Pumpkin Patch Panic (Ducky the Spy #2)

Sean E Avery, Pumpkin Patch Panic (Ducky the Spy #2), Walker Books Australia, 176 pp., RRP $17.99 (pbk), ISBN 9781760657376

Ducky the Spy has an important mission – get Donny the Donkey to stop eating the flowers and protect Mr Pig’s precious, prize-winning pumpkin. Is Ducky up to the task? And, more importantly, can Donny’s pop-off power save the day?

This is one for the readers heading into chapter books, and it bridges the gap between picture books and the Dog Man series or the Bad Guys books. It’s presented in graphic novel format, and the frames are clear and well laid out with broadly drawn artwork.

The text is simple, with large, clear font, and while young readers may need help with some words there is a lot of clear visual context to point them in the right direction.

As you’d expect from any book by Sean E Avery, the humour is bound to appeal to early primary school readers, with lots of silly noises and fart jokes to leave everyone giggling. There is a lot of play on words, with Ducky missing the point to hilarious effect, and that type of humour can be fantastic for getting kids to think about language and how it works. Learning to play and have fun with words is important to encourage confidence in language and writing skills.

As an adult, though, I particularly enjoyed the one sensible character, Gretta, breaking the fourth wall to side-eye the reader after Ducky has once again missed the obvious.

Between the disastrous donkey distractions, the cunning plans to sneak into the Cat Gang’s territory to steal back the Veg-Big-Inator Ray, and making friends in the weirdest places, Ducky the Spy is going to come up a winner with young readers who like a good laugh and giant pumpkins.

Reviewed by Emily Clarke

 

 

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