Alfie Weather

In Alfie Weather Shirley Hughes gives little kids and grown-up folk a treat as she follows her best-loved character, Alfie, through the seasons. As ever, Hughes combines her classic illustrations--beautifully detailed and evocative--with simple, rhythmic text that work together to bring the pleasures and pains of toddlerdom to effervescent life.

From the joys of splashing in puddles, to the first experience of walking in the crispest of snow, and back to the warmth of the sun, Alfie Weather perfectly captures the thoughts and emotions of small children on their voyage of discovery. As ever, Shirley Hughes has created the perfect picture book for sharing with this stunning book of poems and short stories. Age 2 and over. --Susan Harrison.

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A lilting holiday read with the children - Rated
We'd met Alfie and Annie Rose before, of course, but we took this one on holiday with us last year and it'll always remind me of blissfully happy bedtime stories in the house by the beach.

As always it's a wonderful Shirley Hughes blend of nostalgic images, full of life and crafted with realism, and her special brand of storytelling, with tales told in just the way you'd expect pre-school Alfie to tell them.

Grandma's house in the country feels so real that I'm left wondering if it exists more than just in Hughes's imagination. My favourite story - Winter Stars - invokes memories of nights in country cottages, the shortest days and of childlike wonderment at the treasures of the heavens.

There is the usual sprinkling of Hughes's honest, natural verse. Our own relationship with the local urban fox is forever tempered by the assurance that "No matter what people say, The town fox is here to stay."

Like so many of her earlier works, Alfie Weather is a book my children and I will cherish forever.