Mel Amon (text) and Sophie Beer (illustrator), Good morning my Deer!, Scribble Books, August 2023, 32 pp., RRP $19.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781761380358
The English language is downright tricky to learn, but it can also be a lot of fun to play with! As the title suggests, Good morning my Deer! engages in wordplay around homonyms – words that have different meanings but are pronounced or spelled the same way.
The story follows Banjo the deer on a very busy Sundae. Beginning the day with pan cakes and plane toast, Banjo brushes their hare and puts on a pear of shoes before setting out with Mum for a day of unexpected hijinks, including buying a fur tree, picking flours and eating chocolate moose.
Warm and detailed illustrations create accessibility to the text, alongside the boldly highlighted homonyms. Younger children will find the double meanings of the words hilarious and will enjoy being involved in the jokes on each page, while slightly older beginning readers and writers might be challenged by previously unencountered homonyms in the story, such as genes and jeans or leek and leak. The end papers are beautifully explanatory, and could inspire a vocabulary activity designing similar posters which might serve as useful reminders in story writing sessions.
A notable in the 2024 CBCA Picture Book of the Year awards, this publication should be included in every preschool and early primary years’ library, and is also a perfect gift for a keen wordsmith aged between three and seven.
Reviewed by Kay Oddone
