This is a delightful cautionary tale for all those children who make fun of other people’s misfortune. Brilliantly told with some imaginatively quirky illustrations to complement the text this is sure to put that slightly over exuberant child back, temporarily back into place.
Alfie takes a horrible pleasure in other people's misfortune. He loves it when someone trips over, puts salt not sugar in their coffee, has some unfortunate accident. But an outing to the circus turns in to quite an eventful outing for Alfie when he finds that he too can be the butt of the joke.
When Hyena places a banana skin on Giraffe’s path, he sets off a calamitous concatenation which Hyena finds hilarious: Giraffe’s fall dislodges a coconut which falls on Hippo’s head who treads on Python who bites Ostrich… However, Hyena gets his comeuppance when, in his eagerness not to miss a trick, he slips on his own banana skin and ends up in a pile of pooh. My audience of four-year-olds joined in with the repetitive refrains, laughed louder than Hyena and there were the inevitable cries of ‘again’ at the end. Adrian Reynolds’ animated African animals are big, bold and brightly executed adding to the fun.
Author
About Adrian Johnson
Adrian Johnson lives in London where he works on his children's books alongside his successful advertising work.
He is the illustrator of four books for young readers, including the award-winning What!
