Once a Creepy Crocodile - review

‘Once a Creepy Crocodile’
Written by Peter Taylor
Illustrated by Nina Rycroft and includes a sing-along CD by Rusty Berther
Published by The Five Mile Press
Release date 1st July 2014


Dear Know-It-Al- Nanny,
I have a two-year-old who insists on hearing the same story and the same song over and over again. He demands ‘Cweepy Cwocodile’ at every waking moment. What is a parent to do?!
Desperate Parent

Dear Desperate Parent,
Grin and bear it, read and sing along!
Enjoy,
Know-It-Al- Nanny



Once a Creepy Crocodile is a fun story set in perfect rhyme and featuring a crazy cast of Australian animals and includes a sing-along CD.

What I love about Peter Taylor's Once a Creepy Crocodile is that it is full of scrumptious alliteration and internal and external rhyme and still tells a story. It slides off your tongue like butter melts over your hot pancakes.

Example:

The munchy, crunchy crispy ones that curl up underneath.

or

Then the snake licked his lips and looped a little lower ‘till …

And then there are Nina Rycroft’s illustrations which make this story sing even more. The gorgeous watercolour illustrations are fun, lively and just delicious!

I also like how the second song on the CD is the original version of ‘Waltzing Matilda’ exposing my children to a little bit of Australian history.

The suggested age for this book is upwards from 4 years old, but my easily excited, hard to focus, two-year-old is a big fan (as you may have guessed from the correspondence above). He usually loves any book involving diggers, trains or roaring dinosaurs, but this beautifully illustrated story with its cast of Australian animals hits the spot. He is also quite sensitive to lyrical language and beautiful rhyme, and Once a Creepy Crocodile, certainly delivers that.

I happened to be at the official book launch for Once a Creepy Crocodile in Sydney earlier this month. Imagine a room full of children’s writers and illustrators singing along to Once a Creepy Crocodile to the tune of Waltzing Matilda followed by a chorus of laughing Kookaburra imitations. It was a laugh!

In addition to this I am very lucky to share a writer’s group, Write Links, with Peter and was able to ask him some questions about his writing process and how this picture book story came about. Not only is he a wonderful writer, he is extremely generous with his time in sharing information with emerging writers and illustrators in our group.

To read the interview, please check out the Write Links website here.

You can buy Once A Creepy Crocodile from independent bookshop to major retailers.

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