Category: Siblings

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The Secret Sunshine Project by Benjamin Dean and Sandhya Prabhat

The Secret Sunshine Project by Benjamin Dean and Sandhya Prabhat is one of the amazing novels that my children got in their advent calendar from the superb Wonderland Books.

The story follows Bea, as her happy family of four become a sadder family of three. After the death of her dad, Bea’s family starts to struggle financially and it becomes necessary to move in with Bea’s grandmother – far away from London in the countryside.

The countryside – miles and miles from London Pride, where Bea’s family was last happy. Miles and miles from the one event that Bea and her sister Riley were looking forward to. So Bea decides to take matters into her own hands, and begins The Secret Sunshine Project. If she and Riley can’t go to Pride, she’s going to bring Pride to this village – whether her gran’s arch-nemesis and head of the village council likes it or not!

I really, really loved this book. Though it dealt with incredibly serious subjects – family death, financial instability, systemic racism, as well as trans- and homo-phobia – The Secret Sunshine Project never once felt hopeless. Whilst I loved Norah’s Ark, there were times when I needed to put the book down and take a moment because of the subject matter, but that didn’t once happen here. I read the whole thing in a single, joyful sitting, and came away from it feeling uplifted.

The book doesn’t end perfectly, and any resolution the characters enjoy is a temporary respite in the grand scheme of things, but it felt real, and honest, and hopeful nevertheless.

The ‘dead parent’ trope is one that’s used fairly commonly in children’s fiction – and I should know, I used it myself in my upcoming novel – but it’s sometimes feels like it isn’t properly dealt with. I thought The Secret Sunshine Project did an absolutely wonderful job of this though.

What are your favourite books for Pride month? I would especially love to hear about those by LGBT+ authors – especially trans authors at this time.

Fran ❤

I’ve set up a ‘bookshop‘ of sorts, over on Bookshop.org, so that I can point you to somewhere to buy that isn’t Amazon. I get a small commission for any sales made there. This helps to support me running this blog. If you’d like to get your copy of The Secret Sunshine Project this way, please just click here. Thank you for your support.

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Super Duper You by Sophy Henn

I really liked Sophy Henn’s book, Pass It On, so when I saw she had written Super Duper You, we checked it out of the library and took it home for a read.

Before I start, talking about the book-proper, I just wanted to say that even though our house seems to be constantly overflowing with books, I don’t often buy them. Generally, we only really use the library, read a story until everyone is tired of it and then take it back, knowing that should we want to read it again we only need to place our order and then go to pick the book up.

Generally…

Every so often though, we read a book and I want to own  it. Super Duper You is one of those. It’s got shades of ‘Oh! The Places You’ll Go!’ by Dr Seuss to it, but it’s vastly more succinct and I love that it’s accessible to even the smallest of listeners. Again the art-work is modern and bright and pleasing. Again, I feel like my accent works against me with the rhyme.

I think I love the illustrations and the colours of this book most of all – especially the rainbows and the quirky background ‘grafitti’. I wish my big, special camera was more cooperative so I could take better photos for you, but for now you’ll have to make-do with my tablet’s lens and have a look the book for yourself… 😉

I think the page above is my favourite. It can be used in conjunction with other books to start conversations about the positives of neurodiversity, or about differences in family situations – or about anything, really..

I also really like the fact that it is a love-letter between siblings. There are lots of books which explore the parent/child relationship, but off the top of my head, the only nurturing siblings I can think of are Lauren Child’s Charlie and Lola or The Restless Girls by Jessie Burton. It makes a nice change from the usual ‘my brother smells’ dynamic that seems so prevalent in children’s books.

Have you come across Sophy Henn’s work yet? I’d love to hear what you think.

  • Farn ❤