Children's round-up

TWO worlds, the real and the magical, collide in a tale worthy of Alan Garner.

Twins Pip and Tim have started at a new school, Bourne End Comprehen-sive. To their horror, they discover their new chemistry teacher, Mr Yoland, is an evil magician in disguise, a man whose power lies in stealing people's minds and souls.

With the help of an ancient book of spells and a terrifying assistant - a wodwo, a man of the woods - he aims to unleash a horrifying darkness on the world.

Tim and Pip and their friend Sebastian - the Alchemist's Son, who has slumbered in a chamber deep beneath the twins home for centuries before awaking to fight evil - are the only ones who know Yoland for what he is: and the only ones who can stop him.

The fight takes them deep into the wodwo's lair, a claustrophobic, worm-infested tunnel that burrows beneath an ancient wood, and to a final, terrifying confrontation in a nuclear power station.

Soul Stealer is the second book in the Alchemist's Son series, following Doctor Illuminatus. A darkly wicked read that will keep any ten-year-old lover of sorcery and magic spellbound.

Stephen Lewis

Heir Of Mystery, Unlikely Exploits 2, Philip Ardagh (Faber and Faber, £4.99)

HEIR of Mystery is about brains, reanimation of dead people and transplanting their brains into another person. You hardly notice the gory bits because it doesn't go into detail too much.

The main characters are the McNally children - their parents play no important part in the plot. There is also a strange being called Mr Maggs, a normal adult called Mulch, or Stefan Multachan, and a very rich, dead man called Lionel Lyons.

I think this book is funny peculiar and funny ha-ha and is for children aged ten to 15. Children under ten may find it a bit difficult to understand.

The Rise Of The House Of McNally, Unlikely Exploits 3, Philip Ardagh (Faber and Faber, £7.99)

THIS is the third and best part of the Unlikely Exploits trilogy. It kind of merges the earlier two books, Heir Of Mystery and The Fall Of Fergal, and shows how they are related. It is by far the most complicated of the three because it deals with time and has at least three time paradoxes.

It gets stranger and stranger as it goes along and then right at the last chapter, everything slots together. I have never met this style of writing before. The author swaps from first to second to third person and back again. However, I like it a lot.

Thomas Rychlik, aged nine and three quarters

Greengrove Castle, Matt Thorne (Faber and Faber, £7.99)

ELEANOR lives happily in a small castle community with her parents. Then her life is changed when she is selected to join the secret organisation called Castle Seven. Eleanor and four other children take part in quests. She learns horse-riding, sword fighting and even diplomacy. At first she has fun but then things turn serious.

On her journey, Eleanor faces dangerous wolves, imprisonment in another castle and even betrayal - forcing her to learn a lesson about who to trust.

This is an exciting and interesting fantasy story about a girl who faces many dangerous encounters along the way.

Imogen Cole, age ten

Cat Trap, Greg Gormley (Scholastic, £10.99)

CAT is busy doing what cats do best... enjoying a lazy day lounging around, supping milk and eating fish to the bone. Mouse, however, is becoming alarmed.

At each turn of the page, another big dog is surrounding Cat until there are five in total circling him and he is trapped.

Still, Cat doesn't twitch a whisker. Why? Because he knows something Mouse doesn't... and it's got something to do with his big cousin he's meeting off the train - a tiger.

One glimpse of the orange and black stripy big cat and those dogs bite the dust.

Cat Trap - aimed at two to four year olds - is vividly illustrated by author Gormley, using bright greens, fuchsia pinks, sunshine yellows and other in-your-face rainbow colours.

The story is short and simple, but the large drawings helped it leap off the page and straight into my 22-month-old daughter's number one slot for books.

The element of surprise with the arrival of the tiger is perfectly staged to engender maximum impact. Expect lots of roars... and not just of laughter.

As Tiger would say: "It's grrr... rrr... eat!"

But let's give Cat the final word: "A purrrfect read for little ones."

Maxine Gordon

Zigby And The Ant Invaders, Brian Paterson (Collins, £4.99)

SINCE Winnie-the-Pooh, children's authors have scoured forest, farm and jungle for appealing animal characters.

The Hundred Acre Wood was probably flattened to make way for the Oakleaf Housing Estate long ago. But Pooh, Piglet and Eyeore live on.

Children searching for similarly memorable creatures can start at Arthur the Aardvark - and now read all the way through to Zigby the Zebra.

Brian Paterson's creation had already trotted through four adventures before five-year-old Jack and I came across him. In Zigby And The Ant Adventures, Zigby finds his treehouse overrun by a swarm of well-meaning, if hungry, insects.

Given that the main character is black and white, the books are very colourfully illustrated in a bold style very much like Lucy Cousin's Maisy mouse. An enjoyable, if not captivating, read. Incidentally how does a zebra get in and out of a treehouse?

Billy Tibbles Moves Out! by Jan Fearnley (Collins, £9.99)

BEING a dad, you get to make the rules (at least if mum isn't there). When Tom and Valentina Tibbles' smallest kitten Little Eric grows bigger, dad tells Billy that he must share his bedroom with his brother.

"We all have to share in this house," dad lectures.

Billy is not pleased. But when he, Eric and older sister Twinkles use Billy's bed as a trampoline they break it, and must all sleep in their parents' room.

The prospect makes dad very grumpy. But as Billy cries, "Everybody shares in our house - and that means you too!"

We both enjoyed this well-observed and funny take on family life, with Jack taking particular glee from dad's comeuppance.

Chris Titley

Updated: 09:40 Wednesday, April 28, 2004