Sir Charlie Stinky Socks and the Really Dreadful Spell By Kristina Stephenson Egmont, £5.99 Sir Charlie Stinky Socks, the brave little knight with the magical socks, is called upon to try and save the day when an evil wizard turns everyone in the tall tower to stone. But as luck would have it, he’s far away, so will he get back in time to save everyone? The book is written in an entertaining manner and is full of humour for…

The Littlest Dinosaur and the Naughty Rock By Camilla Reid, illustrated by Michael Foreman Bloomsbury, £5.99 As the title suggests, the Naughty Rock element of this book corresponds pretty well with a naughty step! In the third instalment of this popular series, the Littlest Dinosaur is having an off day. He’s grumpy, sulky, moody and throws his dinner on the floor, so he gets sent to site on the naughty rock. The rock doesn’t turn out to be quite as…

The Wizard of Oz: A Classic Story Pop-up Book with Sounds By L Frank Baum and Paul Hess, retold by Libby Hamilton Templar, £14.99 If your children already love The Wizard of Oz, or you’re keen to introduce them to the story, then this is an innovative book choice. The retold, shorter version of the story effectively encapsulates the main elements of the original story and illustrates the tale in an amazing way. Not only do the pages open to…

Martha No! By Edward Hardy, illustrated by Deborah Allwright Egmont, £5.99 If you have fond memories of the My Naughty Little Sister books, then this book follows a similar vein. Martha Felicity Molly-Anne May is a naughty little girl and her new nanny gets more than she bargained for on her first day. A day out and visits to the playground, park, science museum and restaurant prove rather stressful for her nanny, who spends most of her time shouting, “Martha,…

Funny Felt Monster Faces By Libby Hamilton, illustrated by Jonathan Lambert Templar, £7.99 Books that encourage children to be creative and get involved can help them develop a positive attitude to reading and this book is one of them. Open up the book, and you’ll find an envelope of felt pieces – all shapes that can be used to add faces to the monsters in the book. Four lines of rhyming text tell a tale about each monster with the…

My Circus By Xavier Deneux Bloomsbury, £6.99 This stylish board book is predominantly produced in black and white, with a few dashes of red, yellow and blue for creative highlights. The front features a 3D foam effect picture (although it is not soft and springy foam) and the topic of the book is the circus. Aimed at young children and toddlers, each page has a couple of descriptive words, plus a nice peep-hole effect, which adds an interactive element to…

Pregnancy For Men – iPhone App By Mark Woods WhiteLadder / Crimson Publishing, £0.99 Download from iTunes http://tinyurl.com/PregnancyForMen This best-selling pregnancy book for men, by Mark Woods, which offers a frank, factual and funny journey for men whose partners are pregnant, has been converted into an iPhone app. The app offers a taster of the book, gives guidance as to what happens during each month of pregnancy and provides up-to-date news about pregnancy. At only 99p, it’s a bit of…

The No Panic Guide to Starting School – E-book Edited by Amy Schofield, Contributing Editor Camilla Chafer P2P Publishing Ltd, £29.99, Dubbed, “Your essential guide to everything you need to know about your child’s primary school years,” this comprehensive 222 page e-book provides just that. If your child is approaching primary age and you’re not sure what to expect, then The No Panic Guide provides an excellent overview. It covers issues such as regional differences between schools, Key Stages, how…

Decorated Cookies: Twenty to Make By Lisa Slatter Search Press, £4.99 This inspiring book is packed with 20 great ideas for decorated cookies to make and share. There are cookie ideas for a wide range of occasions, including new babies, children’s birthday parties, anniversaries, Christmas, Halloween and weddings, plus ideas that will work at any time of year. The book is aimed at parents, although children could easily get involved with making the cookies and helping with some of the…

Animal Parade Stacking Boxes: Alison Jay’s Nursery Collection Templar, £9.99 Although this isn’t strictly speaking a book, it co-ordinates with one of Alison Jay’s books that we’ve featured before and does have elements of reading involved in it. This set of six stackable boxes are designed with lovely animal pictures on each side of each box, plus there’s one word accompanying each picture to describe what it is. You could use the boxes with babies as a first introduction to…