The Travelling Bookshop is our book of the month

Have you been lucky enough to find the perfect book? Author Katrina Nannestad’s newest series, The Travelling Bookshop, is all about finding the perfect book, the one that can change your life.

“Books are powerful, books take us to other worlds, they can help us escape our own world, they show us what’s possible, they help us to dream and imagine and become something different,” Katrina said.

“I am hoping that my book, The Travelling Bookshop, will be like that for someone who reads it.”

The first book in the series, The Travelling Bookshop: Mim and the Baffling Bully, is our Book Club book of the month for August.

About The Travelling Bookshop: Mim and the Baffling Bully, by Katrina Nannestad and illustrated by Cheryl Orsini

The right book might just change your life …

Mim Cohen roams the world in a travelling bookshop, with her dad and brother and a horse called Flossy. Flossy leads them where she will, to the place where they’re needed most … the place where the perfect book will find its way home.

Now Mim has arrived in a pretty Dutch village where she meets Willemina, a kind and gentle child, who is being bullied by a girl named Gerda.

Mim knows they’re here to help Willemina. To change her life. To make her strong and brave and happy.

If only Dad would find her the right book. If only he would stop giving everyone else the wrong book!

From the beloved author of The Girl, the Dog and the Writer in Rome and We Are Wolves comes an enchanting series for young readers.

Start reading The Travelling Bookshop: Mim and the Baffling Bully

We have a special sample for Kids News readers – you can start reading here.

CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES

1. Katrina Nannestad has said: “The dream of a travelling home has stuck with me over the years – a bus, a balloon, a barge, a horse-drawn caravan, a caboose at the back of a train.”

• What would your dream home be? Think big – it could be anything, anywhere!
• What would you fill it with?
• Who would live there with you?
• The Travelling Bookshop has a special kind of magic around books and language. What special magic would your dream home have?
• Draw a picture of your dream home from the outside and a map of what it looks like on the inside.

2. Mim knows that the right books in the right hands can change lives, because books are magic. Bring a book to class that has changed your life.

Share your favourite part of the book with the class and talk about why it’s so special to you.

• When did you first read it?
• How did it make you feel?
• What else was happening in your life at the time?
• Is there someone in your class who you think would benefit from reading the book?

3. Mim collects words, turning them this way and that until she finds the right way to look at them to discover something new. “Worms away”, from the label on the box used to bully Willemina, becomes a sign for earthworms on holiday.

• What is special about the words Mim collects? Why does she choose those particular words?
• Find some words around the house and bring them to class – you might find words on labels or boxes, or in the newspaper. Try to find words that are interesting or meaningful to you.
• Put everyone’s words together into a hat and shake them up. Everyone in the class will now draw two words out of the hat (no peeking!) and write a story inspired by them.
• What does Nat collect? Gerda? Does Willemina collect anything?

4. Why does Gerda pick on Willemina?

• Does this make it okay?
• What are three other things Gerda could have done to express what she was feeling?

5. Nat’s act of kindness – when he offers Willemina his tutu to replace her worm-encrusted skirt – makes Willemina’s day. How does her mood change when he gives her the tutu?

• Share three acts of kindness that you’ve performed recently.

6. Mim makes a list of the things that make her happy.

• What are five things that have made you happy today?
• Do you think Willemina is happy?
• What about Gerda? Why?
• What does Mim’s dad say about unhappy people?
• What book would you give to someone feeling unhappy to help them? Why?

7. It seems like Mim’s dad plays with Mim and Nat instead of teaching them, but they actually learn about many important things. List some of the different concepts Mim and Nat learn while playing with their father.

• Design a lesson that seems to be just about having fun and playing, but actually teaches children an important maths or science concept.

8. Throughout The Travelling Bookshop: Mim and the Baffling Bully, the author gives us so much imagery that it’s easy for us to picture what it’s like to be in a small town in the Netherlands, even if we haven’t been there.

• List all of the Dutch elements that the author tells us about (don’t forget all the different kinds of food!).
• Which three elements do you think she has described the best? What techniques has she used?
• Imagine that you are describing your classroom to someone who has never seen a school before. Select the five elements that you think are most important to being able to imagine a classroom, and write descriptions of them using at least two different kinds of imagery in each one.

9. At the end of the novel, Willemina writes Mim a letter, thanking her for being such an amazing friend. Write a letter to someone you care about, thanking them for being your friend and explaining what it is that makes them someone you’re happy to have in your life.

DISCOUNT BOOK OFFER – BECOME A MEMBER NOW

Members of the Kids News Book Club can purchase The Travelling Bookshop: Mim and the Baffling Bully for $5 less than you can buy it in shops.

Only members will be sent a link to the discount via email.

To join for the discount get your parent or guardian to sign a consent form HERE and send to kidsnewsbookclub@news.com.au. Then we will sign you up.