can become the “longest dachshund ever!“. Oh dear.

She gets longer and longer and longer and longer. Will she ever stop growing? What will she do?

I’ve read a lot of books by Dick King-Smith and I think this is his best, and definitely his funniest! I like it because it’s funny watching Dumpling get longer and longer. It’s a very good book for younger readers but just as much fun for older readers.

Little Animal Ark: The Lucky Lamb

By Lucy Daniels

Review by Amy (Year 5)

The Lucky Lamb is all about a little lamb named Wooly and two children named Mandy and Liam.

When Wooly’s mum isn’t feeling well little Wooly has to be put in the farmhouse until she gets better.

I like the book because on the cover the lamb is lovely, Wooly is a perfect name for a lamb and he’s my favourite character

Born To Run

By Michael Morpurgo

Review by Katie (Year 3)

Born to Run is the most extraordinary book I have ever read. It is about running (and I hate running) but that doesn’t mean I hate this book.

Patrick finds a sack of puppies in the canal, and rescues them by diving in! His dad says he can’t keep them and they get sent to the RSPCA home.

When Patrick gets home he throws himself on the bed and dreams of the puppy he liked best…. and he wakes up to find the puppy licking his face!

His parents explain that they where going to move to a bigger house and that they had agreed he could keep him so long Patrick looked after him.

He calls the puppy “Best Mate”.

My favourite chapter was “Be fast Bright Eyes, be fast”. This particular chapter is my favourite because it is also the most worrying. In this chapter Best Mate gets kidnapped by a very cruel breeder who races greyhounds.

The breeder has a step-daughter called Becky who adores all the dogs.She names him “Bright Eyes”. Becky loves Bright Eyes as her own dog.

Then Becky finds out what happens to all the dogs whose time racing is over. The thing that happens is too dreadful to bear with and she is afraid that it will someday happen to Bright Eyes. So, she runs away with Bright Eyes………

Read this extraordinary book to find out more!

All through the time Iwas reading this book, my heart was thumping fast.

The story is sad, happy and worrying all the way through.

When I was reading it late at night I always felt I was actually in the book, and it was happening right beside me.

I absolutely love this story I am writing about.

The Daisy Books

By Kes Gray, illustrated by Garry Parsons and Nick Sharratt

Review by Hannah (Year 5)

I love the Daisy books because they are so funny and make me laugh all day!

I have been reading 3 books so far.

“DAISY and the TROUBLE with KITTENS” is my favrioute. It’s all about these kittens that live in the bin and they’re very hungry so Daisy steals her mum’s boyfriend Derek’s sardines and and gives it to the kittens.

I also like “DAISY and the TROUBLE with ZOOS”. It’s all about Daisy’s birthday when Daisy and her best friend Gabby go to the zoo and have a picnic with lemonade and cheese sandwiches.

Daisy goes inside the snake tent where it’s very dark and she gets to feed the penguins.

Daisy takes a penguin home with her under her jacket but mom goes mad when she finds out and they go back to the zoo where they talk to the zookeeper and Daisy gives it to the zookeeper but she cries but calms down a bit and they all go home.

The last one is DAISY and the TROUBLE with GIANTS and that’s ALL about Giants!

Charlie And The Chocolate Factory

By Roald Dahl

Review by Amy

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a book about a boy called Charlie visiting a chocolate factory.

Charlie’s family is very, very, very, very poor.

My favourite parts of the the book were the very funny songs and the chocolate! I love chocolate and every time I heard a new invention like luminous lollies it made my tummy rumble.

I like Roald Dahl and the picture by Quentin Blake – they’re my favourite authors.