To think that some children's stories are awful to read aloud?

[VioletBam]

Enid Blyton I'm looking at you.

Also...while I love My Naughty Little Sister...the way the stories are written are terrible to read out loud.

It's a very specific style that author has....sort of child-like...Enid bloody Blyton though!

Just churned my way through 2 chapters of The Magic Faraway Tree and God! It was hard going.

Those short sentences...how she mentions everything umpteen times.

Narnia.......total pain in the arse!!!

2 year old DD is loving cat in the hat and at in the hat comes back right now. They are great for reading aloud but I'm running out of breath

I was reading this thinking of the elephant and the bad baby, so much fun.

I love reading Julia Donaldson books aloud! Although after hearing Alexander armstrong's reading of What The Ladybird Heard I always feel a bit inadequate, he does it amazingly. Best ever impression of a hen doing an impression of a sheep

Agree the Mr Men books are awful.

Jez Alborough books are good readers, my and DH's favourite is Duck In The Truck.

Some books are such a delight to read aloud - I still know them off by heart and my dcs are teens.

All of the Lynley Dodd books, Peepo, Each Peach Pear Plum and strangely, the Miffy books have completely stuck in my head.

I loved Julia Donaldson books but her rhyming/metre is a bit pants.

Mine always loved slightly scarey books to be read aloud like Chicken Licken, Not Now Bernard and Where The Wild Things Are.

I like Tyrannosaurus Drip, Hairy McClary and John Burningham books - esp Courtney.

BUT the Mr Men ones are so hard to read. Especially the longest ones like Chatterbox and the wordy wizard one.

Absolutely the worst are Thomas the Tank books. YY to Mr Men too. I also dislike Dahl, love the stories but don't like the way it flows.

My favourite book to read aloud was Alan Garner's Jack and the Beanstalk. It was so easy, it flowed effortlessly from the tongue.

That chuffing postman one, with the letter inserts. It is SO badly written and the storyline is barely held together with string. I threw it out.

The hardest ones are those where there are lots of random flaps or bits not in the main narrative- I never know how to get them in. And yes to the PP who said songs are a pain.

I love reading Seuss, though only The Cat in the Hat so far.

Beatrix Potter is painful but mainly because it's pretty gory!

Looking forward to the older stages.

I'm surprised at the people saying Harry Potter is hard to read out loud. I have very happy memories of reading these to the DDs. I always used to stop at a really exciting place and leave the book by older DDs pillow. My cunning ploy paid off and when she was about 8 I walked by their room and heard her reading ahead on her own. DD2 soon followed suit. It really reinforced their love of reading.

The downside was that by the time the final 2/3 books came out we couldn't agree who would read them first so we ended up buying 4 copies , one each for me, DH and both DDs.

This is bringing back such happy memories - there was the day one of the books was released at midnight and a local supermarket opened just to sell it. I was hosting a girls night and had about 10 mates around. When DH went out to buy our copies he took orders from all of them and came back laden down with about 20 books and a lot of wine!

Liii I didn't even have DC's then and went to my local bookshop party i did take my extremely friendly ginger moggy to play crookshanks though, on a harness

The Thomas the Tank Engine books are bloody awful. So glad DD has gone off Thomas!

I like the Julia Donaldson books but some are far easier than others. I don't find Tabby McTat that great, or The Rhyming Rabbit.

Meg and Mog books are odd.

Peppa Pig books are terribly written. Mr Men books are too long.

DD (3) has "The First Hippopotamus On The Moon" book written by David Walliams and I find it really clunky to read. I can't seem to get the "Hippo-po-rocket" right .

Our two love Ten Little Dinosaurs and Ten Little Pirates and they're brilliant to read...nice bouncy rhythm with a few sound effects thrown in. It's a good job we like them as we've been reading them about 10 times a day each recently!

Readers, I told Dd a little fib. I told her the Rainbow Fairy tosh were too hard for us and we couldn't read them.
Loved Seuss except red fish blue fish. That goes on.

Ooh I used to love reading the Julia Donaldson books, and anything by Shirley Hughes went down well.

Yes yes to the Just So stories Best Beloved and also Rikki Tikki Tavi which sparked a happy hour checking out mongoose vs Cobras fights on YouTube

Our current favorite is a Jez Alborough, "Where's My Teddy?". Great fun to read aloud.

I agree Julia Donaldson is really hot and miss - worst offenders are Tabby McTat and the Scarecrow one. I like Squash and a Squeeze and Room on the Broom though.

Sadly I enjoy reading Dr Seuss more than DD enjoys listening.

I think I'll have a look for The Elephant and the Bad Baby. Sounds worth buying.

Somerville we are on about book 49 of the fucking Rainbow Magic books.

Even DD tells me to skip over the fucking wanky introductions about Kirsty Tate and Rachel Walker who met on holiday and have secret adventures with the fairies and Jack Frost has been an cocksocket arsebadger again who has stolen X from the fairies in EVERY SINGLE SHITTY BOOK

I absolutely loved (and still do) My Naughty Little Sister and also Enid Blyton.

But I agree about Rainbow Magic books - also all those magic puppy and kitten books. Really badly written. Fortunately dd also found them boring and repetitive.

Bloody Lauren Child.

Lola said...
Lily (or whatever her name is) said...
Lola said...
Lily said...
Lola said...
Lily said...
Lola said...

Fuck off and buy a thesaurus you fucker.

YY to Thomas Tank, Blyton and Mister Men. All fuckers!

Also; The Highway Rat and Stick Man aren't quite so repetitive in this house.

I like reading Green Eggs and Ham and Wocket in my Pocket, but most other Dr Seuss is irritating. Of course you can make anything rhyme and scan if you just invent random words all the time.

^Oh the binglybong of Doongy-fnar was a wise and selfless King
And he said to his friends the krrrup and the smarm "let's run away to Fting!...^

(Etc for far too many pages)