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Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy by Sue Whiting
New Frontier

Reviewed by Kathryn Duncan

After the delightful Flight of the Bumble Bee that successfully incorporated music into the story, I had similar expectations for Dance of The Sugar Plum Fairy. Whilst the use of music in story telling again works well, and New Frontier should be commended for the Music Box series, the picture book does not quite reach the same high standards of other New Frontier publications.

The text, by Sue Whiting is good, even if it has succumbed to the use of the American term candy, and the story reminds me of The elves and the shoemaker. The illustrations by Sarah Davis are bright and the unspoken elements such as the expressive teddy bear, the smug king's guard and the baby are delightful. The illustrator has certainly taken the fact that you should show more than you say seriously and the result is a visual delight.

There is a lot that is positive about Dance of The Sugar Plum Fairy, but I felt let down by the design. The book is too busy. Pages are crowded, the text small and it sometimes gets lost in the illustrations. The choice and size of the main font is not ideal, and there is too much "fanciness" in the changing colour and fonts used for emphasis.

The pages that work best are those with the picture of the fairy and only a small amount of text.

Music and storytelling combined introduces young children to two of the arts and this is a reward in itself. It is lovely to sit and listen to the CD and talk about classical music with children and even if the design of the book does not meet your expectations, the fact that you can relax and enjoy the music is enough compensation.