Tom has a brilliant racing pigeon called Blue. Grandad has arranged for Blue to fly in his first race! Everyone is very excited, especially Blue, but can he find his way home to Tom and Grandad?
Reading Champion offers independent reading books for children to practise and reinforce their developing reading skills.
Fantastic, original stories are accompanied by engaging artwork and a reading activity. Each book has been carefully graded so that it can be matched to a child's reading ability, encouraging reading for pleasure.
Author Biography
Penny Dolan (Author)
Penny Dolan is a children's writer and storyteller living in North Yorkshire. She is a popular speaker with both infant and junior children, and has visited many School Book Weeks and literacy events across the UK, with her enjoyable 'Author Talks' and lively story-telling sessions. She has also spoken and performed in libraries, bookshops, museums, art galleries, historic sites and outdoor locations, and has appeared on the children's programme of several literature festivals. She has a wide interest in children's books and has been Chair of the Federation of Children's Book Groups. Penny has a wide experience of schools. She was a primary advisory teacher for English and Drama but has been a freelance language arts worker for several years. She has also taught on residential writing courses for children, tutored both storytelling and writing courses for adults, and spoken at conferences. Penny has a degree in Education, specialising in Language and Literacy and an Advanced Diploma in Educational Drama. As well as working on her writing, Penny enjoys drawing, painting, reading, chatting and daydreaming. Her favourite colour is yellow. Her favourite food is strawberries-and-cream, and she is probably the world's slowest swimmer. She has three untidy desks, two grown-up children and one rather bad cat.
Beccy Blake (Illustrator)
Beccy is a children's illustrator and artist, with a love of all things slightly bonkers which invariably end up in her pictures and paintings. She loves observing life and all the silly side it brings, her illustrations make her young audience smile when they're reading a book and add to the story within. Since leaving art college in Newcastle upon Tyne she has worked extensively in the world of childrens publishing, design and advertising, editorial, greetings cards and one off mural and art commissions, both here in the UK and overseas. She works mainly in pencil, acrylics, watercolour, pen and ink and digital media often combining all.
She recently decorated an "Owl of Bath", Mowlberry Beak, which is currently situated in Combe Down, Bath and is working on painting a lion for The Cinnamon Cafe in Windsor, part of the Lions of Windsor trail.
She is currently based in Bath with her partner, also an illustrator, 2 kids, a cat called Elsie (who has her own comic illustrated for her), and a pond full of newts and frogs.
