My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is the fourth children's book in a series about Felicity, a brave little sparrow, who without doubt will delight her young readers just as much as in the previous stories. It revolves around Halloween and trick or treat night. Felicity and her sparrow friend, Cairn, become frightened at first by their ‘person’ friends who are dressed up in various costumes. They soon become used to the scary appearances and start to find it is fun after all, when the kids start collecting bags of sweets and candy.
But the two sparrows begin to feel threatened by circumstances involving a haunted house and mistaken identity. It is well written because most children reading the story will probably get the idea about what is happening well before the feathered friends. And it’s that which adds to the fun for the young readers.
There are lessons to be learned about loyalty and bravery, as well as a lot of fun about language with the sparrows using words like ‘tricky’ or ‘treaty’ for example. I was pleased to see their special person friend again, Mister Yellow Horse, who appears in previous books. The kids will also be delighted to find a real baby bear called Vincenzo as one of the characters in the tale. Later, the ‘mad scientist’ adds a strong feeling of tension and danger to the mix, when the pace speeds up.
Unfortunately, the book requires some editing as I found a few annoying typos in it but they did not detract from the enjoyment overall. It would be a lovely adventure book to read to very young children or for slightly older ones to read for themselves.
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