Title: The Prisoners, the earthquake and the midnight song
Author: Bob Hartman
Illustrator: Catalina Echeverri
Published by: The Good Book Company
Price: RRP £8.99 Only £5.85 at Eden at the time of writing
Good for: Children aged 2-8 years
Best bit: It’s a hard call between Bob’s excellent storytelling and Catalina’s awesome pictures! Both are wonderful.
Worst bit: This is a board book, which might suggest it’s only for toddlers, but the story will appeal to older children too. (And the board book will make sure it is hard-wearing!)
More:
“Listen! Do you hear it?
Outside a prison, the jailer is snoring.”
With his usual excellent storytelling skills, Bob Hartman takes us straight into the action of this story, giving us a hook to keep us engaged – can we imagine hearing this sound? Can we perhaps make this sound? Yes, let’s all snore as we start the story.
“But there’s another sound. Do you hear it?
It’s come from the middle of the prison…”
And on it goes, inviting us to ‘hear’ the sounds at each stage of the story.
The text is large enough to read from a distance, and it would be easy to read each line once and say it to the child/ren you’re reading to while showing them the picture.
The story is quite short, so you’ll be reading it more than once, especially if you have toddlers on your knee!
This book is an excellent addition to your home Bible story library.