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Heather M (8 KP) rated Bear's Magic Moon in Books

Dec 31, 2018 (Updated Dec 31, 2018)  
Bear's Magic Moon
Bear's Magic Moon
Suzanne Pinner | 2012 | Children
8
8.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
The message for children is very positive. (0 more)
A story about bravery.
Little Bear loves his life on the ice, and has great fun all day long. However, there is one thing that Little Bear doesn't love: the DARK. He is afraid of the dark. So afraid is he, in fact, that when Daddy invites him to the new moon celebration, he cannot go, even to hear Wise Old Bear tell stories of his adventures.

Little Bear huddles in his home until a scary, shadowy figure appears in the entrance. This turns out to be Wise Old Bear, bringing a kind lesson to help Little Bear.

I love this lesson, and it's one that I always try to tell myself, my sons and the children I teach. Bravery is being afraid but going ahead and doing the thing you're afraid of anyway. Bravery isn't not being afraid. I believe that myself and it's great to see this being taught in a lovely picture book.

The illustrations are lovely, with lots of colour and interest added to the snowy landscape and Arctic skies.

This is a story that you will love to read with your children and would work well in the classroom too.


I posted this review on my blog:
https://wp.me/p9SEjW-76
  
The War of the Worlds
The War of the Worlds
2019 | Drama, Sci-Fi
Grisly non-adaptation of the immortal H.G. Wells story retains the same basic premise and the very occasional moment, but essentially scoops out the innards of the actual novel and replaces them with indescribably turgid attempts to (I would guess) update the story and make it relevant to the modern world.

Part of a grim tradition where BBC attempts to adapt SF, fantasy and horror classics operate to different standards than when they are tackling Austen or Dickens. If the team who perpetrated War of the Worlds got their hands on Pride and Prejudice, it would end up being a lesbian romance between the Bennets' maid and one of the minor daughters, performed on ice, with a frame story concerning the Boer war. It's not just that it does the book badly, it genuinely doesn't seem interested in it at all. Someone gets a leaden, clumsy speech articulating the subtext of the novel (how to adapt a great book for the hard-of-thinking) but as to what this version of the story is supposed to be about or why we should care at all... It takes real skill and determination to screw up a classic piece of literature quite this badly.