Kings of the Castle

Kings of the Castle is a beautifully illustrated and thought provoking book. The main character, George is a little monster who goes off for an adventure while his family spend the night at the beach. George tries his best to build a sandcastle but his little pet Boris has other ideas. Things take a new turn when a strange creature steps out of the sea and George has to encounter a stranger. The story centres around how we act around someone who is different comes into our lives and what happens when we can't communicate well with them. But how, through a few simple ways, we can learn to understand each other and find out what we have in common and even achieve something amazing. As a stand alone read, this book was lovely to share with my year 1's and they really enjoyed the book design and large pull out illustrated pages. However I could see this book having lots of potential to use across the curriculum. It would make a lovely English focus text. There would be opportunity to create many writing outcomes; character description, feelings, writing postcards, letters, discussions and many more. This book would lend itself to wonderful PSHCE sessions on friendship, welcoming someone new, dealing with children who struggle to communicate in class, team work and understanding each other. I think this book is a real treasure to have in class and would be one I'd repeatedly pull out with my children. Picture book / Ages 5+ / Reviewed by Marie Berry, teacher.

Suggested Reading Age 5+