Katie and the Dinosaurs by James Mayhew

At first my eight year old seemed more interested in Katie and the Dinosaurs than my five year old, who I'd picked it up for. But then suddenly my five year old started flicking through it and now we're reading it every night. I'd like a little more variety in reading habits but I think at this time of year something familiar goes a long way, especially since she's just started school. She's totally knackered already! How are we going to get to half-term and then Christmas?

The Katie books by James Mayhew are a very well-loved series which started out as a picture book with a little girl called Katie going to visit famous paintings. We haven't actually read those ones and they're on my list to pick up next.

Katie and the Dinosaurs has Katie and her Grandma in the Natural History Museum (I think we're on a museum-themed-roll at the moment - after The Missing Mammoth last time!) on a visit to look at the dinosaurs. I must say the last time I went to the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs I gave up after half an hour because the queues were so crazy. But that was during a school holiday. Katie and her Grandma seem to have the museum to themselves, they must be there on a Monday, during term-time and just as it opens!

Katie wanders off, leaving Grandma resting on a bench and finds herself in a bit of the museum she doesn't recognise, at a door which warns her: 'ABSOLUTELY NO ADMITTANCE WHATSOEVER'. Of course she can't resist a peek and finds herself in a world where dinosaurs are living. She makes friends with a Hadrosaurus who is hiding from a T-Rex and can't find his family. They climb an Apatosaurus to get a better view and find the Hadrosaurus' home and then they set off. But on every page an unsuspecting Katie and her new friend are being followed by the T-Rex. I can imagine a younger child would particularly enjoy spotting it each time.

Hadrosaurus is eventually reunited with his family and Katie shares the contents of her lunchbox with them all (cucumber sandwiches because they are plant eaters). But then disaster! The Tyrannosaurus Rex has found them and he fancies a tasty snack in the shape of Katie. They all have to run away, until Katie remembers the meat pie she has, handily still in her lunchbox! The T-Rex is placated and Katie manages to escape back to the museum after a slobbery dinosaur kiss from Hadrosaurus. She finds Grandma who asks her where on earth she's been? Katie replies that she's seen all kinds of dinosaurs and would Grandma like to see them too? They set off together. We never know if they go back in, which is quite nice really since it makes a good activity to ask your child 'what happened next?'.

I really like the mix of dinosaur information and story that is so well combined in this book. It's not overloaded with dinosaur facts but there are plenty of name checks and the plant eaters and the meat eaters are noted and the landscape is great to look at and understand the different types of environment. All in all, a lovely book!

The Curious Case of the Missing Mammoth by Ellie Hattie and Karl James Mountford

We picked up a copy of The Curious Case of the Missing Mammoth from our local library (in fact they had some lovely books just loitering on a table so we took a whole armful home with us!). It's a lovely whimsical book which takes you through a beautiful Victorian museum room by room with the ruse of finding a young mammoth that has gone missing. The premise is that at midnight there is a magic hour when everything in the museum comes alive, the problem is that the young mammoth, Teddy, has gone missing and needs to be back in place before the hour is over.

There are lovely funny touches like the room containing the Extinct and Endangered Creatures doing an aerobics class. It's full of eclectic stuff, like all the best museums, with lots of different (some quite random!) information. There are loads of fun facts under the different flaps. It's great for reading to different levels of reader since you don't have to examine every flap and read all the text but you can if the child is interested or wants to read it themself (in the case of my nearly eight year old!).

I think this book would make a really lovely gift for a museum mad (or mammoth mad!) child. It has really lovely thick paper and beautiful flaps that work well inside each spread. Gorgeous!